So my nephew is kind of a stubborn little guy and lately has gone on this kick where he absolutely refuses to drink water, he loves his soda way too much..I spent all weekend trying to coerce him (he's 4), but nothing seemed to work. Does anyone have suggestions for trying to change a child's eating habits? Any help would be much appreciated!

We just had to break the "juice monster" around here because while my DS6 and DS4 will drink water and milk, DD2 was refusing anything but juice. Even though we water it down to be almost unrecognizable as juice, I still didn't like it. So, I just stopped buying it and offered her milk with meals and water (with ice and/or a splash of lemon) all other times. It took a couple of days of tears, but she understands that I'm really not buying juice anymore and if she's thirsty she knows what her choices are.

I think keeping the bad stuff out of the house is the key. We just returned from vacation with visits to grammy and gramps, where soda is freely available. Of course, DS chose that. But if you don't have soda around, they'll drink whatever's available when they're thirsty. With our DS4, we still have some issues with juice, because DS has a dairy allergy and I do allow juice with calcium and a soy drink that has juice in it because he doesn't like the taste of most dairy alternatives. But recently we got him to drink more water if it's kept very cold in the fridge. He also has some Sigg aluminum bottles that help keep the water cold. We've had success with these pitchers - he can serve himself: Kid-Size Pitcher

Same here. We just don't buy soda. My kids drink H2O or soymilk at home. One serving of 100% juice per day (juice box in their lunches for school.)

My nephews (7,9,11) lived with me for a while and it took a while to break their poor dietary habits. We had no soda in the house, only water and milk and OJ. I kept water in an old jug in the fridge as well. I also fostered boys between 1 year and 6 years of age and ALL were hooked on soda, too.

I would not coerce them to drink anything - but would put milk and water on the table for them. They can choose to drink either one or not drink anything at all. Most said they wanted soda, and I'd say, we only have water and milk. Pick one. It took up to three days before they just accepted it.

The other battle was over junk food, starches, etc. Macaroni and Cheese and Pizza are not meals for growing boys. But that's what they wanted and in many cases, that's what they had the taste for. I'd have to try many different meats prepared different ways to find the ones they liked, then work others into the meals with just small amounts of mashed potatoes and a green vegetable like broccoli or squash. This would take 2-3 weeks.

Usually breakfast with eggs and bacon/sausage would be when they would catch on, then a healthy sandwich lunch, then (Finally) they'd take to dinner. Then, I'd get them to eat meat first, then work on the other items.

After two months of meals high in protein and with little sugar, their bodies would start to fill out and grow.

Oops. Double post.

That's so sad that the 1-year-old was also hooked on soda. Good planning with the proteins. We definitely have to work on the sweets around here. DS had nothing bad for him until he was 2, then it's sort of gone downhill. I partly blame the dairy allergy, because it didn't seem fair that he could have nothing when others were eating cake and cookies at birthdays/snack times, but that's no excuse. It's especially hard when mom is a major chocoholic...

I'm with st pauli - don't have it in the house (ok the 2lt habit a day I have with pop but....). I don't mean to sound like the meanie mom i am. but what happened to saying no to our kids. drink water, milk (soy, rice, cow, whatever), or something healthy or be thirsty. geez. i do sound mean. we need to do better with processed foods but it is the mama's habits that need to change :-( Oh I have to say what is already said - soda at one! It is like when a friend of dd6 slept over and she was surprised to learn i was going to read to dd2 before bed. she asked will you read to dd4 too. yes. long pause... will you read to us. i swear, i answered quickly and headed up to bed with dd2 before she saw mommy tears.

My nephews - I had a rule about no candy in the house. I knew the kids would be breaking it when they would show up for dinner and not eat. I'd tell them "Inspection Time" and I'd have them clean out their rooms for me. We'd go through all their clothing and stuff. I'd know where it was when they would get real slow. LOL. Its was a constant battle, but they can only win at the margins now. When they visit, I get no resistance, and just have had one meltdown, even though their mom and dad still dote on them. One is now 16 and works out a lot and eats right on his own. We'll see about the others.

As to the foster kids - You have no idea. I could write a book on this.

One five year old boy that was with us for 6 months got placed with a family member who was close to the mom. His first comment was, "YEAH!!! Now I can stay up late and eat all the candy I want!!"

While employed as a flight attendant for one year between college semesters, I witnessed mothers filling their children�s baby bottles with Coke quite frequently and would often deliver unsolicited and unappreciated cartons of milk -I couldn�t help myself.

Our kids generally drink regular, chocolate or soy milk, water and OJ, but my son does drink soda in moderation which has meant approximately twice per week since he was six or so. Just recently though, I have begun to include a short can of diet caffeinated soda (in addition to milk) for his school lunch because he has to get up at 5am each morning now for school. I�m still considering whether this is a really bad idea (the soda, not the school).

