How Much is Enough Food?

Rarely do I give a workshop on introducing solid foods to babies or feeding toddlers and preschoolers (including picky eaters) where a parent doesn’t ask how much food they should feed their child. It’s quite an easy question for me to answer. And, the answer applies to any meal or snack for a child of any age:

As much as they are hungry for.

If this answer surprises you, you’re not alone. This answer usually is met with confused faces. So, let me expand. As the adult, it’s your role to provide opportunities to eat 5 or 6 times a day. It’s your child’s role to choose how much to eat.

I recognize that it’s difficult to trust them to know how much to eat. But it really is best to do so.

We’re born being able to know when we are hungry and when we are satisfied. Over time, through social pressures, we learn to not listen to our bodies and instead look to external cues for how much to eat. This is associated with higher rates of eating disorders and obesity.

Studies show that when kids are raised in households where they’re told to stop eating before they’re satisfied (i.e. because the adult believes that their child has “had enough”), they learn to sneak food and gorge on food when they get the opportunity.

On the flip side, when kids are forced to eat more than they are hungry for, they learn to over-ride their bodies’ signals and they learn to overeat.

Instead, trust your child to listen to their bodies and eat as much as their bodies tell them. Expect this to vary from day-to-day. Some days they’ll eat so much that you don’t know where they’re putting it all. Other days they’ll eat so little that you won’t know where they’re getting their energy from. I recommend serving a very small portion. If kids want more, allow them to have seconds.

You’ll know that your child is getting enough to eat when they have lots of energy and their growth is tracking along their curve on their growth chart.

Picky Eater Tip: Be Good Company

When kids enjoy being at the family table, they’ll eat better. Period. This is a strategy for dealing with kids who are picky eaters (fussy eaters) that is amazingly powerful, yet seldom used. When the families whom I work with adopt this tip they love it. It immediately makes meal times way less stressful (for everyone). Everyone is freed up to enjoy the meal.

This strategy has the power to create the family meals for that you wish for. Yet, if you’re like most of the parents I meet, you feel that you need to be doing more to be good a good Mom or Dad. You’re under the impression that to do a good job of parenting your child around food, you need to cajole them into eating their veggies. To refuse allowing seconds of rice/noodles unless they take 2 more bites of their meat.

If this rings true for you, I have big news. You don’t have to be the food police. Your job is to plan, prepare, and provide meals and snacks. And, to join your child at the table to lead the way in creating a positive environment.

How to do this? Be good company. Have pleasant conversations. Yes, that includes having pleasant conversations with your partner too – your child doesn’t have to be the centre of your attention for every second of the meal.

What to talk about? Choose any topic except the food you’re eating. One of my favourites is to play good thing, bad thing. This game is also known by many other names. What it involves is everyone at the table taking turns telling about the best and worst things about their day. Even preschoolers love playing this game. And you’ll connect as a family.

No, this doesn’t mean that magically you’ll no longer be concerned about your child’s nutrition. It seems paradoxical, but the more you back off telling your children how many bites they need to eat, the better they’ll eat. Kids respond positively to you removing the pressure. Hunger motivates kids to eat. You don’t need to. When you follow this “be good company” strategy, it’s a weight off your shoulders and it’s empowering for your children.

When kids enjoy being at the family table, they’ll eat better. Period.

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My kid used to eat just about everything…

Does this sound familiar?

“My kid used to eat just about everything and anything but she stopped eating meat all of a sudden. She's now 2.”

This, hands-down, is the single most common question that parents come to me wondering. Well, it’s not always meat that their children suddenly won’t eat. It may be vegetables, fruit, or most foods (i.e. they’ll only eat something like 5 foods).

If you’ve recently experienced this, the good news is that you’re not alone!

Most (but not all) kids will happily eat almost everything when you’re first introducing solid foods. From about 6 months onwards, these happy babies keenly gobble up most foods you put in front of them. In fact, they’re delighted with all the different textures, shapes, and tastes that you introduce to them.

Then, all of a sudden, something changes. This change can happen as young as 9 months, and most commonly happens somewhere between 18 months – 2 years.

Welcome to the picky eating stage.

It’s a completely normal developmental stage that most kids go through.

No, you didn’t cause your great little eater to suddenly “hate” foods that she loved previously. If you’re like most of the parents I’ve worked with, I know that I need to tell you to turn down the volume of the Mommy-guilt (or Daddy-guilt) voice in your head that’s telling you that it’s all your fault, that you did something wrong to cause this. That you “broke” your child. Let me tell you definitively: you didn’t.

The science doesn’t tell us why kids all of a sudden become picky. Some scientists have theorized that it’s a protective thing. From back when we lived in caves. At this age infants become toddlers and start wandering away from parents. It would be evolutionarily protective to have kids become scared to put random (i.e. potentially poisonous) plants in their mouths. It’s an interesting theory but who knows if this is true.

What I do know is that picky eating is a developmental stage. Kids become wary of foods. They honestly become scared to try things (yes, even if they’ve eaten them before). They don’t have the language skills to tell you that they’re feeling trepidatious about trying that food. So they simply say “I hate it!” (before they’ve even tried it.

The good news is that you don’t just have to wait until your daughter or son grows out of this stage. You can support them to be confident enough to try new foods, to increase the range of foods that they’ll eat, and to get the good nutrition that they need.

