I’ve made sprouts with lentils, in a jar under the sink. Thing is, they look kind of creepy and one kid visiting us who saw them thought they were some kind of insects!..My daughter had NO food eating problem and was a pretty hefty kid until her early teens. Now she’s as thin as a promise and a Healthy Food Nazi. But I still have to cut the chicken off the bone for her!:rolleyes:
Could I just reiterate how important it is not to make a BFD over kids eating/not eating? No clean plate club, no sitting there till they finish, no forcing the issue or arguing or insisting. They will outgrow it.
My mom did much the same. I wouldn’t look twice at Chinese food until well into my 20’s when I was taken to some REAL places for work lunches, because of my mother’s ultra-bland ideas of what “chinese” food was.
I have just skimmed this thread, but I wanted to throw in one more medical issue besides sensory sensitivity to textures. If you notice specifically that your child is a slow eater, takes small bites, keeps food in cheeks before swallowing, etc., please have your doc check his or her tonsils. My daughter was this way at the table–didn’t eat much, took forever to eat–and we finally found out that she had “pendulous” tonsils that hung down into her throat and made it difficult and even painful to swallow. She did NOT have the typical tonsil symptom of noisy sleep, because when she was flat on her back the tonsils were out of the way of her breathing. When an ENT doc first looked at her tonsils he thought they were borderline for removal, then he angled a flashlight DOWN her throat and said, “Ohhh–they hang down in there; they have to go!” After the surgery he told me it was definitely the right call. She was just past her third birthday when she had them out.
My nephews only ate bananas, dry cereal, milk, hot dogs, and spaghetti with butter as young kids. It drove my mother CRAZY - it was all she’d talk about. But my sister-in-law never made a big deal out of it.
Then, in junior high school and high school a new miraculous thing happens to kids - peer pressure. Want to get a 12 year old to eat, say, pizza? Get a dozen of his class mates to laugh at him if he doesn’t. They are now in college and while they probably aren’t great sushi eaters, they are fairly normal.
I echo others that the child should be checked for a medical problem (hiatal hernias and acid reflux can also cause very picky eaters). If that seems OK put decent food in front of him and otherwise ignore what goes into his mouth. If you’re worried about his well being, also give him gummy vitamin.
Minute rice tastes like cardboard. My Mom made Carolina long grain and she sautéed mushroom and onions in butter and added it to the rice. it was pretty good that way. Still it was a far cry from the Aromatic rices I like today.
I only buy aromatic rice from the Chinese grocer and it is wonderful. It smells like pop corn as it cooks. Usually Jasmine rice in a big bag. It has great taste for white rice and is good in most things. I got a non stick rice cooker and it makes the rice come out perfect. It was a bit pricey but worth it as I love rice dishes. I think young kids like the buttery flavor.
Three is a bit young to understand the following memo, but it is an amusing bit from Kate Buckley’s blog, Eating the Daisies
To: Offspring
From: Management
Re: Meal Policy
Lately there seems to be some confusion regarding the Meal Policy at Buckley’s Bed & Breakfast.
For your clarification, we have reprinted it below.
You will note that there is a new section on ‘Snacks’. This was added after careful consideration and zero consultation.
All changes are effective immediately.
Meal Policy
• There will be one common dinner provided for all lodgers each night.
• You will eat it.
• We do not care if you do not like tomatoes.
• If you finish everything on your plate, you will get dessert.
• If, after tasting the dinner you cannot choke it down, you may (a) make yourself some toast or (b) try your luck at the neighbor’s; either way, dessert is off the cards.
• There will be no food or drink (other than water) issued once you have brushed your teeth; therefore, we would recommend eating a second serve — tomatoes or no tomatoes — at dinner time.
• Snacks will be available throughout the day.
• ‘Snacks’ are defined as: fruit, nuts and carrot sticks.
• If you really are starving, you will eat them.
That was funny! Growing up in the 60’s there was only one day a year that I got to pick out what I wanted for dinner, my Birthday. I always asked for my Mom to make Salmon P Wiggle. My kids love it too.