Since they were very young, we allowed our kids to make their own decisions about what snacks they consumed. Of course, we discussed proper nutrition on a regular basis and the importance of balancing empty calories so they could make informed choices. They do fairly well and usually choose small portions of junk food (if at all) combined with yogurt or fruit when they want a snack. We don�t buy whole and organic foods exclusively, but I believe their diets are healthier than average.

I have *no* doubt that your kids' diets are healthier than average, delbows. I read recently that the average American child gets ONE fruit or vegetable per day, and that the most common one they get is FRENCH FRIES!

Now, I don't know about you, but french fries don't even count as a veg in our house! That's a starch, like pasta or rice. (And a special treat kind at that!)

It's a wonder kids survive to adulthood on a diet like that! I feel guilty when I have to count their morning OJ as one of their fruits & veggies to get to the 5 required...

French fries definitely fit into the starch and junk food categories at our house! On the rare occasion that we eat fast food, usually from Culver�s, our family of four splits a medium order of fries although everyone does get their own burger!

I have yet to find a kid who can resist a hot french fry. They make great bribes!

But my dietician friend has declared war on fried foods and can back it up with data and makes me feel guilty...

OTOH, mashed potatoes with the skins on, boiled slowly, with lots of parmesan cheese and milk are pretty high in just about everything. I like to use evaporated milk if I can.

I had to laugh, Austin, because my DS doesn't like french fries.

LOL

Ah, but they are not MY french fries! Send him over, I will deprogram him!

I could eat my weight in mashed potatoes! I also leave the skin on, use Yukon gold potatoes, and use skim milk and fat-free sour cream, so it's creamy and rich-tasting without all the calories. Sometimes I boil garlic cloves in with the potatoes for simple garlic mashed potatoes. Yum!

One medium potato has 45% of an adult's RDA of vitamin C. Surprising, no? But that pretty much goes away if you deep-fat fry them...

Ever tried mashed turnips? They can be just as good!!

I've heard that. But I'd have to peel those, and I'm lazy!

Boiled or steamed mashed cauliflower tastes just like mashed potatoes too. (there is the problem with the smell of the steaming cauliflower, though...)

We lucked out with the dairy allergy and mcdonalds - they put milk in their french fry coating, so he can't have them, and what's the point of going to mcdonalds if you can't eat the fries? or the chicken mcnuggets, which also have milk? So we happily avoid it.

Is it all milk? Goats?

My DS is allergic to both cow's and goat's milk (he's been tested for both upon my insistence, even though the ped. allergist told me ahead of time that the proteins are very similar and he would likely be allergic to both). Specifically, he's allergic to whey, but the casein and why cannot reliably be separated enough to just let him have stuff with casein in it. (no whey!) McDonalds uses cow's milk.

Watch out for most kinds of chocolate milk --- they have high fructose corn syrup and other icky ingredients.

Re: caffeinated soda. Have you thought about giving him dark chocolate instead? A portion of a dark chocolate bar has the same amount of caffeine as a soda (see this link). Chocolate (provided it's made with cocoa beans, meaning, real chocolate) is also said to be less apt to promoting tooth decay than many other sugary foods. Just do a google search for "chocolate 'tooth decay.' "

This is NOT to say that eating tons of chocolate will prevent tooth decay. I'm merely saying that the cocoa in chocolate appears to have a protective effect against tooth decay. This is probably one of these eat-in-moderation type things (similar to a little wine being good for you, but not a whole bottle all in one go with every meal!).

Hmm. This may qualify as a science factoid for the week?

Val

I had 3 babies in 4.5 years and cut down on my McDonald's intake throughout, to the point where I stopped eating anything there bar an occasional carton of french fries. I eventually came to find the taste of fast food to be rather revolting (took 2-3 years of not really eating it).

THEN I saw the DVD version of Supersize Me. It has a DVD Extra where they did a science experiment. They bought a Filet-o-Fish, a McDonald's hamburger (or a Big Mac or something), a McD's Large Fries, and a burger from the tasty burger place across the road. They put each item in a glass jar, sealed the jars, and then OBSERVED what happened over time. The results were predictable for everything but the french fries....mold, etc. As for the french fries: nothing happened, except that maybe they got a little limpid looking.

After I saw that segment, I never, ever ate McDonald's fries again. And I don't eat most other fast food fries. We like Organic Russet Potato oven chips from Whole Foods. Very tasty.

Val

I love their milk. I can drink a whole quart of chocolate milk sitting in the parking lot after shopping.

Promised Land


One of the funniest food scenes from a movie (that is pretty foody to begin with ) is when William Hurt and his brothers, in The Accidental Tourist, open up the oven to look at a Holiday Turkey that has been at 120 degrees for two days. To this day I get the willies when I see stuff undercooked.

Looks delicious! I was looking forward to trying some until...STINK! Promised Land isn't avaiable in California.

Val

Val,
Thanks for the information regarding caffeine levels and the suggestion for dark chocolate. My daughter is the dark chocolate aficionado of the two kids and my son doesn�t care much for it last I checked. You gave me an excellent reason to bring it home more often for the rest of us!