The bad news is that I can’t solve your question in 1 short and snappy blog post. I can, however, point you in the right direction.

As first steps, I encourage you to:

• Continue serving your child small servings of every food that you eat in your household.
• Role model eating these foods by joining your child at as many meals and snacks as possible.
• Plan meals and snacks that include both familiar and challenging foods.

And of course, keep your eyes on your peeled for other strategies I'll share to help your picky eater transition smoothly through this difficult phase (while ensuring that they’re meeting their nutrition needs).

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My Least Popular (But Very Effective) Picky Eater Tip

I’ve been doing workshops for parents on picky eating for 8 years now. At every single picky eater seminar there is one strategy that always causes resistance with the parents in the audience. I continue to share it because it’s a very powerful strategy for minimizing picky eating. Yet I can almost hear the thud it makes when I describe it and it lands on the floor. The problem for which it’s a solution? How to get kids (particularly toddlers and preschoolers) to stay at the table for meals. It’s the solution for meals that go on and on forever because your child sits down, takes one bite, then pops up from the table to do something terribly important, then returns to the table, takes another bite, pops up from the table (and so on and so on).

So, what’s this successful, but unpopular strategy? Create a rule that all meals and snacks are eaten when sitting down. In other words: Stop. Eat. Then Continue On. Yes, I do mean snacks too. You may wonder why I continue to share this strategy knowing that it’ll be so unpopular. I share it because it really is successful for supporting kids to do a good job of eating. If we allow the common practice of letting kids eat snacks “on the run”, i.e. while in the car, in the stroller, you chasing them around the house spooning bite after bite into their mouths, we’re teaching kids that there is an alternative to sitting still at a table to eat. As seen through a toddler’s or preschooler’s eyes:

“Why is it that sometimes can I eat while playing. But other times I’m told that I have to stop playing and sit at a table to eat (which is bo-ring).”

Create the expectation that all meals and snacks are eaten sitting down. In families who set this expectation, kids come to the table when called. They eat. Then, they continue on with their day (i.e. go back to playing). Meals and snack go much more smoothly and are less stressful because the kids aren’t constantly getting up from the table.

I understand the initial resistance that you may have to this strategy. In our super busy lives, how are we supposed to carve out time to stop and eat snacks? And it seems like I’m saying that you can never leave the house again, because you always need to be home to give snacks. Not true. Let me clarify.

Does this mean that you never get to leave the house again? No. In the summer this is especially easy. Stop at the park bench, picnic table, or spread out a blanket and enjoy a snack. Use similar ingenuity at indoor locations. For example, you can stop at the bench in the recreation centre foyer or use a table at the food court at the mall.

The important point is to stop. Don’t feed your child in the stroller, car seat, etc. And, don’t hand out a snack while your child continues playing. I know that it’s tempting to do so in our busy lives. But, it sets you up for more battles at meals and snacks. What seems like an efficient use of time in the immediate, actually costs you more time in the long run. In families who establish the stop-to-eat expectation, meals and snacks are very quick. And, they are much more pleasant. When it’s meal and snack time the kids simply get down to the business of eating.

Simply put: Stop. Eat. Then, continue on.

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Where to Start with School-Age Picky Eaters

Being known as the picky eater dietitian, people expect that I work with toddlers and preschoolers. It’s true, many, if not most, of the families I work with have 2 – 5 year olds. But I also work with parents of school-age picky eaters. These parents thought that picky eating was just a phase that their kids would grow out of. But now their little ones aren’t so little, and they are still picky. Often what sparks these parents to contact me is their child expresses anxiety about social situations because of the food. They don’t want to go to birthday parties and sleep-overs because they are worried that there won’t be anything for them to eat.

The good news is that we certainly can help these kids to become less picky and more confident with food. The bad news is that change is slower at this age than when working with younger kids.

When working with school-age kids my approach is even more individualized than with toddlers and preschoolers because of their more advanced developmental stage. However, the actions in these family’s plans always start in the same place. If you’ve got a school-age child who didn’t grow out of picky eating, here’s where to start.

Challenge School-Age Picky Eater’s Self-Identity

Ford said (I may be paraphrasing a bit here):

“Whether you believe you can, or you believe you can’t, you’re right”.

These kiddos have a self-identity that they are picky; that they don’t try new foods. Therefore, we need to change their self-belief before they’ll be open to trying new foods. One simple, but powerful way to do this is to change how you speak about your child and food. As a caregiver, you are incredibly important for shaping how a child thinks about him- or herself. Stop calling your child “picky” or “fussy”. Stop saying things about food like “you won’t like this” or “I know that you won’t try that”. Yikes, talk about a self-fulfilling prophesy. Instead, say things that open up the possibility of change. Say things that communicate your belief that they will learn to like new foods. Examples include “you don’t like it yet” or “your taste buds change as you get older. You may want to try it again.”

