The kids are eating us out of house and home – and I couldn’t be happier | Emma Beddington

Our boys are back from university, and after months of pulse-based dinners, my husband and I have rediscovered the joy of snacks. Not that we're the ones who are eating them ...

How many of these cookies can I eat?" my older son texts (he is downstairs; I am up). They're really good." My fingertips tingle with satisfaction.

Both boys are home from university briefly and I have a new identity: I'm an intermittent feeder. My husband and I don't exactly eat like birds in our empty nest - well, I eat like one of those gulls that shoplifts Doritos - but we shop like middle-aged people trying not to die, our cupboards boring and barren, our freezer packed with pulse-based, batch-cooked dinners.