I looked on the label for the Horizon brand organic chocolate milk which I buy for their lunches. Sure enough, it has cane syrup in it. I understand that even diet soda promotes tooth decay. Fortunately, DS has never had a cavity, but he will need to be especially careful now, since he will be getting braces soon.

I�ll mention the dark chocolate idea to him. Maybe his taste has changed in the last year.

Austin,
I sent an email to find out if Promised Land milk is available around here. Their dark chocolate milk sounds great.

We have definitely increased the amount of fiber and lean protein in our diets, but I have to make a greater effort to reduce the sugars we all eat.

Sugar is my weakness, too, Val. Well, and starches... We've switched to whole-grain everything, so that helps. Not enough though!

Sugar is also my weakness. I think we are all allowed to have weaknesses without feeling guilty! They make life more fun if you don't go overboard.

So along those lines, I only ate part of a large brownie today. I was feeling full and didn't see the point!

Val

The result of the fries is not necessarily alarming, other than the fact it shows how much fat is absorbed into the potato. An early common method of storing food was to cook it in fat, or cook the fat out and let it cool with the fat hardening on top to make an air tight seal. The biggest problem with the fries is consuming so much fat when your body doesn't need that much to burn.

As for getting a child to eat right, who buys the food? Who puts the food in front of the child? I never heard of a child starving himself to death if not given what he demands.
Don't make it a contest of wills. Put the food in front of them at appropriate times, if not eaten in an appropriate time then put it away. Give it to the dog if you don't want to save it for the next meal. Above all, do not yell, coerce, beg, etc; this is breakfast/lunch/dinner, the child will eat sooner or later.

Oh, I SOOOOO agree, OHG! We feed the kids every 3 hours or so, give or take, to keep behavior problems at bay. But if they don't eat the food that's offered when it's offered, well, that's their tough luck. I'm not a short-order cook, and they'll live until the next meal.

They are allowed to put in specific requests politely, and I try to incorporate them when it is convenient (usually within a day or so, depending on what it is and if I need to go to the store). But junk food requests are virtually never honored. That's a special treat, granted only by the capricious whim of the wholly unpredictable parents!

Definitely agreed on that, although sometimes I am a wimp and go for the mac and cheese - frankly I like it myself (horrors!).
I do try to throw some frozen peas into the boiling water at the last minute to perk up the nutrition a bit.
They'll eat peas without cheese all over them, but it saves me using another pot when I am having a really lazy dinner night (mac and cheese from the box is a big clue there...)

I have thought for a long time that if I was having a 'last meal', it would surely include macaroni and cheese (home-made) and chocolate milk.

master of none, I do make concessions on some things.
When GD7 is visiting, no onions are used; she gags over the texture of them. GS9 has always needed his meat cooked very tender, at 5 he was very much like your daughter. But milk provides protein, natural applesauce or other cooked mashed fruit & vegetables is OK, etc. Many of the foods we cook for ourselves could be mashed or chopped finely at the table and mixed with something moist to make it more palatable for kids having a hard time eating textures that require more chewing.

Dark chocolate...especially Guittard chocolate chips!

Two books that may be of interest

For kids with eating issues, I recommnend "How to Get Your Kid to Eat But Not Too Much" which expands on the good suggestions already mentioned here (offer your kids good food, but don't make a big deal about whether they eat it or not; don't short order cook, etc). It is very sane.

For information on the food industry we have been reading "The Omnivore's Dilemma." DS12 still gets bedtime stories, but they are not mostly books I meant to read but didn't have time too. And this was on my list and he didn't object. DS has always been into reading labels, but this book really has gotten us reading very carefully to try to figure out how much corn byproducts we eat in a day. It is very enlightening.

I highly recommned Fast Food Nation (Eric Schlosser) to anyone who hasn't read it. If that book doesn't put you off fast food, nothing will.

Along those lines, the Supersize Me DVD has a long segment showing a long conversation between Eric Schlosser and Morgan Spurlock. It's very interesting.

Val

Keep in mind that 'Fast Food Nation' is primarily PETA propaganda. I'd be at the principals office in a flash if that was shown at school without my prior knowledge.

I just looked up 'The Omnivore's Dilemma' on Amazon.com, and browsed through what was available on line. I spotted this in the first couple pages, 'and "baby" carrots machine-lathed into neatly tapered torpedos'. I'm sorry, but if the author has so little knowledge about baby carrots then I'd doubt if he knew what he was writing about in the rest of the book. Baby carrots are not 'babies', they are mature carrots from varieties bred to grow to a small size. Planted at a high, uniform population and harvested in a timely manner, they will be uniformly small. Ever get a package that had some larger than others? Those tend to be overripe and will be 'woody'.

I was curious, so i looked up baby carrots. This is wikipedia, so take if FWIW. But it looks like there are 2 different ways to get a "baby" carrot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_Carrot

There are 'baby carrots' and 'baby cut carrots'. Here's a link to Burpee's seed catalog for baby carrot seeds.

