When I was weaning him, Burton ate just about everything I put in from of him and he was so easy to make meals for.
However, recently he has become very fussy about the meals I make for him.
As a rule his favourite meals (always homemade) are / were:
Cottage pie
Chilli con carne (v.mild)
Meatballs & pasta
Spaghetti Bolognese
Fishcakes (sometimes)
Slow cooked chicken, bacon & leeks in a tomato & herb sauce
Steak & ale casserole
Turkey mince bolognese
Corned beef hash (once)
Shepherds Pie (sometimes)
He will also eat:
Marmite
Cheese
Cold cooked cocktail sausages (bought ready cooked, he won’t eat hot ones!)
Peas
Bananas
Strawberries
Raspberries
Tinned pasta shapes in tomato sauce
Deli counter cooked chicken slices
Apple
Raisins
Yogurts
Ham (sometimes)
Cheerios
Bread/toast
Mini cheddars
Quavers
Goodies gingerbread men and some other snacks
Chocolate (of course!)
Rice
Pasta
He does eat vegetables that I hide in meals such as carrot, onion, peppers, sweet potato and courgette but wouldn’t eat any if he saw them on his plate. He will eat baked beans when in cottage pie but not on a plate and the same applies with mashed potato! He won’t eat anything covered in breadcrumbs or batter or pastry and he won’t eat potato that isn’t a topping on a pie. He used to eat my homemade pizzas and scrambled egg and omelettes but now won’t even try them. He will eat bread and butter with cheese on the side, but he won’t eat a cheese sandwich!! Even when I dissect him and show him what it is!
On the whole I like to think his diet is good, I mean when he does eats his meals he gets the relevant nutrients he needs and no doubt he eats more things then some children his age.
But he is a nightmare at trying new food – he won’t even try foods he is not familiar with! I have read somewhere that on average it takes a child something like 15 times to taste a food before they decide that they like it or not. Yet how can a child make up their mind when you cannot get them to even try it once!
Recently, he has even been refusing to eat the foods he usually really enjoys. To be fair to him, this usually happens after he has been poorly with a tummy bug (the last one he had was about 5 weeks ago) but this time it is going on for longer than normal. Of course being Mr Independent Two Year Old, he won’t let us spoon or fork feed him as he gets stroppy now so once he decides he isn’t eating it, he won’t. I am trying hard not to make an issue out of it but it isn’t always easy to keep my cool and not get frustrated by it in front of him. I always sit with him at meal times and usually the evening meal is eaten with Daddy there aswell, and more often than not we eat the same meal now to encourage him to try new things aswell as eat the meals he likes.
So in an attempt to get him to eat all three of his meals, I introduced stickers as incentives this week. Starting Monday, I made a very basic incentive scheme – he gets a sticker for each meal he eats, if by the end of the day he collects all three stickers,then him and Daddy can walk up to the shop to buy him some chocolate buttons. The idea being that after the first week, once he got the concept of rewards for being a good and clever boy, I would drop the daily reward and make it into a treat at the weekend instead like a magazine or trip to a soft play centre etc. Monday this went very well and he got his three stickers and his buttons.
However, Tuesday he ate breakfast ok but at lunchtime he wouldn’t eat his scrambled egg, but as he ate one tiny mouthful and the rest of the food on his plate I allowed him his sticker, yet at tea time he only ate about 3 peas. We reminded him about how he only needed one more sticker to get his buttons but he wouldn’t budge! Daddy asked him if he wanted some buttons but he said “no” – how funny as he knew that if he said yes, this would mean eating the meal and he didn’t want to! Anyway, that was that and he got told there was nothing else and he nodded and got down! (he did have a yogurt an hour later before bed though as he was hungry!). He did eat all his meals today although grandma was present at lunch time which may have helped him eat his cooked meal, as I don’t know if he would have eaten it all had it just been him and I!