My husband hates chicken on the bone. Absolutely hates it. Same with pork chops. He doesn’t like gristle, pulling/cutting the meat off, the weird tendons and stuff on the chicken, etc.
He was another one who didn’t realize until adulthood that he really loves some vegetables, but their preparation method by his mother was what turned him off from them. A short list of his “wow, I love _______!” experiences includes asparagus, butternut and acorn squashes, mushrooms, leeks, kale, and turnips.
Oh, and my sister shared the tale of a friend (so yes, we’re getting to “friend-of-a-friend” here) whose boyfriend expressed horror when she suggested making homemade cookies. No, he absolutely did not want any, homemade cookies are awful. Yuck. After she made some and he thought those particular cookies looked pretty nice, they got down to the origin of his aversion: his health-nut mother put grated zucchini into homemade sweets when he was a kid. This caused him to refuse homemade treats, thinking that was how you made cookies.
Another suggestion is to provide food the kid likes and will eat, but to also introduce and offer new (and repeat) foods often.
The plate might have two-three old, regular items and something new (or maybe not so new).
I might give my kids chicken, mashed potatos and carrots (old familiar items) and also beets (something new or newish). They might not eat the beets the first time (or first several times, or even ever) but eventually will get used to the idea that there are other foods and they may or may not like them, but at least they won’t be freaked out by them…
Getting a kid involved in cooking and menu planning is good. Kids want to do what they see their parents doing. A bonus to this is that it gets him used to being in the kitchen, so it’s easier to learn more cooking skills when he’s a little older. Cooking is an important skill for everybody to learn, since most people live on their own at some point in their adult lives. Some of the ones who can’t cook get by on takeout or restaurant food, but that’s expensive and can be unhealthy.
As a nice here-and-now bonus for you, a kid is more likely to eat something he helped cook.
IMO, this is how eating disorders get started. Put enough pressure on a kid about what they eat/don’t eat, and some kids will dig in their heels to maintain or seize control of their choices. As mentioned upthread, “picky” eaters often become that way because what they eat or don’t is the only thing that gives them the feeling they have any control over their lives.
I narrowly avoided developing an eating disorder, but I developed other compulsive behaviors (smoking) that serve the same purpose, letting me feel as though I have some control over my choices.
I have a 13-month-old who has a major meat aversion. Almost any meat that goes into her mouth immediately comes back out. I can get her to eat maybe three bites of the gravy from a meat-flavored stew without the meat. The only exceptions are pulled pork and bacon. I keep offering the foods to her, but when the first bite goes in and she immediately opens her mouth up and spits it out, I have to assume she’s just not a big fan of meat, at least non-pork meat.
She’ll eat most fruits, veggies generally only if they’re in things (lately she’s a big fan of broccoli cheese rice), and she eats eggs and dairy like a champ. Just no meat. What can I do to get her to eat meats? It would help me out immensely to be able to feed her spaghetti sauce (which was last nights attempt at dinner for the family) or things with hamburger or chicken in them. I’m sick of making grilled cheese and quesadillas for her.
My 2 year old son was the same way about meat at that age. I think meat is a tougher thing to get kids to eat sometimes, because it is such a different sensation/texture than the baby foods they grew up on so far. My son would spit it out too. All we did was keep giving it to him in different ways, and he did get over it. Meat is still not his favorite but he eats things like ground turkey, meat sauces, and chicken and fish without issue now.
Often with kids, it is the repetition of a skill/something new more than anything else that works. And time. Keep in mind that kids that age don’t need much meat, if she eats eggs/dairy she is getting protein. Just keep giving it to her, don’t give her attention for spitting it out, I bet you anything she gets over it.
You can also try putting some thin sliced turkey in the grilled cheese/quesadillas for now!
And the “clean plate club” (or an emphasis on not wasting food) is how people learn to eat when they’re not hungry. “Eat what’s in front of you, and don’t waste food” is not the proper approach to something like one of these. You wouldn’t feed your kid something like that, but a restaurant would. When your kid is grown up (it will happen sooner than you think), he could go into a restaurant and order something like that.