I'm having a weird sense of deja vu, have we discussed baby carrots here before?

Maybe I'm not getting enough of the book quote to follow you here, but isn't that why he puts "baby" in quotes? To indicate that they are not really babies? And they do peel "baby" carrots on lathe-type machines, right?

I guess I don't understand what he's getting wrong there. I have never read the book.

(Sorry--we crossposted there!)

I didn't take "Fast Food Nation" as PETA propaganda, but rather as a criticism of our unhealthy, high-calorie lifestyle. I'm not a PETA fan myself--their frequent treating of women (never men) as "meat" annoys and offends me, plus I like a good steak and adore bacon!--so if they were trying to "get" me with the documentary, they failed miserably! The film encourages vegetarianism, certainly, and is critical of some of McDonald's business practices. But McDonald's isn't saintly, and I don't really have a problem with encouraging Americans to eat less meat and more veggies. That's just common sense if you look at our typical diet, where fries are the only veggies the average kid eats in a given day! Besides, I think that message is WAY too mild to be PETA-based propaganda! PETA generally has the subtlety of a sledgehammer, IMHO.

I do think the film does a good job of showing how damaging fast food can be to us if eaten more than occasionally (which we still do, even after seeing the film), and that a healthy diet rich in fruits and veggies and whole grains is important to good health.

Did you watch the movie and see PETA's pawprints all over it, OHG? I'm curious about what I missed there...

Diet and its history are very interesting. Thanks to dental foresics, we can trace what people ate and when they ate it.

http://blgtnjew.livejournal.com/74625.html

Opinion on diet:

http://blgtnjew.livejournal.com/75103.html

I think people are made to be opportune eaters - eat what you can find and eat it all.

If PETA was concerned about a healthy diet, then they would petition for WIC to include animal protein sources such as Chicken, Fish and Beef to be included in the program. My SIL is neck deep in trying to change this. Many kids are lactose intolerant, mostly minorities, and this has a huge impact on protein/fat intake and subsequent growth and mental development. Meat is the most nutrient dense food as well.

BTW, I love to look at old photos. There are a lot of hints about diet and lifestyles in them.

http://www.shorpy.com/

I was talking about the BOOK Fast Food Nation. I never picked up any PETA-type messages in it (there was a whole chapter devoted to potatoes, though).

The author also discussed the dangers of marketing fast food to children and was concerned about children eating so much of it. He also said that he "ate an enormous amount of fast food" (page 9) during the two years that he researched the book, so he doesn't sound like he's advocating for PETA. He came across as being pretty balanced.

As a reference to an earlier post about french fries, the ones sold in fast food restaurants (and likely most others) are flavored with a laundry list of additives. The additives give food flavor and make it appear to be fresh longer.

Additives also extend to many other food products; as an example, Fast Food Nation list the (very) many additives that make a Burger King strawberry shake taste like strawberries. You can see the book online at Google books; go to the bottom of page 125 for the list of additives in the Burger King shake.

I'm going to relate this to education by saying that our schools do a woeful job about teaching their students about even the basics of nutrition and why eating non-processed food is so important. Lack of education is a huge reason underlying a lot of problems in this country.

Val

Oh, I couldn't agree with this more, Val! My son ate cheese pizza every single while he was in 1st grade, and his side dish was sugary yogurt. As he has had issues with <ahem> regularity (not to sound like a commercial or anything...), this was NOT a good diet for the boy! And this is a kid who LOVES salmon, broccoli, salad, whole wheat bread, all fruit...But the schools seem to prefer that kids eat everything they took instead of that they eat a little bit of good foods. They prioritized minimizing waste over minimizing waists, if you will.

It was really appalling to me how lousy the nutrition was.

Now it's my turn to agree wholeheartedly. I'm not sure why so many institutions serve such poor food. As a contrast, we visited Mount Rushmore once and everything about the place --- including the food --- was spectacular. They had so much fresh food, I couldn't believe it.

I have a friend who works in a medical school. He's always scratching his head asking why a place with so many heart patients consistently serves fatty high-calorie food. The VA hospitals are the same???

Back to education: I saw a documentary about a special kind of school for at-risk youth a few years ago. One of the school's big platforms was to provide high-quality fresh food for free to the kids. The principal said that the kids were learning better and behaving better in this school than they had at other ones, and he believed that the food was a factor in the improvements.

Val

Oh, I don't doubt that one bit! I'm not a terribly earthy-crunchy person, but I don't know how we can be surprised that a generation of kids living on little more than unpronounceable chemicals and food additives is having behavioral problems! I mean, duh!

OHG, was it you who said that we shouldn't eat things unrecognizable as food to our great-grandparents? For the most part, I think that's right. (Sushi being an exception! )

Ahh, but sushi was recognizable to great-grandparents who were living in Japan, so it counts.

Val

Kriston, I don't remember saying that, but that's not bad advice.

