...if you had guests for dinner with one particuarly picky child?

[MerryXmasMrsHenry]

It's a difficult issue which I'm considering at the moment as DS is reaching the age where his friends will come round to eat with their parents.

Some of our friends' children will eat whatever you put in front of them. Cooking for them is a delight. DS is the same.

My house rules are: (1) we always try food once (usually he ends up going 'mmm! can I have more?') (2) I cook one meal at a time and anyone who doesn't like it will have to lump it.

It works for us because DS eats everything; it also worked for me and most of my friends when we were kids. So what about DS's pickier friends? I do not see why I should serve 'plain food' for everyone just because one child will eat nothing but - why should one child dictate what everyone else eats? I certainly will not cook two different meals so that the picky child can have their plain food and the rest of us have a slap-up meal - and I've sometimes found that even when I cook what I'm told the child likes, they don't want to eat it - possibly because I cook it in a different way from their parents .

At the same time I want to be hospitable to everyone - and to not have children left hungry!

So what's a woman to do? Am I the only one with this dilemma?

By the way I am not talking about vegetarianism/ veganism here, as that's not what I call 'picky eating'.

When mine decides he can't manage and leaves the company for time out, he has been known to overturn the table in the process.
Accidently mind, whilst fleeing.
So if I knew what moondog was like, but also that she cooks fabulously, I'd leave him at home over a spaghetti bolognaise and go alone!

pagwatch - I doubt md had thought about it so much as to make that distinction...have seen her pronounce in a very black-and-white way before. annoying, un-empathetic, but, you are right, not to be taken seriously.

Just to clarify - my house rules are for my family, not for visiting kids - but the issue is then that if a visiting child is refusing to eat anything, it makes it harder for me to maintain those rules with my own DCs. So that's the dilemma.

Goblin, I really like your approach and will remember to ask friends to consider doing this if they think their child might have trouble eating our food.

JJ - I didn't mean you! You're still in my good books!

My only suggestion is that many children feel happier serving themselves from dishes on the table rather than having the food put on a plate for them - that way preferences about food not touching for instance can be accommodated and they can avoid somethings altogether.

And if one of the serving dishes is full of bread even better

Yes, it's not difficult to offer plain rice or spaghetti before you have put the sauce on. I also offer bread and butter to uminpressed guests.

Agree you should not make a "special" meal for one picky child but a little effort to accomodate a guest is surely polite?