Dear Richard,
Each year we visit my widowed sister-in-law in France and stay with her for two weeks. Her finances are tight; ours, not so much. Usually we do all the market and supermarket shopping, and we take her out for dinner a couple of times. I love eating out in France, and I’d like to do it more often during our stay; but when I’ve mooted this in past years my sister-in-law has demurred, either suggesting I don’t like her cooking (which is fine but will never win her a Michelin star) or saying she doesn’t want to take advantage of us. She often makes pert little asides about being the ‘poor relation’ as it is.
I am getting to the age when travel may soon become more difficult, and I want to gather a few more happy memories of gastronomic delights while I still can. Should we stay elsewhere for part of our holiday, or is there a diplomatic way to sell my sister-in-law on the idea of going out a little more often?
— M, Herts
Dear M,
I’d stay elsewhere for part of your holiday. Because it’s your holiday, isn’t it? (Obviously you can afford to, otherwise you wouldn’t have mooted it.) If you enjoy eating out – and who doesn’t, in France? – then why shouldn’t you? Continuing to allow your sister-in-law to hobble such innocent pleasures is not an option, it seems to me.
You ask for a ‘diplomatic’ way of persuading her to let you take her out more often for meals, but judging by your letter that’s pretty much a lost cause. She’s clearly locked into the mindset of being ‘the poor relation’, I don’t think you’re going to ‘re-cast’ her anytime soon.
So, on a practical level, my suggestion is this. Stay with her for a slightly shorter period than normal this summer – say, eight or nine days instead of the usual fortnight. But ‘bookend’ it with three days or so either side, in a hotel. That’ll give you six guaranteed meals out, plus a couple with your sister-in-law. At least eight restaurant rendezvous! Voilà! Bonnes vacances, M!
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