Oh, sorry to attribute to you unfairly. I must have picked it up elsewhere. It just sounded like the sort of wisdom you would pass on and I would agree with, you know?

And good point about the sushi, Val! Thanks for the assist.

I heard that advice (don't eat anything your grandmother wouldn't reconize) from Michael Pollan, author of Omnivore's Dilemma, when he was promoting one of his books. I don't know if it originated with him or not. It is one of the things that stuck in my mind, though, and made me interested in reading his books.

OHG, I have felt that this book has done a good job of descibing some of the issues my family's farm has gone through in terms of market pressures, legislation, big chemical companies, Big food corporations, incentives etc. It is very sympathetic to the farmer (and many no-win situations that they seem to get placed in) and to ordinary folks who might just want to know what they are actually buying at the store. As in the case of the baby carrots, you actually have to be knowledgeable to read the label and know the difference between a "real" baby carrot and a cut baby carrot that has been lathed down. I think that that is really the bigger point he makes in the book--we are so far separated from the point of production, we really have very little idea what our food has been through by the time we buy it. Anyway, if you decide to read farther, I'd be interested in hearing your thought.

I grew up extremely poor and as a result learned poor eating habits. My childhood diet consisted mostly of grilled (government) cheese sandwiches and potatoes. As an adult my poor eating habits caught up with me so I have been trying to learn more about nutrition. I vowed to teach my children better than what I was taught. As I studied, I taught my children. I read a terrific Superfoods book and had my kids create their own Superfoods book. They loved the exercise and learned a lot. I realized I had been successful in teaching my children when I made French Toast for dinner one night (the first time ever). Dd5 looked at me and said, "Mom this in not a nutritious dinner. You need to make something healthier tomorrow." I am still working to improve, but it is hard to break life-long habits.

Last year I ran a garden club at my dd's school. At the beginning of each meeting, we would have a snack and a nutrition/food lesson. It was a great way to introduce the kids (many low-income students) to fresh fruits and vegetables. I was always amazed that they consistently ate everything we brought. I guess it helped that they were always hungry after school. I had several parents tell me how their children were eating fruits and vegetables that they never would eat before, even unusual things (for kids to like) such as grapefruit and blackberries.

I am really strict with breakfast. DD gets 10 ounces of blended fruit, only way she consume fruit, 1/3 cup organic vanilla yogurt with vitamin and 2 organic scrambled eggs.

Then she has some O's or granola on the way to school. In the summer she could eat serious amounts of chips on the beach and she will eat 3 pieces of pizza for dinner, or fries when we eat out. But the breakfast holds her against things I cannot get into her the rest of the day.

And we had a check up 2 days ago. 15% of weight and height for her age.

Ren

Texas Summer, that's great that you ran a garden club, did you tie it in with 4-H or Clover Buds? Did you use outside resources like the Extension Offices, or from this great site, www.kidsgardening.com ?

I thought I'd give a few suggestions on veggies and other healthy foods. My 4 teens are good eaters, but don't think it just happenened! There are plenty of "tricks" I've learned along the way.

How to get them to eat fruits and veggies
1) Have them pick out the fruit trees, bring it home in the car, contribute to digging the holes, fertilizing, watering, spraying (as needed), winterizing, and pruning.
2) With veggies, have them pick out the veggies (pick some fun veggies -like pumpkin/popcorn), weed and till the garden, help with fertilizing, help with planting, weeding, and watering.
3) Ask them to check how things are going and pick anything ready.
4) Teach them how to make recipes with fruit/veggies - jam, cobbler, pizza or spaghetti sauce, broccolli salad, etc.

They will eat almost anything they have worked to grow. It's like magic...really!


If you can't garden for whatever reason (I DO understand this), this also works...it's the magic shortcut.
* Kids decide whether or not they like something the first couple of times they eat it, so...
1) Add butter, salt, cheese, or even a sauce over the veggies, even if there is more butter/cheese than veggies at first.
2) Slowly, lessen the amount of cheese and dressing each time it is served.
3) If asked where the cheese or sauce is, tell them you ran out, but thought they could just eat it with a little salt this time.
4) Serve trays of veggies after school with salad dressing on a hot day
5) Be a good example and carry veggies/fruit with you and offer them some (Grapes and bananas, apple slices, carrots, etc) always works when they are hungry and away from home. Eventually, bring them their own bag of fruits/veggies and comment on how you noticed how much they like Jonathan apples, etc.


Never allowed to eat items:
1) French fries and chips
2) Soda, Kool-Aid, Sunny D, Caprisun, etc.
3) Juice is for special breaksfasts and served in a juice cup
4) Candy is eaten sparingly (But I bake for them several times a week)
5) Fast food - We limit this to Costco and Subway. But very rarely do we eat out.
6) Sparingly on the sausage and bacon.
7) No on donuts, churros, other fried food.

Now that they are teens, I don't need to monitor them as much. Fast food makes two of them gag, with one throwing it up.

If you can introduce it while they are young, and not fuss over it, and not make them something just for their liking....they'll follow your lead, along with a little trick or two.