It’s sooo frustrating! I not know why he is being funny about the food he normally likes but I guess he will get back on track eventually. I guess its a phase. I hope so. I do wish he would try new foods though – I don’t care if he doesn’t eat very much of a new food, one mouthful would do! If we go out to eat he won’t eat anything off the menu! Mind you, most kids meals are usually something with chips, which he doesn’t eat anyway.
Maybe I am expecting too much from him at his age? Maybe I am to blame because when he was younger if he wouldn’t eat something, I would give him something he would as I didn’t want him to be hungry. Mind you, I haven’t done this for several months now.
What are your toddlers like with their food? I am sure I am not alone ………..am I?
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Thank you xx
Big Sister is exactly the same with the sandwich thing. She will eat the contents and the bread separately but not together as a sandwich! I thought she was just a bit odd!
he sounds similar to Jack, sometimes he will eat a whole meal, sometimes he won’t touch it, I try not to worry as over the week it probably balances out. I tend not to put as much on his plate for his evening meal now & find he quite often asks for more but a large plateful of food seems to be a bit overwhelming.
I don’t know about Burton but Jack tends to fill up in the mornings – milk, cereal, toast & fruit then lunchtimes he has a sandwich cheese & fruit & often by teatime he doesn’t want anything – and barely eats snacks during the day. He knows he can’t have pudding unless he eats his dinner and often I will let the other 2 eat theirs in front of him and still he won’t eat his dinner……stubborn or just not hungry? who knows.
I think the best thing to do is not stress, they will eat when they’re hungry (hopefully!)
x
Thanks Helen for your comment, makes me feel better that I am not alone. You gave a point, Burton does eat better in the morning. Maybe I need to give him his cooked meal at lunchtime again, it’s just that I wanted him to eat his with me and OH at tea time. they are monkeys aren’t they!? Xx
I know what you mean…unfortunately the timings with when they want to eat & when you do don’t always work out do they…I often plate up a dinner for Jack for the next day so often he is one day behind us with his meals, perhaps you could do that & he could have his the next lunchtime – saves all that cooking again at lunchtime….. you have your hands full enough! I’ve just got some Organix mighty meals to try out so I might try one of those out this lunchtime rather than wasting it on him tonight! x
He used to eat at lunchtime but I thought if we ate together at 5.30 then it would encourage him to eat new and old things. I have to admit he eats better at lunch time. Hmmm food for thought *ahem*
Good luck with the mighty meals xx
My son (just 2) is the same. I’m obsessed with healthy eating, and a good cook, so it’s a bit soul-destroying that he rejects my lovingly home-made shepherd’s pies and risottos (that he used to eat happily) in favour of pasta or gnocchi with a plain tomato sauce, fishfingers, sausages, mash, chips, chicken in a cheese sauce with rice, cheese/peanut butter sarnies or pizza! Anything else he’ll push round his plate and not eat. He’ll eat carrots and sometime broccoli or sweetcorn (I do the classic mum trick of hiding veg in pasta sauces), but that’s it veg-wise – luckily he loves all fruit so gets his 5-a-day that way. I read about toddlers who eat salad and hummus etc and I wonder how their parents get them tp do it! I find my son eats more if we all sit down together, but my husband coummutes so we can’t do that in the week. Mind you, my brother ate nothing but fishfingers and weak tea until he was about 12 and he’s 6 foot and eats like a horse now! I think the fussy eating is about toddlers wanting to be in control in what must be quite a daunting world for them at times, rather than just not liking the food.
I just think they have no room left in their little tums for dinner……most days Jack eats more than me! x
I don’t have any advice I’m afraid but, wow, what great sounding homecooked food your boy gets! Puts my cooking to shame.
It is soul destroying I too make (and enjoy making) home made meals with lots of hidden veg so when he won’t eat it or try it , it’s hard not to react in a slightly frustrated tone isn’t it? I think you are right about the age thing and how it’s about them asserting independence. Altho he has always been reluctant to try new foods. Xx
No she isn’t odd at all! X
Hell, yeah, I try not to make meal times a battle but occasionally I do lose my temper and end up spitting ‘Just. Eat. It.’ Or, on one occasion, crying! Which is really not like me at all, I’m normally tough as old boots! I don’t want to bribe him, as he’s bad enough for asking for treats (lollies at the moment – I’ve got round that by making low-cal ones out of squash) but threats like ‘if you don’t eat a bit more, then no more television today’ don’t really work on a 2-year old as I don’t think he totally gets cause and effect just yet. Sigh!