School-Age Picky Eaters: Provide Opportunities to Try New Foods

You likely stopped serving your child new foods long ago because they never ate them and it seemed futile. However, if kids are never served new foods, how are they going to eat new foods? It’s like saying that you won’t take your child to the pool until they know how to swim. Herein lies the rub. Your child won’t learn to swim unless you take them to the pool, many times, and they take swimming lessons. Learning to like new foods works the same way. Kids need to see them and try them many times before they learn to like them. Now you’ve likely been serving your child a different meal from the rest of the family for many years. Suddenly switching to making one meal for the whole family and expecting your child to eat everything isn’t the answer. A successful, and gentle, first step is to use a strategy that I call the share plate. This means serving at least one food in a meal on a plate or in a bowl in the middle of the table from which everyone can serve themselves. Other terms for this are “family style” or “Chinese style”. Encourage everyone in the family, your fussy eater included, to serve themselves from this plate/ bowl if they wish. An example is to serve some cut-up fruit on a share plate at breakfast. This strategy works because it provides your picky eater with an opportunity to try something new if they choose so. But, it doesn’t force them to try it. It also communicates with your actions what I shared above – that you believe that your child will, one day, join your family in enjoying these foods.

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Don’t Make this #1 Mistake with Picky Eaters

The most common mistake with picky eaters that I see parents make is that they stop serving their kids foods that they don’t eat. I understand why parents make this choice. It seems futile to go to the effort of making food only for your child to ignore it. Or, loudly announce that they hate it. Or, melt down from just seeing it on their plate. It seems like a waste of your precious time, a waste of food, a waste of money, never mind the heartbreaking feeling that your child is rejecting you. However, stopping serving the dreaded vegetables/ meat /[insert the foods your child doesn’t eat] is the wrong way to go.

I like to give non-food analogies because food is such an emotional issue that it can be hard to see what’s going on. So here’s my non-food analogy for kids and challenging foods:

Deciding that you’ll serve your child vegetables [insert the foods your child doesn’t eat] once they like them is like deciding that you’ll take your child to the pool once they know how to swim. Of course, you need to take your child to the pool so that they can learn how to swim. They aren’t going to suddenly wake up one morning knowing how to swim.

The same goes for foods your child doesn’t like. They won’t learn to like them if they never see them. Research shows that kids need to try foods somewhere between 10 – 30 times before they learn to like them. That doesn’t count the number of times that a child needs to see a food before they’re willing to try it. Of course each child and each food is going to vary in the magical number of times. I just learned to like Brussels sprouts last year and trust me, I’ve tried them way more than 30 times.

A study showed that parents usually give up after trying 5 times. So you haven’t even made it to the minimum number of presentations never mind the top end of the average range.

So what’s the solution? Plan meals that include both safe foods and challenging foods. One meal for the whole family that includes at least one safe food for your child. Yes, if you have more than one child you will need to include safe foods for each of them. What should the challenging foods be? Foods that you eat in your family. This way you aren’t making separate foods just for your child, which, when they aren’t eaten, feels like that waste of time. You’re cooking food that you’ll eat. If the kids don’t eat it – then more leftovers for you! No wasted time, food, or money.

The powerful word in this situation is “yet”.

Your kids don’t like it yet.

Serving a food again and again is how they learn to like it. Just like how a child who is starting swimming lessons doesn’t know how to swim yet.

Keep up with the practice and trust that your child will get there.

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What’s the Right Age to Start Solid Foods?

Parents have been sending me a lot of questions lately asking what is the right age to start introducing their baby to solid foods. They’ve heard 6 months before. Now they’re hearing 4 months from other health professionals. And, some places online say 4 – 6 months. They’re right to be confused with all this conflicting information. If you’re wondering what age to start your baby on sold foods, here’s the scoop…

The recommendations haven’t changed. The World Health Organization recommends 6 months¹. In Canada the recommendations from Health Canada, the Canadian Pediatric Society, Dietitians of Canada and the Breastfeeding Committee for Canada say 6 months². The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends “around 6 months”³.

I suspect that reports from a new, and important, study on preventing peanut allergy are behind the advice that these health professionals are giving parents. Now I’m not in the doctor’s office when the parents are being given this advice, so this is a best guess. But the study is being talked about a lot in the health provider community, which is why I’m suspecting it’s behind the advice that parents are receiving. Unfortunately the researchers chose to use a phrase that I’m suspecting is creating some of this confusion.

The research study found a significant decrease in peanut allergy with their intervention⁴. What was their intervention? To introduce, and regularly feed, peanuts to children starting as babies versus waiting until they were 5 years old. Giving peanuts to the babies reduced the incidence of peanut allergy. But here’s where I suspect the misunderstanding comes in. The children in the “early” introduction of peanuts group were between 4 – 11 months old. Because this is “early” versus introducing peanuts at 5 years old. The article doesn’t compare introducing peanuts at 4 months versus 6 months. However, I suspect that busy health professionals could have glanced at articles describing the study and mistakenly concluded that the “early” group meant introducing peanuts at 4 months versus 6 months of age. Especially, since the researchers didn’t report the older children’s age as 5 years, but as 60 months.

The reality is that the scientific and health communities still don’t know anything definitive about the perfect age to introduce solid foods to minimize food allergy.

What we do know is that babies start to run low on the iron that they’ve stored in their bodies at approximately 6 months of age. And so it’s at this time that we need to start introducing iron from a new source, i.e. solid foods. Iron is important for brain development in babies and young children.

And, babies show the signs of being ready to start solid foods between 4 – 6 months. Just like every other developmental stage, babies arrive here at slightly different ages. The signs of readiness for eating solid foods are:

• The disappearance of the extrusion reflex.