PS: A great Christmas gift for both the giver (your child) and the receiver is homemade jelly (with your child's name on it), homemade salsa, or a bag of homegrown popcorn! (Corn grows so easily, too!)


It also helps them see others enjoy what they've made from fruits/veggies, furthering a positive relationship/association with fruits/veggies.

Hi Jayne,

I agree that these are great ideas and I suspect they will work for many kids. I guess we can even say they worked for mine, who is finally eating a balanced diet at 13 years. We have grown foods at home and visited farms. He shops with me and helps me cook. We look through recipe books and plan menus. He gets excited about what we buy, what we grow and what we are cooking, but when he tries to eat it, he gags. He says he can hardly wait until he is old enough to be able to enjoy all the foods that we grow and buy.

He has sensory overexcitibilies. Here is one aspect of these.



My DS is just so sensitive to subtle differences in flavor and texture that hiding a food in another food was impossible. At a potluck I grabbed some bread that had butter and a sprig of parsley on it. I took off the parsley before I gave it to him; he had not seen the parsley. He took a big bite of the bread and gagged. He said, "Yuck this has parsley in it." He was 4 years old. We have worked on this gradually, for years, trying to desensitize him and finally he is able to try new foods without throwing them up.

Every kid is different and while these techniques are good ideas. For kids with overexcitibilities the effects may take a really long time to show up. I remember getting so discouraged reading the magazines and books that had all these great ideas and recipes for kids that I knew wouldn't work. I felt like I must be doing something wrong. But I was doing OK. DS was moving in the right direction, just very very slowly!

Hi ACS,
My kids have sensory issues, and I was originally very frustrated with their lack of diversity in their diets as toddlers. But I gathered together many suggestions and these are the ones that worked. Gardening especially has introduced them to a wide variety of veggies. If they work hard enough to get something to grow, I think they're willing to give it a try no matter what, even asparagus and celery which they all had problems with the texture at first.

Another issue is that babies are born with their mouths covered with taste buds. When wine tasting, the reason the tasters whoosh the wine in their mouths is to use the taste buds not on the tongue. This causes foods to be very powerful for babies and toddlers and is why baby food is so bland. If my kids gagged, I'd wait and introduce it later. The taste might not be so strong.

You are so right that it is amazing how sensitive they are at the subtle differences.

I do agree, it takes a long time to ease up on the butter or sauce, but eventually it took.

It also was convenient, since labels like Green Giant, have some veggies with sauces/butter already on them, so I could just microwave it and it would work.

I've heard about hiding veggies in food, but I've never tried that. But I have surprised them with zucchini bread and sweet potato pie...couldn't believe there were veggies really in there.

DS has textural and flavor issues with sauces (and butter doesn't cover over the flavor) so the sauce trick never worked for us. He is a purist and really prefers just one food at a time. And he can taste the zucchini in the bread. I once tried zucchini brownies. A friend swore by this recipe because her kids could never taste the zucchini in it. One bite from DS and he yelled, "Are you trying to poison me? What did you put in here?" It actually took a while to undo the damage of that because from then on he didn't trust me when I gave him a new food. I have been up front with ingredients since then, so if he tries a new food it is something he knows about.

We really did do the gardening pretty seriously. And he fully participated and was excited. But he would still gag and be disappointed because he had wanted to like it. Then he would ask excitedly if we liked it. It was very sweet. And i think we are seeing the payoff now, years later. We kept telling him that tastes change and just because he didn't like it now didn't mean he wouldn't like it later and to keep trying it.

The only thing we tried that worked was freezing the foods. He could eat peas and corn if they were frozen and he ate the whole. Once they thawed though, it was over. I think the cold blocked the taste.

I guess my point is that there are lots of useful tricks, but no magic bullet. I know I got a lot of harsh looks and strong judgments from other parents who didn't have this problem. I don't want other people to feel bad. If you child has taste overexcitibility, you may just have to do what you can and then wait it out.

My mom used to feed us frozen veggies straight from the freezer as a snack food.

Cathy, I do the same thing with my DS. We started with frozen peas and green beans when he was three or four. I think he still prefers peas that way. They taste great on a hot summer day. What other veggies did she try frozen?

I also have a friend that pours yogurt (organic) into popsicle molds for the freezer. Her kids think that they are getting away with eating ice cream for breakfast. While that is a great way to get them to eat dairy for breakfast, I'm not sure what habits that teaches them in the long run, though???? I'm picturing a 20-something-year-old kid eating a bowl of ice cream for breakfast and saying, "But my mom let me eat ice cream for breakfast all the time growing up!" Sometimes the cleverest ideas that we have as parents look positively insane years down the road!

She mostly gave us frozen peas and corn. You can make "popsicles" out of all kinds of things. You can peel a banana, put a stick in it and freeze it.

You can add fiber to yogurt by topping it with bran buds or similar cereal.

