Meal ideas for a fussy preschooler. I'm desperate!!

[Andjustlikethatihadnoclue]

We eat the same things every week and I'm bloody fed up of them!

He's so fussy but I need to try at least a couple of different dishes for my own sake 🙈

Things we eat:
Cottage pie (with sweet potato mash)
Plain rice with chicken breast & broccoli
Chicken sausages with chips and beans
Chicken nuggets & alphabites
Pesto pasta
Spag Bol

I need some other suggestions that might go ok please!! 😩

My 3 year old loves toad in the hole, macaroni cheese with bacon and leeks, and noodle stir fry.

Could you do dishes where all the elements are familiar, but on different combos? For instance

mild keema curry (similar to cottage pie) + rice

Chicken sausage pasta bake

Pesto chicken breast + mash.

Once he’s fine with slightly different stuff then change one more element (so, Tuna pasta bake or veggie curry).

Tomato sauce pasta and garlic bread
pizza and veg sticks

Try pasta with red sauce and sausages on the side then this can morph to pasta with red sauce and bits of steak, then bits of chicken

mashed potato with a sausage stuck in the top…then this can morph to jacket potato with sausage stuck in the top, then try different types of sausages then add cheese to sprinkle on the top

Chicken pieces with a lemon to squeeze over it and buttered pasta this can morph to chicken with a curry sauce to spoon over it

for veg try frozen peas and corn (chilly peas and corn in this house)
allow ketchup to be squeezed on any veg
try lemon squeezed on veg (or the option of)

Oh my oldest went through this phase! He's almost out of the other side now.

Are you near an ASDA? They do these mini waffles with hidden veg in the frozen section, near the hash browns and potato waffles. They also have own-brand sea creature-shaped fishcakes with hidden peas in them near the fish fingers.

And Bernard Matthews does turkey dinosaurs for variety on the theme of breaded poultry. 🤣 There are also Quorn dinosaurs which we currently have although they didn't go down so well with my DS.

Also have you tried frozen vegan sausage rolls? Mine won't eat the meat ones but loved picking at the Linda McCartney ones and as time's gone on he'll eat the lot now! Also vegetable fingers (supermarket own brand or I think there's a brand called Green Cuisine? they also do them) and Linda McCartney sausages. The veggie stuff has veg in although it's obviously processed I stopped caring about that a long time ago in favour of giving him anything he'd eat.

Also if he'll eat tinned hoops, Heinz do veg hoops which contain more vegetables. Mine went through a phase of eating the Heinz Big Soups as well, which were nicely balanced. Not a whole tin of course!

This happened to me and honestly we just kind of had to struggle and keep introducing the same foods until they were finally accepted (obviously I never let him go hungry) but we had to persevere! Watching and eating with his nursery friends helped

Someone here suggested make your own pasta - ie. you fill up a bowl with pasta with a bit of butter and olive oil, and then another one with sautéed red pepper, grated cheese, crispy kale, meatballs or whatever and they help themselves.

Weirdly this works an absolute charm. It's anything they know they have control over imho.

Also works with potato skins and wraps, made at the table.

A lot of the fussiness (in the absence of ARFID) for littlies is about control.
Put food in the middle of the table for everyone and let them choose.
Help them serve up but otherwise just get on with your own dinner and enjoy that.

'I'm having some roasted pepper, would you like to try it? I'm having some chicken ' etc etc until you both have something approaching a fajita.

Cottage pie: have the meat and mash in the middle separately, so next time you can have chicken and veg in sauce instead of the mince, or even fish. Then try mixing elements which have been successful another day. Make it fun, don't make a fuss, just keep going. They come round in the end usually, and even if he doesn't, he won't starve and is actually eating quite a variety of textures and flavours.

One of mine would only eat foods with 'dip' for months at that age. So I puréed one element of every meal and served it in a pot for dipping, but she never realised that she was eating the same as the rest of the family.

Have a look at yummytoddler, loads of advice, loads of easy recipes (not just for toddlers!)