• The ability to sit up (with support) and hold their own head up (without support).

• Can visually track your movement.

• Becoming fascinated with watching people eating.

As we learn more about what causes food allergies and how to prevent them, the recommendations may change. There are some fantastic studies underway that I can’t wait to get the results from. Until we know more, I still recommend starting solid foods at about 6 months. If your little one is between 4 – 6 months, you’re seeing all the signs of readiness, and you’re keen to start – go ahead. If you enjoy the simplicity of breast or bottle feeding or you’re not yet seeing the signs of readiness in your child, hold off until 6 months of age. My advice for the last 7 years has been “start solids at about 6 months”. I’m not changing my advice yet.

References:

1. http://www.who.int/nutrition/topics/complementary_feeding/en/

2. http://healthycanadians.gc.ca/healthy-living-vie-saine/infant-care-soins-bebe/nutrition-alimentation-eng.php?_ga=1.150740528.74375254.1447739252

3. https://www.aap.org/en-us/advocacy-and-policy/aap-health-initiatives/HALF-Implementation-Guide/Age-Specific-Content/Pages/Infant-Food-and-Feeding.aspx

4. http://www.leapstudy.co.uk

Does the 1-Bite Rule Work?

Many families use the 1-bite rule at mealtimes. What’s the 1-bite rule? It’s when there is a family rule that kids need to try 1 bite of every food on their plate. Other names for this rule include the “no thank you bite” and the “polite bite”.

I get a lot of people asking me whether or not it’s a good strategy. The answer is: it depends.

What does it depend on? Two things:

1. Your child’s temperament
2. That it’s okay to not like a food

Your Child’s Temperament

Temperament is the term used to describe the inherent way that a child responds emotionally and behaviourally to challenges or new situations. We usually use the term “personality”. Some children are more outgoing, some more reserved. Some are more adventurous, while some like to sit back and observe before taking action. All of these temperaments are normal—but they do influence how your child approaches eating.

The 1-bite rule works well for kids who are more adventurous because they are more comfortable jumping into new situations. For reserved kids, forcing them to take action before they’re ready just causes them to dig their heels in further and become more resistant to trying new foods. Most of the time when parents hire me to work with their family, their kids have a more reserved temperament. We remove the 1-bite rule and the child is allowed to proceed at his own pace. Once he trusts that he truly is in control, he’ll try new foods on his own.

That it’s Okay to Not Like a Food

It’s so easy to do. You’ve racked your brain to figure out what new recipe your family will enjoy, grocery shopped, and prepared the dish. So, when she tries her 1 bite, out you blurt “It’s good right?” or perhaps you say “See, it’s not so bad. Try another bite”. I’ve also heard well-meaning Dads say “See, your Mom is a good cook.” Because you’ve put so much effort and love into the dish, you want your family to enjoy it. The unfortunate side effect is that this pressure will make your little one less likely to try something. Because now she not only has to try it –she has to like it too.

In general I don’t recommend the 1-bite rule. Kids are smart. They understand that when you serve food, you want them to eat it. If you do choose to have the 1-bite rule in your family, make sure that your child is the adventurous type and it truly needs to be okay for your child to try a food and not like it.

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Spitting Out is OKAY

While it may be considered poor table manners (and perhaps somewhat gross) to spit food back out, it’s actually a good strategy for helping picky eaters gain the confidence to try new foods. Yes, spitting out is okay.

For toddlers and preschoolers, trying a new food is scary. One way to make it less scary is to know that if you do choose to put something in your mouth, and it doesn’t taste good (or has a “yucky” texture), you can spit it back out.

For some picky eaters, “tasting” the food by touching it to their outstretched tongue is even less intimidating than putting the food in their mouths. This too is okay. Because it’s them taking steps towards trying the new food.

Now just because you allow food to be spit back out, doesn’t mean that you need to allow the drama that often goes along with it – the loud exclamation of “yucky!” and over-exaggerated action of spitting the food back out (perhaps accompanied by the classic wiping of the tongue to get rid of the “disgusting” taste).

Even young children can be taught how to politely take food out of their mouths without the fanfare. And, as they get a little bit older, you can teach them how to subtly spit the food into their napkin.

Bottom Line: Spitting food back out is okay. Making a big fuss about it isn’t.

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Be Careful What You Say to Picky Eaters

You need to be careful when it comes to talking with picky eaters, toddlers and preschoolers, about food. Words are powerful. What you say can help kids open up to trying new foods. Or, it can backfire and make them more resistant to trying new foods. So what are the right and wrong things to say? It’s likely not what you think.

Right Things to Say to Picky Eaters:

Do use creative marketing. There’s nothing like an unfamiliar word to make a kid say “I hate it!” before they even try a food. On the other hand, kids respond both to fun names and descriptive terms. Use their extremely keen observation skills to your advantage by using familiar and descriptive terms. For example, broccoli can be “little trees”. Name a dish after your child’s favourite superhero.