My mom used to make her own applesauce from scratch and freeze batches of it for later in the year. She'd pull it out and warm it so we could eat it, but it never defrosted all the way in the middle. So though it was not on a stick, we would eat what we called "applesicles": icy in the middle and warm on the outside. Yum!

I never tried frozen peas with my kids...hmmm...

Kriston, "applesicles" sounds delicious. I'll have to give it a try!

Somehow, eating frozen veggies seemed more apparent to me than eating frozen fruit, which is odd, now that I think about it. I'll have to give frozen bananas a try too. Thanks! Hmmm... I have a whole bag of frozen blueberries that I use in my hot cereal in the morning. Maybe I'll have to go snitch one and see how it tastes frozen?

I read an interesting book recently called Twinkie, Deconstucted. It is not only about highly processed food and where it comes from. It applies to almost every food that we eat now, which is rather sad. The book takes the ingredient list for the Twinkie and devotes a chapter to each ingredient, starting with the first ingredient: wheat flour. He goes to the farm where the wheat flour that ultimately ends up in a Twinkie is grown. He describes holding in his hand the bright pastel shades of the wheat seeds encased in a protective shell of Round-up pesticide. He then takes the reader through the process of harvesting the wheat, shipping the wheat off to the grain milling plant, removing the outer bran from the wheat, and then the bleaching that is involved. The next chapter takes the reader to China, where you see the factory where they synthesize from chemicals the vitamins which they add back into the wheat flour. And so forth. Every chapter walks the reader through the entire process of how that particular ingredient is grown or made. It is really an eye-opening view into our world of food.

Yes, I should read that book, E-beth, I need to lose more weight. Sounds like a great dieting tool!

Applesicles do sound good, I could definately handle that. I don't know about peea-sicles, though.........




No disrespect, but I try not to "trick" my kids, especially concerning food. They're pretty darn smart and you never know what they are processing and on what level and how it will effect them.

I throw stuff in sometimes if it's not utterly unexpected. Like I'll put shredded zucchini in my pasta sauce. They can see it if they look hard, but there's no discernible taste (even to them!) and in tiny shreds like that, there's no real textural effect on the sauce. But I often change up my pasta sauce, and they don't ask "What's in this?" very often. (When they do, it's usually because they think it's really good!) So I don't think it matters much to them.

I try not to make things too weird though. It's not worth the trust issues.

Never using recipes helps! They don't expect my food to always be the same. And both my boys say they want to become chefs when they grow up (as well as engineers, race car drivers, chemists, architects, etc., etc.), so I think I'm doing okay.

I like to play with food and try new things, so they do, too. I think that's a big key in our family. Food is fun!

And I should note that my kids aren't terribly picky eaters. I think acs is right that some kids are just easier with food than others, and no amount of tricks, cajoling or techniques will change some of those tough cases. I always feel like parents get blamed for that: those who feed their kids nothing but McNuggets from birth deserve it, but those poor parents who are doing everything they can to teach good eating and are just stuck with kids who won't eat are unfairly blamed.

I just love these kinds of books.

First of all, Round up ready wheat is not yet on the market. Its still under development.

Second, Round up is not a pesticide. It is an herbicide. It breaks down in days under normal growing conditions. It is so safe that many environmental organizations use it to control invasive species.

"Glyphosate itself is practically nontoxic by ingestion or by skin contact. The acute oral toxicity of Roundup is > 5,000 mg/kg in the rat.[24] It showed no toxic effects when fed to animals for 2 years, and only produced rare cases of reproductive effects when fed in extremely large doses to rodents and dogs. It has not demonstrated any increase in cancer rates in animal studies and is poorly absorbed in the digestive tract. Glyphosate has no significant potential to accumulate in animal tissue."

Without it, older herbicides would be used - atrazine is one - and there would be increased tillage and greater amounts of fert used - so its a VERY GOOD tradeoff.

As far as twinkies go, my favorite twinkie story is the one involving the San Fran city council.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twinkie_defense

I certainly think more of this is hard-wired than I had originally thought. Before DS was on solids, I was rather confident and smug that I would not have one of those picky eaters. DH and I eat tons of healthy foods, lots of fresh fruits and veggies, whole grains, hardly any processed foods and that would just be what DS ate too because there weren't other options in the house. It seemed so easy.

And what was the punishment for my smugness? A kid who gagged when he even touched a noodle with his hands. A kid who looked sceptically at anything new, a child who could discern a submicroscopic green speck a mile a way, a child who lived almost exclusively on milk products, bread, apple sauce, and bananas for the first 8 years of his life. But an energetic, happy, tall, thin, kid who never gets sick. Go figure!

Well, be fair there, Austin. ebeth was recounting her memory of the book, not quoting from it. I presume she's not a farmer, and so she may not have gotten the details quite right.

Please be sure that you're taking issue with the book, and not attacking her memory of it. (Said the middle-aged woman who is amazed at how many things she can forget in a day...)

Hey, acs, does he have allergies or food sensitivities (like lactose intolerance or glutin issues)?

