How many parents have picky eaters? Other than sleeping, I would say getting our kids to eat has been our biggest challenge. So big in fact it prompted me to write How Childbirth is Easier Than Feeding your Kids, (It’s true, I swear!) and start the One New Food campaign.
Having a tough time getting your kids to eat…well anything! Try these kid-tested tips, they work, and will encourage your kids to try new foods!
But in the past seven years I’ve learned many important lessons about picky eaters, and chilling out is at the top of the list! Isn’t that what we all learn really?! So here are 10 Tips to Help Your Picky Eaters if you find yourself frustrated at mealtimes.
10 tips to really help your picky eaters!
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Start as You Mean to Go!
If healthy eating is your goal, then start serving your children healthy foods from infancy. There’s a reason your pediatrician recommends starting solid vegetables over fruit. It’s important to not get too sweet too fast, and introduce the basic veggies first! This goes as they grow too. At mealtimes sometimes I give our girls vegetables first and then add protein and grains afterwards. They usually gobble them down.
2. Meal Plan
We’ve been meal planning again for the past few months and it’s really helped. We let the kids choose one meal per week, but it can’t be chicken nuggets! And we post weekly meal plans so the girls aren’t surprised come dinner time, they always know what’s cooking ahead of time. Plus they feel empowered in helping to make choices, and they know they will always have one meal they love. (Read my post on How to Meal Plan Like a Boss for more tips!)
3. One New Food
We started the one new food campaign to get our kids to try foods, because quite frankly we were tired of the tears, and the intolerance to even new brands of almond milk or bread. It started out as new fruits and vegetables, but we upgraded to new grains, oatmeal, cuisine’s etc. I really credit this technique to helping our kids start to try and like proteins like steak and fish, and make them more open minded. In fact they love grocery shopping now because they can choose their new foods! (Here’s the One New Food archive if you’d like inspiration!) If you decide to try one new food a week, please share your pics using #ONENEWFOOD and I’ll cheer you on!
4. Don’t Force Kids to Eat!
Say what? I know I know…I used to be the one saying, “Just one more bite…come on! I’ll give FIVE desserts!” But it’s exhausting, and never worked. You know what does work? Being calm and chilling out. We have a policy, you have to take two bites of everything on your plate, and then if you don’t like it, you don’t eat. It takes the stress and pressure off of them, and off of us as well. And if they don’t eat no worries, breakfast will be awesome-sauce! I will say though now that they’re older, we will allow a healthy bedtime snack if they genuinely tried the food.
5. Always Put Something On Their Plate Kids Love
The caveat to the above statement is to always put something on your kid’s plate that they love. Be it a rice, grain, or fruit, it’s important that there be something they will like to eat. For example when I make pulled pork or barbecue chicken, our threenager won’t eat it, so I keep trying to introduce it, but always add corn on the cob on the side or with homemade cornbread that I know she’ll love!
Don’t worry, the stove wasn’t on, I staged for the picture!
6. Involve Kids in the Cooking Process
It’s really important to teach children how food is made. They can help pour in the ingredients, chop up nuts for recipes, mash bananas for muffins, or stir whatever you’re making. This was the key to getting our girls to eat potatoes. Once they saw how I cut them into fries or mashed them, that helped encourage them to finally try mashed potatoes. And like them!
Steel cut oatmeal shaped like an owl! Hoot hoot!
7. Play With Food!
Use cookie cutters to cut out foods, play with food, or put sprinkles on it if you have to! Bottom line meal times don’t have to be boring. (Yes I put sprinkles on whole wheat pancakes and broccoli!)
8. When all Else Fails Hide the Good Stuff
I hate getting deceptive, but sometimes you have to hide the nutritious foods. Smoothies and muffins are my go to, with green juices coming in second place. Seriously, they love green lemonade, I dare you to try it!
9. Rotate Dessert Nights to Help with Bribe Tactics
We don’t eat dessert every night to cut down on bribing. You know holding a delish cupcake or lollipop over their heads to force encourage your sweet babies to eat?! So instead we do one night a dessert, the next night just fruit after dinner, and the third night nothing. That way they aren’t addicted to sugary sweets every night. Or so we hope…
10. Allow Kids to Pack Lunches
I started this in first grade and so far so good! Even our three year old likes to pick and pack her lunch now. Our lunches include a protein, a veggie, a fruit, a starch, and a dessert. This not only is a time saver for parents but has enabled us to talk about what healthy foods are, and how they help our bodies. Also, you can pre-cut foods like apples the night before and soak them in pineapple juice to keep them from browning. And we cut up carrot sticks in advance as well, that way the girls just grab them from the fridge and go!
There are thousands of articles on the web that have pieces of advice for your picky eaters, but bottom line you have to do what works for you. Just please parents, don’t be sort order cooks, make one meal for everyone! These 10 tips to help picky eaters are what we’ve found to be helpful, but that doesn’t mean our kids are eating broccoli and asparagus everyday!
Much like life, picky eating is usually a phase, and if you can weather it with calmness and a touch a grace, you will be teaching your children more than just healthy eating! And you’ll save yourself much headaches!
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Great tips! I’m glad the girls are eating better!
i am so glad i don’t have super picky eaters. that would drive me insane. good tips above though! i’m definitely a “bribe-er” – ha!