Here’s a great example that a friend of mine shared with me recently. Her son is 4. A couple of months ago she announced that dinner was lasagna. She hadn’t served her son lasagna before so he responded with the classic “Yuck, I want something else.” As a friend of mine, she knows better than to believe him and make something different. Instead, she put a piece on his plate and while he was watching she said “see, it’s pasta cake” and separated it into it’s different layers. Her son knows what pasta is. And, he definitely knows what cake is. Sure enough, once he saw that “lasagna” was something that he recognized, he happily ate it. So far, her son won’t eat lasagna. But he happily eats “pasta cake”. As he matures, he’ll become comfortable with the word “lasagna”. Until then she’ll happily include “pasta cake” in the family meal repertoire.

Wrong Things to Say to Picky Eaters:

Don’t talk about the nutritional benefits of a food. Most parents I work with and who attend my workshops unfortunately get this one wrong. Of course you care about healthy eating. You think about it when you choose what foods to serve. But don’t talk about it with your child. Studies show that if kids are taught about how healthy a food is, they are less likely to try it. And, if they do try it, they rate the taste as yuckier than if nothing was said. So, as tempting to talk about how the broccoli will make your child grow big and strong, make the effort to zip it. In this case, your actions speak louder than words. By serving broccoli, and eating it yourself, you are teaching your child that they should eat broccoli. No words are needed.

Don’t call multiple dishes by the same term. Toddlers and preschoolers are not yet able to classify things. It’s just not where they are at developmentally. Sure, we adults can use the term “fish” to mean salmon and halibut and tuna. While these foods all have very different tastes and textures, we adults can use one word “fish” to refer to them all. The developmental stage for toddlers and preschoolers means that they use a word to refer to one very specific thing. Very specific. If you use the word “fish” to mean “halibut” then that’s what they expect. If you then say “we’re having fish” and serve them salmon, they’ll freak out. Because you lied. The food in front of them is something very different than halibut – that’s obvious to see. And their natural reaction is to not want to try it. Instead, use the technique that I shared above. If you’ve always called halibut “fish” and you want to serve salmon, call it “pink fish”.

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Will Kids Starve Themselves?

Some sayings are true. Some aren’t. You’ve likely heard people say “kids won’t starve themselves”. I hear it all the time. And, I rarely read an online conversation about picky eaters where someone doesn’t say this. Unfortunately this is one of those sayings that just isn’t true.

Will Kids Starve Themselves? Yes, Sometimes.

For some picky eaters, mealtimes have become very stressful. They’re left between the two choices of 1) being hungry or 2) facing the stressful meal situation. Some kids choose to go hungry. Yes, in other words, they starve themselves.

These kids either aren’t eating enough foods and their growth starts to falter. Or, they eat such a narrow variety that they aren’t getting the nutrients they need (even if they’re getting lots of calories).

Now the answer to the problem is not to force kids to eat more. Let me repeat that very loud and clear: THE SOLUTION IS NOT TO FORCE KIDS TO EAT MORE. More often than not that approach just increases kids’ stress, causing them to eat less.

Stress

What causes this stress? There can be many causes. That’s why I do a full assessment when working with families, because it’s important to identify and address the root cause. Some kids are sensitive souls who need to approach new foods gradually. Some kids are at a boundary-pushing stage and choose to engage parents in a battle of wills. Some kids miss out on learning specific chewing skills and find a variety of foods difficult to eat. Some kids have texture sensitivity and find certain food textures unappealing. I could go on listing causes.

I want to be really transparent here. I went back and forth many times about whether or not to write this article. I don’t write this to cause you more panic. The last thing that I want to do is cause more mommy guilt because guilt and shame get in the way of making change. I’m writing this because I do see kids who are starving themselves. So I feel the need to address the myth that’s spouted so very, very often by well-meaning advice givers.

Will Kids Grow Out of Picky Eating?

I also write this because I see so many families who could use my services. But they don’t seek help because they think that their child will “grow out of” their picky eating and that “kids won’t starve themselves”.

Lastly I write this because sometimes I see clients whose child is 7, 8, 9, or 10 years old and who is still a picky eater. Creating change for these kids is really, really hard (and progress is painstakingly slow). I wish so much that I could turn back the clock and work with these families when their kids are 2 and 3 years old. Not only could we prevent years of poor nutrition and stress for the child, we could have alleviated stress for the whole family. Because the whole family is affected when feeding isn’t going well with one child.

What’s important is that if feeding isn’t going well, you look for a solution to the problem. Don’t believe this myth that kids won’t starve themselves.

Check out my book where I share my simple-step-by-step solution for picky eaters (2-5 years old).

Picky Eater Success Strategy: Deconstructed Dishes

This is a favourite picky eater success strategy. It really can help you make one meal for the whole family. I have no idea why many kids don’t like their foods to touch. Another mystery that stumps me is why when sauces touch foods it’s considered unacceptable, but dipping is fun and yummy.

These are just 2 of the common great unsolved mysteries of young children’ eating habits. You’ll drive yourself crazy if you try to figure out why it is this way. It’s equally futile to try to rationalize with your child about how peas that have touched chicken are no different than peas that haven’t touched chicken.

So don’t waste your time (and brain cells). Leave it be and trust that (eventually) they’ll grow out of it.

In the meantime you aren’t relegated to eating sauce-free meals. Or, making your child a completely different dish every night. Instead, serve your child deconstructed dishes.