I always wonder if some of this pickiness is there for a reason...

No allergies that we ever found, except pollens.

What we found interesting was that he never put toys or anything non-food in his mouth. There was never a worry about poisoning or choking with him. I see babies chewing on all kinds of things and I think it looks so weird, even though I know it is normal.

He is also what I would call a food person. He knows what people are eating, what is in everything. He reads recipes for fun and looks forward to helping make stuff he would never eat himself.

I cannot imagine for a second getting away with zucchini in the pasta sauce; he flipped out when he saw a tiny tiny speck of basil once. Not that it matters, really, because the pasta sauce was a new addition in the last couple years, anyway, but I would be a fool to try to add a green thing to it. This kid has laser vision for the green flecks.

DS7 was the same way about never putting things in his mouth. After about 6 months or so, it just was never an issue. He did suck his thumb--especially when he was thinking about something or studying how something worked--but he just didn't mouth toys. However, he is my "I'll try any food" kid, so I don't think that was a sensitivity issue so much as the fact that he's a really visual kid and he liked his thumb a lot.

DS4 did mouth stuff, so it was a real adjustment when he came along! Of course he also managed to reach up inside the fireplace stove, into the wall and pull out a handful of fiberglass insulation when he was a little over a year old. We didn't know that was even possible! The room had been childproofed for 4 years by that time! And when he was about 18mos., he locked me out of my bedroom. By the time I got the door open, he had pennies in one hand, his arm was wet to the elbow from the toilet, and he was reaching for the outlet with the other hand. No exaggeration! All he was missing for the "child kills self with exploration" hat trick was a bottle of something poisonous waiting to be guzzled! I would have thought it was a made-up story if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes!!!

Sorry to digress...My point is that the 4yo adventure nut who knows no fear is my picky eater. My 7yo cautious, responsible kid with food allergies will eat whatever I put in front of him--and we eat some unusual things compared to most Americans!--and ask for seconds and thirds.

Weird.

Some people are "supertasters".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supertaster

They actually have more tastebuds and taste bitter flavors more strongly. Many green vegetables taste bitter to supertasters.

Thank you Austin!

Kriston is right in that I read the book over a year ago and was quoting from memory. It is not an pro-environmental, anti-pesticide, organic-hugging book at all. I was merely trying to point out the level of care and detail that the author goes to in researching the ingredients. It is hard to imagine that one could write an entire chapter on "wheat flour". You grow it, you harvest it, you mill it... what else is there to say? Just wait until he gets to the polysorbate 20 chapter. (*note* I am also remembering this from over a year ago, so take the last sentence with a grain of salt, please!)

I found the book fascinating from a food allergy point of view, since we have major food allergies. He shows you how a soy or corn product will come down a manufacturing line and split into food and non-food production items.

Interesting. I was intrigued by the list of most offensive foods. I am not a picky eater and never have been. But I do gag on Brussel sprouts and Kale, even now. And I do not like coffee or chocolate because they are so bitter.

So maybe he did get it from me--I have always blamed DH!

Understood.

Me. I cannot stand coffee (love the smell) and olives taste weird to me. I can tell when food is starting to spoil by smell or taste when no one else can. I cannot handle sour candy at all. Alcohol in small amounts if at all - love the buzz, but after a few sips, it turns me off. I can taste very small amounts of impurities in food such as detergent or bleach left over from cleaning or other contaminants like oil that no one else can. Moldy smells, smoke, urine - all jump out at me.


I am very anti-pesticide myself. I studied the use of chemical weapons in the Army and hate them and most pesticides are the same thing as are most herbicides.

Food is VERY interesting stuff. Most industries will give tours. I got a tour of a cheese plant once. They make hundreds of tons of it a day in giant vats. You see all the care that goes into making it and then get to taste it at the end - and its quite good!

OTOH, I love the dairy ads where they show cows on grass, when most dairies are using prepared rations now. Nothing wrong with that and its probably better for the cows, but still - its misleading.

Soy is an interesting substance. A good friend's son was a vegetarian and ate a lot of soy. He ended up with issues related to the hormone mimics in soy and had to go off it onto grass-fed beef and fish and is now OK.

I wonder if some people are "super receptors" for some things??

My DS4 can't stand the smell of peanuts and peanut butter. He asks us to go eat a mint or something if he smells it on our breath.

Here's where I learned about supertasters:
TMBG - John Lee Supertaster

(I have learned many many things from They Might Be Giants!)

Thanx for all the great suggestions... My sister tried a few of them but her husband found the easiest solution.. He brought home this new drink called Wat-aah and my nephew just loves it.. http://www.drinkwataah.com/ .. but sometimes she does have to add a lemon when he gets stubborn again..

That's great you've found something that's working. Is it the graphics on the bottle he likes then? Maybe you could let him pick out a cool Sigg bottle or two, and keep them filled in the fridge. Would save money and landfill in the long run.

http://www.sigg.com/index.php?id=46&L=1