Re: your comments (sorry I don’t have time to quote):
Honestly, I was dropping hints. He’d describe his proposed (exotic) menu & I’d ask what the kids were going to eat.
And he did cut up some fruit for the kids on the night in question, once they were eating their cottage cheese, thus enabling me to get a few bites.
The other problem is that some people just don’t take criticism well. If you say “I really didn’t care for it”, they hear “You have no idea what you’re doing.” I’m trying to tread lightly.
And I do appreciate his culinary talents. He’s made a number of dishes that tasted like decent restaurant food - he loves Emeril Lagasse’s and Jamie Oliver’s cookbooks. Some recipes he just finds off websites. He made moroccan chicken w/lentils the other day, it was to die for!
I did show my son how to put peanut butter on a cracker the other day, so I’m getting him ready for the “there’s the jar, help yourself” speech!
I was engaged once to a trained chef. In the entire time we knew each other, she cooked for me exactly once.
This sad fact didn’t lead to the breakup, but it did indicate some things.
These days, I do a good bit of the cooking for my wife and our three very small children - and we all eat pretty damn well. And whether that means that mom and dad have more exotic food after the kids go to bed or have simpler food along with them is all part of the happy compromise that leads to kids being able to live with you in the first place.
I have to agree with WhyNot on this one… At the very least the kids have to try what’s for dinner. Children who aren’t forced to eat foods they don’t immediately like often grow up to be picky eaters. I know people who toured Europe eating nothing but steak and plain chicken because thats all they like. What a complete waste.
Force your kids to eat salmon patties today and they’ll thank you later.
I do the cooking at our place. When the kids were very little they got a simple dinner in the kitchen and my husband and I ate after they went to bed. When it became important to socialize them at the table, I gradually evolved several scenarios. Sometimes we all eat one of the few things they like as is–plain meat, spaghetti, pizza, fried rice or a casserole. Other times I make a simple verson for them, and a fancier verson for the adults. For example, we might have fish baked with tomatoes, olives and artichoke hearts, while they would have plain fish. Other times I just have a stand-by like hamburgers or tuna sandwiches and hubby and I eat whatever weird thing I have planned. We don’t force anything, but they are free to try whatever they like. Sometimes it goes on the accept without questio list, sometimes not.
I used to believe this too until I ran into Princess Stubborn. She will sit there for an hour and not eat it. And she will whine the whole time. And she will throw a tantrum for forty minutes if you send her to her room. Forcing her to eat something would literally be forcing her, prying her jaws open and sticking it in. Not going there. We can go to the “don’t eat, but you won’t eat” but as I mentioned, that tends to make my life miserable. We do have some luck with bribing “try it or you don’t get any treats.”
Perhaps she will go to Europe and eat nothing but steak and plain chicken. That will be her loss and I’ll have had a more peaceful mommyhood.
I don’t think a “feeding” has happened until someone or something consumes the food. Cooking and placing the food is only preparatory to eating. Of course, if you snack and sample while cooking, then I think it counts as a feeding.
My one year old loves hummus too, as do my friend’s kids of similar age. My MIL always expresses shock that he could like something so ‘exotic’ :rolleyes:. I think it is pretty standard for kid fare as long as it’s not super garlicy, what’s not for kids to like about chickpeas?
He’s easygoing when it comes to eating, but if that changes when he gets older I have no intentions of getting into daily battles over food. I agree that making a slightly altered version of the main dish everyone is having is quite often a way to go. My husband and I like spicy dishes and our son just gets a little tamer portion of what we are having if I think it will be too much for him, or he just eats extra potatoes intead of the meat or something.
Another idea is to buy a few of those toddler meals by Gerber or whoever. I don’t buy them for every day (too expensive) but they are a good backup meal for when you want to have something the kids can’t or won’t eat. I have a few in the pantry then when you need a quick meal they are microwaved in 30 seconds, and are pretty good for them too,or at least better than chef boyardee type stuff. My son likes the spinach ravioli they make but there are lots of different kinds, all very child friendly.
This may be a topic for another thread, but IME there’s no point in “forcing” a kid to do anything concerning his/her body functions. You can & should grab them before they run into traffic, and may need to hold them down in order to administer vaccinations or somesuch.
I hear you fessie, and I respect your choices. We all choose our battles. Me, I don’t make my kids wear pajamas. I figure if they want to sleep in the clothes they wore for the day, it’s less laundry for me! People look at me like I’m some sort of neglectful cretin when they find out, but oh well.
Like **Dangerosa **says, sometimes it’s just easier on a parent to give the kid what she wants to eat, and that’s fine for her and works for you, too.
I was just a little perplexed by the idea that a kid can’t eat “exotic foods”. Of course they *can *eat them - whether or not you choose to serve them is up to you as a mother.
Oh, thanks WhyNot! It wasn’t so much a matter of “can’t” as playing the odds - I encourage them to try everything possible. But if I want their little tummies to be full so I don’t have to listen to lots of whining & crying, then I need to give them something they actually like. Having cottage cheese & fruit handy really isn’t a lot of extra work per se.
With two of them going through food issues simultaneously, it’s kind of interesting - they’ll often imitate each other, either rejecting or accepting a particular option.
cainxinth I can’t tell if you’re trying to be snarky or not, but I just can’t help but wonder if you have children. Because people who don’t have kids often fail to realize that babies control 3 things - eating, sleeping and pooping. There are a whole lot of people who’ll be glad to take your money if you want to read their books & take their classes & watch their videos on how to gain that control yourself - or you could just save a lot of time & energy & let it go. I like peace, myself. And giving in on some issues doesn’t mean I’ve abdicated my responsibilities.
