To give my daughter meals she probably won’t like?

Respectfully, the OP is not force-feeding her child. I get this is an emotive subject, and not everyone would approach it in the same way, but this is a parent clearly struggling, and seeking advice. As is clear from the thread, there isn't one perfect solution and what works for some people won't work for everyone.

Why force her to eat something she doesn’t like. That’s the way eating disorders start. Would you eat something you wouldn’t like?

Agreed. I have vivid memories of my Mum making me sit at the table for hours on end and finish my plate of freezing cold food. I used to hide it in the potted plants, in my pockets, sneak off to the toilet and spit it out, anything to clear my plate. I still rarely to eat at her house, thirty years later. Horrible memories. I won't spend Christmas Day there either because the one year we did she angrily berated my youngest for not clearing her (huge) plate and sulked for the rest of the day about it.

Mine are both fairly picky - they won't eat anything in sauce. So I make meatballs/chicken/pasta plain (and add the sauce for DH and I) and just pop a bit of the sauce on the side for them to try every time. They never do, but I feel like I've done my part in offering. The only rule in our house is that all vegetables have to be eaten. They're both very healthy, happy girls, and very sporty, so clearly getting enough calories.

The other thing I would say is that in my experience both my kids' palates reset from about the age of two where they suddenly massively reduced the amount of foods they were happy to eat. My first loved jacket potatoes and pretty much anything else I put in front of her and then one week stopped eating them and I think it was literally because we hadn't had one in the previous week and the reset had happened. I think from then it's been a very gradual process of offering different foods including some new ones and taking their preferences seriously while also trying to incorporate some variety for the adults. So adults might have a tastier sauce and the kids have baked beans for example. So at four their palates were still very limited. School made a massive difference because they were encouraged to try new things and now jacket potatoes is the meal both children have several times a week at school, only because they were offered at school. And we can now have them at home again. What I'm saying is it is a gradual trajectory towards adulthood and I can see my kids on that trajectory now as they are several years in to it. Your DD is at the very early stages of that transition.They are still a little bit picky but progress has been made and their palates are gradually expanding. I am confident that they will develop into adults with a wide palate in adulthood just as I did. I was very picky as a child and teenager which I think is quite normal tbh and my parents never pressured me around food they just let me experience new foods in my own time.

I will adapt my meals to my children's preferences. That could involve serving things separately so they can help themselves to what they want, having sides they will definitely eat, offering toast if they don't want anything, and having fruit and yoghurt for pudding. Mealtimes shouldn't be a time of upset and feeding during tv watching will store up problems for later. I found the division of responsibility guidelines helpful but the Facebook group mealtime hostage was really really helpful at how to actually use the division of responsibility in my house. Offer a variety of nutritious foods including those you know she will eat and don't try to make her eat anything if she doesn't want to. Over time with food as a low stress social activity her palate should expand.

Your turning food into a battleground don’t do that your just setting her up for life long food issues. Just give her the food that you know she will eat along side something new but never mix them all together because then you have just ruined a safe food for her and she won’t want to eat it again. You need to stop putting pressure on her and just leave her to it saying it’s this or nothing means that she will just choose to have nothing over something that she won’t eat.

You can always save uneaten dinner and offer later instead of a snack.

Get her to help cook. But children's cook books and get her to go through with a post it and say "that looks nice".

We always eat the same food as our kids at the same time. Even did when they were kids (even if it meant I ate cheesy pasta at 11am!)

Turn the TV off.

I sympathise with you all, but I remember being very hungry as a child. My war time parents believed that "you'd eat it if you were really hungry" and "we had to eat what was put in front of us". I just couldn't eat a lot of fairly ordinary things that my parents liked. Imagine the foods you dislike the most being put in front of you every night. Adults are allowed preferences, apparently.

I eat a very wide range of foods now, but in a disordered, greedy, shoveling-it-down way. I'm overweight, still hungry and always focused on when I'm getting my next meal. I envy people who are relaxed around food. Perhaps I'd have been like that anyway?