Picky Eater Success Strategy: Deconstructed Dishes

What I mean by “deconstructed” is to serve your child all the same components of your meal – but in a manner so that they aren’t touching. Take a beef and broccoli stir-fry for example. Cook a small amount of the meat, broccoli, and other veggies in the pan before you add the sauce. Remove them and set aside. Continue cooking the stir-fry with the rest of the ingredients and sauce. On your child’s plate place each of the items so that they are not touching each other, i.e. some beef, broccoli, other veggies, plain rice, and a small amount of sauce (perhaps in a dipping container like a small ramekin or saucer). And, place a very small amount of the stir-fry with all the foods touching with the sauce on it (like you are eating it).

“Deconstructed” meals are a fantastic compromise because they:

• Allow you to eat a wide variety of dishes.

• Allow your child to join you in sharing dishes.

• Make your child feel confident with food because he has control over what ingredients he does and doesn’t eat.

Book an information call today to find out how I can help your child.

How to Help Kids Stop Dawdling at Meals

Most parents ask me for help with getting their kids to actually stay sitting at the table (if that’s you, check out this blog post). But every once and a while parents ask me for help with the opposite problem. Their child takes forever to eat. Every meal is a long, drawn out affair with long minutes going by between each bite. Every time you go to take their plate away they take another bite or two. You feel torn amongst letting them get enough to eat and actually moving along with the day. If this sounds like you, here’s a strategy to help your child eat enough during a reasonable mealtime.  

Step #1: Check Your Expectations. For us adults, the mechanisms of eating are easy. We move the muscles in our mouths and throats to eat without even thinking of it. And, we have the dexterity to use utensils with ease.

Toddlers still are learning the mouth control for eating. So it can take longer to chew and swallow safely. That’s exactly why we have the recommendations of not giving choking hazards to kids under 3 years old.

Preschoolers and school-age kids have mastered chewing and swallowing. But they are still mastering utensils. Expect them to take longer to eat when a meal involves utensils.

Step #2: Use a Visual Clock. Have you taken into account the extra time for mouth coordination and utensil use and determined that you have an honest to goodness dawdler? Here’s a technique that I’ve used with lots of kids to help them learn to manage their mealtime. It’s quite simple really. Kids this age do well with visual cues. This technique stops you from nagging that it’s time to finish up (and prevents kids from learning to tune you out). You simply set a timer, let kids see it counting down, and kids learn to manage completing their task (in this case, eating) within the allotted time. Older kids can follow a simple timer countdown on a cell phone or tablet set up on the table. Younger kids need a visual that doesn’t involve numbers. There are a number of apps and devices available to create a visual representation of a clock. An example of a product is: http://www.timetimer.com/store

To look for apps simply search for “visual timer” in your device’s app store (iTunes, Google Play).

To use the visual clock, introduce the new rule to your child then follow-through. Expect them to get it wrong a few times as they experience the learning curve. During this transition, don’t let them continue eating after the timer is done. Because they will likely be a bit hungry, do plan an extra big snack and, if you can, move snack time up a bit.

Kids are smart. They learn how to regulate their meal time within a few days.

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How Much Should You Focus on Your Child’s Table Manners?

Before I chat about child table manners, I want to explain this photo. Yesterday I had the opportunity to see Ellyn Satter speak live. Ellyn's work is the foundation for mine. She's easily the most influential person in my career. And while I've thoroughly studied her work and used it with families for more than 7 years, I had never met her. By the time that I was finished university, had started to pay down my student loans, and could afford to travel to a US destination for her in-person training seminars, she retired. But yesterday she came out of retirement to present in Vancouver. You bet that I was going to be there - I may have been the first to register :) The table manners question was asked of her, and it was fantastic to see that she responded with the same answer as I give parents.

Table manners, like most matters of etiquette, can cause a strong reaction in us - really getting under our skin. When it comes to table manners, parents usually approach me in two ways (which really are about the same thing). Either they ask about how to best teach kids to have good table manners. Or, they’re embarrassed about their child’s messy eating and apologize to me for it.

When it comes to table manners, the best course of action is to not sweat about it. Like many other things, your actions speak louder than words. Kids naturally have an internal drive to master things and grow up. Eat together with your child on a daily basis. Use good table manners yourself – use utensils, a napkin, say “please” and “thank you” when you ask someone to pass you the pepper, don’t get up and down from the table like a jack-in-the-box. Your child will pick up your good habits.

That is, as long as they aren’t staring at a screen during the meal (iPad, phone etc).

Don’t sweat your child’s messy eating. It’s normal for kids to use a combination of utensils and fingers into the school-age years, depending on the food and how hungry they are. And like all things, some kids learn to use utensils faster than others.

The most important factor for kids to learn to love healthy eating is to enjoy eating at the table. This requires the table to be a pleasant place. Constant nagging about table manners (“elbows off the table”, “use your fork”, etc) can really get in the way of kids enjoying meals.

It takes a lot of effort to organize yourself to plan and prepare meals and snacks and to have an adult sit down with your child to eat together. Congratulate yourself for accomplishing this and know that over time your child will learn good table manners.

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How to Get Kids to Sit at the Table

How to get kids to sit at the table. A common question that I get is how to get kids (particularly toddlers and preschoolers) to come to (and stay at) the table for meals. The best way is to set a rule that all meals and snacks are eaten at a table. As seen through a toddler’s or preschooler’s eyes: “Why is it that sometimes can I eat while playing. But other times I’m told that I have to stop playing and sit at a table to eat (which is bo-ring).”