The answer isn’t “never eat out” (though “eat out less” would be a sensible thing to do for most people). That just makes restaurants a forbidden fruit, and makes it more likely that he’ll eat a lot of restaurant food when he’s old enough to decide for himself. He needs to learn to make good food choices (what and how much to eat). That does mean that you, as the parent, don’t get to make all the food choices. Yes, you’d make better ones than he would, but he needs to learn how to make those kind of choices.
We’ve all met people whose parents did everything for them as kids. They didn’t always know how to do stuff when they were finally out on their own. Making food choices is a skill just like doing laundry or cooking. You learn it by doing it.
I don’t think my kids had any molars to chew meat with at 13 months, so I doubt I fed them meat other than what had gone through the blender or food processor. Try ground or fine cut lamb if you want to feed her meat, it’s a lot easier to chew.
I couldn’t agree more. Recently, I lost 20 pounds by working out on the Wii Fit and being very strict about portion control. My number one rule is: never eat everything I’m served in a restaurant. Typically, you get 3-4 times more food than you need. I either order an appetizer and a salad as my meal – and make sure to leave about 1/4 of it on the plate, or I will ask for a to-go box the second they put the plate in front of me and immediately put half of it in the leftovers-for-lunch box.
I spent my childhood locked into those control battles, eat-it-or-wear-it and you won’t get up from the table until you finish X food that you hate. That kind of pressure is unhealthy and teaches really bad eating habits. I react poorly, as an adult, when other adults feel compelled to comment on what I have or have not eaten, especially because I’ve chosen not to clean my plate after I’m already full.
Not on cats. Some cats will stop eating to the point where they get fatty liver disease if they don’t like their food. One of the symptoms of fatty liver disease is nausea, which can make the cat even less willing to eat. Untreated, feline fatty liver disease has a mortality rate of more than 90%. “Eat this or nothing” is safe to use on children and dogs, but not on cats.
You do need to get him to eat faster than he does now, but don’t go overboard. Eating fast is associated with being overweight. Obviously, if you’ve got a set amount of time to eat a meal, someone who eats fast is going to eat more than someone who eats slowly. I’m trying to train myself to eat slower at dinner for just this reason.
The American Dietetic Association says that “eating too quickly, in less than 20 to 30 minutes, leads to overeating”. They also agree with me and Dogzilla that teaching kids to clean their plates is a bad idea and contributes to weight problems later in life.
Speaking of making kids eat too fast: My dad used to hate watching my sister and I dawdle over meals. So whenever we went out to eat, the second the waitron set the food down in front of us, Dad would holler, “Hurry up! We’re leaving!” Terrified that Dad would leave us before we finished our meals, we both learned to wolf down our food in about ten minutes. My stepmom said she had indigestion for years because she didn’t realize he was talking to just us, in a misguided attempt to speed up mealtimes. He finally clued her in, but continued the practice until we were trained.
My sister has been morbidly obese for most of her life. I have… food issues, mostly related to other people fussing about how much or how little I ate. She and I are both working very hard to maintain healthy eating habits, but it has taken years of bad health (for both of us) to finally get it together. I am a slow eater and I think that’s a good thing: I don’t eat so fast (anymore) that I overeat because my body hasn’t had time to send my brain the message that I’m full. This is why I leave food on the plate; I stop eating when I’m full. Go figure.
Ok, if a 3 year old won’t eat anything but hotdogs, chicken nuggets and pancakes, it sounds like you have other problems.
Why not give him some real food that has more than 2 steps in it’s preparation?
Are you and your partner both in the 67% of Americans that are overweight or obese, or do you just want him to become one?
Also, the fact that you need advice on giving him something else, means he is already gonna get whatever he wants in the future. Get outta that habit!
OTOH, you don’t want to spend too much time at the table. There are problems other than the obvious one with that. One theory I’ve heard about why watching TV while you eat is associated with being overweight is that people who watch TV while they eat tend to stay at the table after they’re full, to wait for a show to finish. While they’re sitting at the table, they eat. It is easy to eat when you’re bored and sitting at the table, even if you’re not hungry.
Like with so many things, there are hazards at both extremes here.