I don't know why you'd make your life hard and cause upset. Just give her the foods she likes, it sounds like she has a reasonably good diet. Offer new things on the side with no comment or pressure, and keep doing that. Eat the same meal with her, and no TV!! It's so weird that adults can chose to eat the foods they like, yet it's normalised to make kids eat stuff they don't like. For example, serve pasta with the meatballs on the side. Anything for an easy life parenting-wise is our philosophy! You're making food into an unnecessary battle / stress. If you think she needs more protein, then blend some lentils in the pasta sauce.

I have 2 fussy eaters and both have been underweight at some point, though healthy in general. The older one hardly ate anything when he was a toddler. I was tearing my hair out. He somehow started eating rice on a trip to India, so now he is 11 and loves a curry, but he still has some periods esp. when his tooth wiggles, when he stops eating. The younger son (5) always ate very little and it was mostly the brown stuff that we don't eat at all, so I have to buy it for him (chips, chicken nuggets and fish fingers). He also loves rice, so I give him buttered rice with salmon + peas or carrots or rice with yellow lentil curry (dal). He will eat half by himself and the rest I need to help him finish it. Once May comes, I buy a big 2l tub of ice-cream and cones, so that he eats an ice-cream a day and he is not underweight anymore after a month or so.
So my advice is to give her whatever she likes at the moment and don't worry if it's the same stuff. They all grow out of this at some point and most of the people are likely to be overweight after 40s anyway.

This was me 20 years ago with my daughter. Her food issues started at 13 months old and her diet was worse than yours dd's. It was a really tough time and I worried so much. She would be crying with hunger but wouldn't eat and was underweight. Back then the professionals were no help. It took years of gradual introducing new foods before she would eat. Things like getting her to hold a pea, moving onto smelling then licking, holding in the mouth and putting it back. Think she ate 1 pea at 3yrs old!
She was diagnosed ND a few years ago.
No other signs early on.
Your dd may or may not be ND too but what I'm trying to say is just give her what she wants (obviously within reason and as healthy as she'll allow)
Try not to be annoyed and frustrated that you are making lovely meals and she doesn't want it. If you can change that mindset it will relieve your stress about it i promise!
I would keep cooking your meals for the rest of your family, serve dd something plain/safe you know she'll like. Don't mix foods together. Keep everything separate so she can control what she wants. Add whatever you're having so she can try if she wants. Don't let it touch the other foods. To someone who doesn't get it it sounds ridiculous I know. But it will stop mealtimes becoming a battle.
If she's still hungry later I would give cereal/toast/fruit/yoghurt. No junk.
She'll come through it eventually. Took my dd to be about 8 before she improved somewhat. As an adult now she eats mostly normal but some days just wants beige food/ a toastie instead of main family meal

(ARFID) is a serious feeding/eating disorder!

and your qualifications, in the interest of full disclosure for your statement @OwlBeThere are...?

I have two picky eaters although they are getting better. DS8 and DD4.

We do a one meal policy in our house BUT with a few amendments. So taking the pasta and meatball example. I would offer the pasta, sauce and meatball separately or mixed together - my DC are free to decide how they want it but they have to have all elements on their plate to at least try. 90% of the time if they chose how they want it on their plate they will eat most of it.
If I do a roast, they are free to chose which veg they want (usually carrots or broccoli as I know both like one or the other), potatoes or Yorkshire puddings (again one likes one the other likes the other) and I get them involved in the choice of meat each week (sometimes its what one wants, sometimes the other and sometimes what I choose).

I've learnt over the years handing them back some control over the elements they can chose helps massively. I do this with most meals and although sometimes we get kickback for random reason, we do not cook a separate meal. I always chose meals with the basics that I know each like. If we try something new they are encouraged to try it but I do make allowances for in case they don't e.g plain pasta or rice left over before mixing into something.
A banana is always on offer after dinner if they don't want to eat dinner. Its a fruit I know they like but isnt their favourite. I can gauge if they are actually hungry or not by if they take the banana before bed.