It’s as though I wrote this post! Lincoln is EXACTLY the same!! Although he doesn’t eat quite as much of a range as B does but generally the same stuff. He won’t eat ANY chicken, ANY cottage/shepherd’s pies or cheese At all. If he knows it’s new, he won’t even entertain it. Not even the “one” spoonful to try it! Like you said, how do they KNOW they don’t like it when they won’t even put it In their mouth to begin with?! I’m right there with you. L is 2 and 1 month. I think they key is meal planning. That’s what I am going to try anyway. Meal plans for the week and we all have the same (or near enough. And if he doesn’t eat it, he will get nothing. And that will be hard to watch. I mean, when is enough, enough? He isn’t the chubbiest of toddlers so weight loss wouldn’t be good at all for him. *sigh* good luck lovely.. Mary xx
We’ve been very lucky with ours – they devour anything put in front of them. The difficulty is getting the balance – the nine year-old would like to try more spicy foods, but they’re too adventurous for the younger two. The way I approach introducing new tastes is to make up a tiny batch of whatever me and my wife have for dinner and let them have a taste of that, either then, or the next day. They’ve recentloy acquired a taste for chicken korma, even the four year-old.
We went through this with H, she wouldn’t eat anything other than what she ate every single day, and it got sooooo tiring! She did eventually grow out of it though. I think they go through stages of wanting to assert their independence and food is a good way of doing it. Just stick to what you’re doing and he’ll start trying new things soon enough, although he does have a pretty good diet anyway. x
I think this is quite comment and the other comments back that up. For some reason after eating a wide range of things, many toddlers seem to stop eating the variety they did and become more conservative. Hope it’s just a short lived phase for Burton.
You are definitely not alone! One day they can wolf down a meal like they have not been fed in days and another day look at me (with the same dinner) as if I have served them up dog poo! Noah also is very reluctant to try knew foods and yet as a baby would eat anything in site and lots of it! I have found now that lunchtimes are easier if I do a picnic style lunch – cheese crackers (not fans of bread) bread sticks and humus, cheese, chicken strips, banana, raisins and maybe a crumpet followed by a yogurt. Fruit is a nightmare so smoothies are the only way and dinners have to be blitzed – no lumps or a sign of a vegetable!
However i did really stress but now I think it does not matter how I give them what they need as long as they eat it. Mine stick to quite a rigid diet of home made meals
Shepherd pie (hit or miss)
Pasta and ratatouille sauce (smoothed) – always a winner with cheese on top!
Pasta, broccoli (cut up with scissors) and cheese
Pasta and pesto
Roast dinner
Mash potato, cheese and broccoli with gravy!
Fish pie
Fishfingers/cakes or chicken nuggets
You have given me some more ideas. xx
It sounds like you’re doing a brilliant job of encouraging him to eat… Maybe he’ll get back on track soon? Oh – all the things I have to look forward to… So far, V will (touch wood) eat whatever I give him quite happily. And if for any reason he doesn’t like it – we just dip it in Petits Filous and he eats it! He does, however, need to have all his food puréed still – and he does silly fake gagging sounds if there are any lumps *rolls eyes*
Before The Boy could talk he ate everything that I gave him, now he can be quite dogmatic at times. When we were away on holiday with nana and grandad (grrr) he really played up. I tweeted about it and someone said to me how everything else in the daily routine had changed (naptime, bedtime, location) and this was the only thing that he could have control over. Maybe he’s trying to reassert his control as a typical two year old does? I think you give him a really varied diet, well done!
And The Boy won’t touch mashed potato (unless I mix it with cheese) or scrambled eggs (unless he has beans with it) either.
Thanks for linking up to ShowOff Showcase.