Such great tips! My 6 year old is my crazy eater. He’ll eat broccoli and peas all day long but it took us years to get him to try syrup on his pancakes just because it was something new. Involving my 10 year old in the cooking process has been a huge help getting her to eat.
CUTE TIPS!
Great tips! My kids are total opposites.. my son hates meat (like me) and my daughter is a carnivore! (like my hubby) We always have a variety of foods for dinner.. to try and make everyone happy! ha!
Great list Kristin!! I am really good at hiding things in my kids food! 🙂 My flour year old loves spending time in the kitchen with me and if he helps make it most of the time he wants to eat it! Chilling out is a good reminder. Dinner time can get stressful!
Great tips! I’m lucky my son is a fairly good eater, but he certainly has his fair share of picky moments. My pediatrician told me not to focus so much on how much food they get in a meal or even a day, but look at how much food they eat in a week. I agree with you that forcing the issue will lead you nowhere. I also keep offering foods no matter how many times my son rejects them. There are quite a few foods that he has started to eat because I just keep offering them. The one thing that’s interesting though is my pediatrician actually recommended meat as a great first food and didn’t really say that it was best to start with fruits or veggies. She said to just feed whatever I was eating. It’s funny how they all say such different things!
Thank you seriously for these tips and my picky eater is my almost 5 year old. So I need all the help I can get and truly appreciate the advice! 😉
My oldest was the pickiest (mostly due to autism related sensory issues), but at 14 he all of a sudden was open to new foods. He’s ravenous, and probably desperate, because he’s growing so fast. I agree, chilling out is the best way to handle it.
These are great tips! Our kids are all generally good eaters (though we’ve had more struggles with our daughter). We think that starting them on homemade baby food (as much as possible) early on helped them get used to the flavors and textures of the food we eat. Other than that, they are all really involved in the shopping and preparation of much of our food.
I definitely agree that not stressing over the issue is important. You have to pick your battles and fighting at dinnertime every night isn’t worth it. They will eventually come around if you continue to prioritize healthy food and offer it often.
Lisa where have you been all my life! Wish you were with me the first 3 years!
Des will eat anything, except eggs, which is WEIRD. (I love eggs)
Scarlet is tough. I do believe in being deceptive if you have to, because sometimes nothing else works!
Meal planning is honestly a life goal of mine.
What an awesome post! I love it! It is so wonderful that you continue to introduce new foods to the kiddos – and that you continue to remember that in a couple years, their tastes will have completely changed! What a great perspective.
I just became enlisted as a contributor to a local magazine – my job is to detail a locally-sourced, seasonal recipe for our readers. I am very excited because it will quite literally force me to try new recipes and test them out on my family!
One other tip I would add is to GROW IT! Kids love dirt and planting and learning about the life cycle of a plant – kids are more likely to eat things they GROW themselves! Kinda like that independence and pride at the grocery store – only more intense!
Love it, thank you for sharing!
What a timely post. My threenager is awful about anything that isn’t PB&J (on whole wheat of course lol). Lately, I’ve been trying to get him to help me cook or even just stir the food so he thinks he’s made it. Truthfully, I loathe dinner time. Thanks so much for linking up with us at Best of the Weekend!
What a timely post. My threenager is awful about anything that isn’t PB&J (on whole wheat of course lol). Lately, I’ve been trying to get him to help me cook or even just stir the food so he thinks he’s made it. Truthfully, I loathe dinner time. Thanks so much for linking up with us at Best of the Weekend!
Thank you for the tips. My son doesn’t want to eat anything healthy. I will try the “One New Food”. I sound like something that might work.
We don’t even require two bites. Our policy is that you can ALWAYS eat fruits and veggies and you don’t have to eat, but you do have to sit politely at dinner and can’t get something else (other than fruits and veggies). Sure, sometimes a kid has a banana for dinner. But that’s fine!
So many good tips in one post! Our girls have gotten fresh vegetables since infancy, and at least one of them is fantastic about eating her veggies. The other one is coming along. The biggest rule that’s worked for us is that if they don’t at least try a little bit of everything on their plate, they get it for the next meal. The hardest part of that is just to follow-through. Once or twice with that and even our picky eater at least tries a little bit!
Our two year old is so, so picky. Every night used to be a big battle, but I’ve started making sure that there is something on the plate that I know she will eat. (Usually it’s the vegetable, so I can’t complain too much). We did baby led weaning with our one year old, though, and, so far, she tries every single thing we put in front of her. It’s been a crazy difference.
I wish I know about Baby led weaning with our 2nd child. So glad you are finding success!
I remember reading this last year, but when it came up in my feed today I had to read it again. We just started “Eat it or Starve” in our house this week because we had ALL gotten too lazy with our eating and would eat GARBAGE all the time. So far 2/3 of my kids have at least partially surprised me by trying (and licking!) different veggies!
My favorite tip is to make sure there is SOMETHING on the plate that they like. In our house it is usually fruit! 🙂
Yes! us too! I really try hard to have at least one or two things. Like tonight the main protein will be fish, so I added mashed potatoes and homemade cornbread. I know they will at least fill up on that!