Create the expectation that all meals and snacks are eaten at the table. In families who set this expectation, kids come to the table when called. They eat. And then they continue on with their day (i.e. go back to playing). Meals and snack go much more smoothly and are less stressful because the kids aren’t constantly getting up from the table.

Does this mean that you never get to leave the house again? No. In the summer this is especially easy. Stop at the park bench, picnic table, or spread out a blanket and enjoy a snack.

Use similar ingenuity at indoor locations. For example, you can stop at the bench in the recreation centre foyer or use a table at the food court at the mall.

The important point is to stop. Don’t feed your child in the stroller, car seat, etc. And, don’t hand out a snack while your child continues playing.

I know that it’s tempting to do so in our busy lives. But, it sets you up for more battles at meals and snacks. What seems like an efficient use of time in the immediate, actually costs you more time in the long run.

In families who establish the stop-to-eat expectation, meals and snacks are very quick. And, they are much more pleasant. When it’s meal and snack time the kids simply get down to the business of eating.

Simply put: stop, eat, then continue on.

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Don’t Put Your Child Under the 2-Bite Microscope

Gathering around the table to share food, stories and laughter can be a very enjoyable experience. But mealtime can be a stressful time if you’re under the 2-bite microscope. What’s the 2-bite microscope? It’s what I call it when parents’ entire interaction with their kids is about the food - how much they have or haven’t eaten. As a parent it’s easy to fall into this trap. After all, you’re concerned about your child’s nutrition.

You’ll know if you’ve fallen into the 2-bite microscope trap if you catch yourself telling your child how many more bites they need to eat.

Time and again I’ve seen that kids who are under the 2-bite microscope don’t eat well. There’s just too much pressure. It seems paradoxical, but the more you back off, the better they’ll eat.

When I say back off, I don’t mean silent meal times. Or, leaving your child alone at the table. What I mean is being good company. Have pleasant conversations. Yes, that includes having pleasant conversations with your partner too – your child doesn’t have to be the centre of your attention for every second of the meal.

What to talk about? Choose any topic except the food you’re eating. One of my favourites is to play good thing, bad thing. This game is also known by many other names. But, what it involves is everyone at the table taking turns telling about the best and worst things about their day. Even preschoolers love playing this game. And you’ll connect as a family.

When kids enjoy being at the family table, they’ll eat better. Period.

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How Much Should I Let My Child Eat?

I want to confess something. It breaks my heart when I hear a child ask her parent if she’s full. I silently scream. Unfortunately, I’ve seen it many times. Here's the answer to "how much should I let my child eat?"

How Much Should I Let My Child Eat?

The overwhelmingly vast majority of kids are born knowing when they are hungry and when they’re full. It’s only through social learning that we lose our ability to listen to our bodies and learn to overeat.

When I hear a preschooler ask her parent if she’s full, I know that she’s lost her ability to listen to her body. She'll now look to external cues to tell her when she’s full.

It takes trust to let your child choose how much to eat. You’re a good parent. You care about your child having enough to eat. So I know that it’s so very tempting to tell her that she needs to finish those peas or eat two more bites of chicken before she’s done.

It doesn’t help that she’ll likely be completely inconsistent in how much she eats. Eating lots some days (what my Grannie called “having a hollow leg” – as in “I don’t know where the child puts all that food. She must have a hollow leg”). Other days she’ll eat almost nothing (which causes parents to say “I think that she must pull nutrients out of the air like a plant – she certainly isn’t eating them”).

Sure, sometimes kids will get it wrong. Sometimes they'll choose a more interesting activity and not eat enough. Other times they'll eat too much and get a stomach-ache (or perhaps even throw up). It's just like everything else in life - kids sometimes get things wrong. Giving them the opportunity to practice lets them learn from their mistakes. If you're consistently offering 5 - 6 opportunities to eat each day in a low-stress setting, they'll get the nutrition that they need over the course of a day.

Hold back from commenting on the amount of food that your child is eating. Let her gain food-confidence by controlling how much she eats.

In other words, how much should you let your child eat? As much (or as little) as their tummy tells them to eat.

Showing that you trust her and letting her build food-confidence is an amazing gift that you can give.

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Don’t Be Heavy-Handed with “Nutrition” Talk - Teaching Nutrition to Kids

I had the best time on Friday! I was invited to the Valentine’s Day party at the local elementary school. I brought a variety of fruits and veggies and led an activity where we used cookie cutters to cut out hearts and thread them onto wooden skewers to make cupid’s arrows (thank you Pinterest). Do I have the best job or what?! But was I just playing? No. There’s a method to my madness. I’ve learned something in the (gulp) 20 years that nutrition’s been my world. It’s that teaching nutrition to kids isn’t the way to inspire people to have healthy eating habits. Sure, talking about vitamins, minerals, etc will change what some people eat. There will be the exception that proves the rule. But it truly is the exception. I learned this lesson the hard way. When I was a bubbly, enthusiastic nutrition student, I shared my new-found knowledge with anyone and everyone (whether they asked for my 2 cents worth or not). Guess what? Not surprisingly, most people rolled their eyes at me and went on with their same (unhealthy eating) behavior.

I’ve learned that the most effective way to influence people’s behaviour is to simply serve them delicious, healthy food. And don’t say anything about it.