I have also recently started getting them involved in the food planning for the week. Each get to chose a meal they would like (within reason) and then they seems more willing to eat the rest of the meals for the week.

arfid doesn’t need weight issues, and safe foods are eaten. It 100% sounds like arfid,

@Agix "Letting your kid go hungry"

tbf @jey91 said "I would never allow my daughter to go to bed hungry"

You are being unreasonable making her sit there for an hour and turning food into such a battle, you really are.

Letting your kid go hungry becsuwe you've purposely made food you know they might not eat is absolutely wild parenting.

Unless you're in poverty and that food is the only food you have access to, there's no excuse.

Make her food she likes, and enough of it to give her the calories she needs whilst she's growing. You'll make her a lot sicker by underfeeding her than just letting her be a fussy eater.

The meatballs should have been on the side for her to try when ready. She doesn’t NEED to eat meatballs.

many children have restrictive diets and as long as it’s basically healthy and the child is growing that’s enough

just give the child pasta and veg every day and add twists for yourself to stop you getting bored

there are biological reasons why young children are limited eaters and most will grow up much more adventurous in time - the time being between 18 and 20 from my experience . Not 4. Although sometimes going to school helps

I still can’t eat pesto - I loathe pesto - 20 years of pesto at least once a week can do that to a woman but it was the right thing to do

don’t try to force your child to eat , don’t make meals a battleground, do ensure that she has enough protein, fibre, vitamins and carbs to keep her active and healthy ( and for a child protein and fibre are the least important/ easiest to hit )

@jey91

Look at your quotes first, I've taken the ones which are most salient to your situation

I stand my ground

I obviously want to avoid her having any kind of disordered eating

but I sometimes pressure her

I obviously don’t want to be cruel and create issues around food

I had always been told and read that if you make alternatives as soon as they refuse food, you’re teaching them that you will always do that

I would never allow my daughter to go to bed hungry.

I never force her to eat it. I just do “this is on the menu tonight” and don’t make an alternative

My anxiety only comes from wanting her to be healthy

If you think of food which you actively dislike, then imagine someone putting that in front of you, to be eaten, every mealtime, how would you cope?

Your approach is causing all the issues around your daughter's eating, can't you see that?

Your girl is eating, she likes what she likes, zero problem, surely?

I don't really have any other advice OP but just wanted to say it's clear to me you're doing the best you can 💐. This is a very thankless task. @Clinpsyc had words of wisdom above, I thought.

I used divided plates and reward for trying new things. Even if it was just a lick of something new.
The majority of her meal is always something she eats.
Packed lunches I did lots of little pots of different things until she found things she liked. My child was fussier than yours and had quite a bad food aversion.
Slow progress but she's now 10 and gradually trying new things. Even adding a new fruit is big progress for us.

This was me 20 years ago with my daughter. Her food issues started at 13 months old and her diet was worse than yours dd's. It was a really tough time and I worried so much. She would be crying with hunger but wouldn't eat and was underweight. Back then the professionals were no help. It took years of gradual introducing new foods before she would eat. Things like getting her to hold a pea, moving onto smelling then licking, holding in the mouth and putting it back. Think she ate 1 pea at 3yrs old!
She was diagnosed ND a few years ago.
No other signs early on.
Your dd may or may not be ND too but what I'm trying to say is just give her what she wants (obviously within reason and as healthy as she'll allow)
Try not to be annoyed and frustrated that you are making lovely meals and she doesn't want it. If you can change that mindset it will relieve your stress about it i promise!
I would keep cooking your meals for the rest of your family, serve dd something plain/safe you know she'll like. Don't mix foods together. Keep everything separate so she can control what she wants. Add whatever you're having so she can try if she wants. Don't let it touch the other foods. To someone who doesn't get it it sounds ridiculous I know. But it will stop mealtimes becoming a battle.
If she's still hungry later I would give cereal/toast/fruit/yoghurt. No junk.
She'll come through it eventually. Took my dd to be about 8 before she improved somewhat. As an adult now she eats mostly normal but some days just wants beige food/ a toastie instead of main family meal