However, I won’t dismiss your opinions out of hand - a whole passel of my online mommy friends were discussing just this issue. When it comes to older children, many of them will try to force a feeding by serving it over & over until the plate’s been eaten. Or making the kid sit until it’s consumed.
Nope, not for me. I’ve seen the extraordinary problems that can cause (not to say it always does, but it can). I’ll save my energy for other battles.
I’m not certain I can equate personal hygiene with food preferences, unless by “broccoli” you mean “vegetables” of some sort in general. I require my children to wash themselves, brush their teeth, clean their rooms, and all manner of character building exercises, but I will never force one of them to eat broccoli if he doesn’t like it. They do like and eat asparagus, green beans, lima beans, celery, green peppers, zucchini, and salad greens. I don’t believe it’s necessary that they eat broccoli, so I will choose to serve one of the other vegetables that my whole family enjoys.
Oh, and fessie (since we already mentioned hummus) have you tried couscous with the kids? That’s been another hit with my little one, and your adventurous husband can get all wild and add things to it…after you’re taken some plain out to save for the kids’ meals.
Mine really liked butter beans. My girlfriend swears by tofu, but my kids weren’t impressed by tofu until they were like four or something. My kids eat a lot of “non kid” stuff, they like squash soup (but not squash), salad, broccoli. My son is much less picky than my daughter. In my philosophy, you introduce your kids to a wide variety of foods (we tried eggplant, even mom and dad weren’t impressed) and surprising things stick. Which means you don’t just stick to peanut butter, hot dogs, and chicken nuggets because “that’s what kids like.” At the same time, I don’t think you can force a kid who hates broccoli to eat it - with some kids you are setting yourself up for a power struggle you will pay for one way or another. My mother used to force liver on us once a month. Eat it or get grounded. I still don’t like liver and she could have gotten the iron from foods we did like. Far as I can tell, all liver did was make one meal a month miserable for everyone. Just keep setting broccoli down, maybe someday they will try it, and make sure that there is food available they will eat.
I keep buying tofu, with good intentions, and wind up throwing it out after a few months! Do you happen to recall - what exactly did you do with the stuff that met w/a small child’s approval?
Mine love Gardenburgers, I stock up when they’re on sale, but that’s all I know about soy. All four of us hated the soydogs I bought recently, total waste of $$$.
Gave them spaghetti & meat sauce last night, which they love. Except that we were low on whole-wheat spaghetti noodles, so my Hubby cooked up some rotini. Each of them picked out every piece of rotini, saying “No” and shaking their heads. Pretty funny.
[rant]I’ve always been unimpressed with guys who whip up a fancy meal in an attempt to impress me with their culinary skills. Anybody can take all day and follow a recipe and get a nice meal. I’ll be impressed when you can walk in the door from work at 6pm with nothing defrosted or pre-prepared and get a tasty meal on the table in half an hour. With kids whining about being hungry, the phone ringing and somebody else trying to have an “important discussion”.[/rant]
I agree with this. But you always have to keep in mind that kids sometimes just want comfort foods just like the rest of us. I think as long as the kids are generally trying new things then if they abstain a few times, the world won’t end. My oldest is very picky so I always make sure there is at least one food on her plate that she really likes if I’m going to make something new. Then it’s easier for everyone for us to agree on “If you want extra *** you have to eat at least 3 bites of ***”.
Plus once you get the routine of “just try 3 bites of ***” settled kids become more accepting of trying new things because they know you’re not going to force them to eat all of it. And they’ve learned that some of the things they thought they might not like at first actually were pretty good. So it gets easier with time. But you can’t really start it until they get to a more sophisticated reasoning stage.
Yep, when I was a kid we had to eat a certain amount of the foods we hated from the meal. We had to eat two chicken livers, say, or five Brussels sprouts. I still hate those things and don’t eat vegetables to this day. It’s all wound up in issues with food but I can’t say it helped me any. I know my parents were trying to be responsible and that’s cool, but it was a horrible experience every time.
I know “How do you know you don’t like it unless you try it” makes logical sense, but sometimes you just know.
Stir fry it with the veggies they like. Bake it up (use the firm stuff) and throw it in noodles - I like it with aspargus, kids don’t eat that but can pick around the aspargus and we’ll have a salad on the side. We fry it firm and put it in veggie chili (my daughter won’t eat chili, too spicy - that’s a peanut butter sandwich meal for her). I like to fry it in olive oil with a lot of popcorn salt for a snack - the kids like that too, but they have to be old enough to enjoy the salt. It picks up sauces well, I make a kid version of thai peanut sauce - i.e. no chilis - with peanut butter and soy sauce (my son will eat the spicy stuff but not my daughter), or soy sauce, or ginger sauce.
You can “hide” almost anything if your kids eat spagetti sauce and you own a food processor (even a blender). I haven’t done it, but I know mom’s who put all their green veggies in spaghetti sauce.
I buy the shelf stable kind, it will go bad eventually. But it sits in a box in the pantry for months.
The tofu thing at our house didn’t happen until around four. Until then both kids turned up their noses at it. I have a girlfriend whose kids all ate it as one of their first foods though (they are a vegetarian household, however, so tofu is much more integral to their house).