With kids there is even more opportunity! You see they haven’t had 10, 20, 30 years-of habits that we need to break. With kids, all we need to do is to include healthy foods in fun and everyday activities. To make healthy eating the norm. That’s why I worked to get myself invited to the Valentine’s Day party. Because, it was a fantastic way to infuse a celebration day with healthy food. The kids totally got into it and had a fantastic time. In fact, we hardly had enough fruit to thread on the skewers because they were eating so much of it. I can honestly tell you that they didn’t miss baking cookies one bit.

Creating a positive association with healthy eating is more powerful than knowing that I “should” eat something because it has vitamin so-and-so in it.

Recently a study confirmed my experience. They found that kids were less likely to try a food. And, they rated a food as tasting worse, if they were told that it was healthy.

It’s so tempting to go on and on about WHY kids should eat a healthy food. But do your best to resist the temptation. It’s more effective if you aren’t heavy-handed with the “nutrition” talk.

As the saying goes:

“Actions speak louder than words”.

How do you incorporate healthy eating into fun activities? I'd love you to share in the comments below!

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Should I Make My Kid Taste New Foods?

I received the following question from a parent this weekend: “Should I make my kid "taste" new foods / challenging foods that I put on his plate? If I don't make him taste them he just ignores them and it's debatable whether we are actually moving closer to him deciding he likes them.”

Should I Make My Kid Taste New Foods?

In short: No, I don’t believe in making kids try new foods.

And YES, there absolutely is progress…even if they don’t try it!

By seeing the food over and over again, you are normalizing the food for your child. Many kids are honestly scared to try new foods. The more times that they see it (even if they don’t try it), the less scary it becomes. And, by seeing you (and other influential people) eat it, it helps them come to trust the food.

You never know when the magical day will come that your child will try it. If you stop serving it now you’ll never know if it would have been the next time, or the time after that.

Tips to Get Kids to Try New Foods

Here are some tips to follow to make sure that each time you’re serving these vegetables you’re maximizing the likeliness that he’ll try them:

• Make sure there isn’t any pressure to try (and like) foods. Many picky eaters are sensitive kids. They can feel pressure coming from you a mile away. By preparing and serving foods you’ve indicated that you want them to eat it. Enough said. Instead, focus your energy on enjoying each other during this family time. It seems counter intuitive, but the more pleasant the table experience, the more likely kids are to try new foods.

• Give small servings. A small serving is less intimidating than a large one. If he tries it and likes it, he can ask for more. If he doesn’t, then you’re minimizing your food waste.

• No “one bite rule” (also known as the “no thank you bite”). While the “one bite rule” may work for some kids, it only fuels picky eating in many, many kids. And while it may get one bite of that food in your child today, it isn’t teaching him to like these foods. What he’s learning is to eat to please others – the opposite of mindful eating.

• Allow touching, licking and spitting out. For picky eaters, putting a food in their mouths is a very intimate action. These steps allow a child to ‘get to know’ a food before eating it. Teach your child how to do these activities with good manners (such as spitting food out into their napkin).

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Make Weekday Evenings Easier: A (Not So) Secret Way

If you’re like most of the Moms and Dads whom I’ve worked with over the years, then you find the dinner-bath-bedtime routine of weekday evenings to be a stressful, rushed time. One way to make these evenings easier is to plan your meals. When I suggest creating a meal plan, often people respond something like:

“I’m already crazy-busy. How am I supposed to add one more thing to my life?!”

I agree that at first it seems like making a meal plan is adding more to your already overly full schedule.

But, in reality it actually saves time and stress.

I grew up watching ‘80s cartoons. One show had a saying that they’d repeat:

“Knowing is half the battle”

This phrase is true when it comes to meal planning.

Long gone are the days before you had kids when you could leisurely stop in to the market to wander the aisles and decide what you feel like eating tonight. Then taking your time cooking dinner. Or, perhaps you were more likely to eat out most nights – catching up with your partner and/or friends over an hour-long (or longer) meal.

A good portion of the stress of making dinner each night is figuring out what the heck you’ll make. Many parents admit that this thought (and it’s stress/ worry/ fear) starts creeping into their minds at about 4pm.

Not having a plan leaves you multi-tasking to come up with some idea while you’re finishing up your work day, rushing to pick the kids up from daycare, and fighting the traffic to get home and/or to extra-curricular activities.

Not having a plan likely means creating an extra task of running in to the grocery store, with kids in tow, when the store is at it’s busiest. Not fun.

While it does take time to sit down and create a meal plan, doing so will save you hours of stress each week.

It’ll also save you time and money. Imagine no more:

• Last-minute trips to the grocery store.
• Staring blankly into your fridge.
• Garbage bins full of veggies, bought with the best of intentions, but now gone bad.

Does the structure of a meal plan make you feel constrained? Remember that it’s your plan – change it whenever you want! Did you plan to make a complicated, new recipe tonight but you had an awful day and all you want to do is order pizza? Order the pizza! And revise your plan so that the ingredients that you bought for that new dish are used up before they go bad.

Not convinced? Give it a try, just for this month. It’s only 4 weeks. December is an extra busy month, if meal planning can save you time, this is the perfect month to try it!

I’d love to hear how meal planning is going for you – the good and the bad! Share your experience in the Comments section below…