mother's day dinner calamity

nothing says "thank you" hot dogs and jalapeño poppers

When your mom has birthed ten children, Mother’s Day stops being a Hallmark card holiday and starts feeling more like a national celebration. Such was the case last weekend, when all ten of us gathered to honor our mom.

Each year, the Voetberg gentlemen are charged with one duty: cook a nice dinner for the women. And typically, we pull it off. But this year? This year teetered on the edge of a FEMA call.

The night before, I asked my dad what the game plan was, to which he listed that Kolby was bringing a prime rib (great!), Deter would bring sweet potatoes (awesome!), Elisha would make jalapeño poppers (random, but okay!), and Tucker was pitching in hot dogs.

What the actual heck? Hot dogs? Lisa did not give birth 10x to be fed hot dogs for Mother’s Day.

A typical family dinner looks like a magazine spread and tastes heavenly. The secret behind these moments? The Voetberg ladies. Domestic powerhouses. (Between you and me, I think the girlies are getting a little competitive with their cooking accomplishments—to which I say: excellent. Let the best cook win.)

I knew full well we couldn’t match the ladies’ touch. But we could at least aim for something resembling taste and class.

T-minus 20 hours to the dinner, and all I’m envisioning are those godless hot dogs entering Lisa’s sacred kitchen, with disappointment defining Mother’s Day 2025.

Being the family autocrat, I jumped into action and yelled at rallied the brothers to pull their game together. The mothers of their children deserved better. To my relief, the boys pulled through, and made one killer dinner (credits below).

Kolby: Prime rib, quinoa salad*
Jared: Tri-tip steak, homemade bread*
Vance: Pork roast, fresh green salad
Blake: Pasta salad
Deter: Sweet and yellow potatoes, homemade paleo brownies* broccoli with hollandaise
Ben: Berry fruit salad, homemade macarons*
Elisha: Jalapeño poppers
Joby: Abandoned ship when we needed him most (JK. he went to his mother-in-law’s.)
Tucker: Demoted to clean-up duty
Rudy: Ditto Tucker

*Dishes made by their wives. Let the record show.