COMIC TIMING

Comedian Katherine Ryan tells PRUDENCE WADE why it's important to her to have her family sit down to eat together

KATHERINE Ryan knows all too well how savage kids can be, particularly after her toddler said her food tastes like "dirt".

"He said, mummy's cooking is disgusting," the Canadian comedian recounts of her toddler, Fred.

Katherine has three children Violet, 14, from a previous relationship, Fred, two, and Fenna, 15 months, with her. childhood sweetheart and husband Bobby Kootstra.

Fred is her most difficult child to wrangle at dinnertime, and she's gone to desperate lengths just to get him to try her food.

"I've made a deal with him - I've said you can taste it and if you want to spit it out, you're allowed and you won't be in trouble. Just put it in your mouth and taste it and see if you like it. Then he'll be like, OK, and he'll allow himself to take a bite. And even if he spits it out, everyone in the kitchen goes, 'Really well done, Fred. Wow! Great. Did you see how Fred tried that? That was really cool.

"So basically, I'm raising a toxic male and rewarding him for absolutely nothing," Katherine jokes.

She adds: "Fred's taught me a lot about life, about men, about myself." London-based Katherine had her first child when she was 25, and says having two more over a decade later was a completely different experience.