to be fed up with DS (2) refusing decent, homemade food and to feed him potato waffles and toast instead?!

[inconceivableme]

He used to be a pretty good eater and still eats reasonably well at nursery but meals at home are increasingly hit and miss and the food waste and stress is driving me nuts. All he wants is bread, pasta, crackers, yoghurt, cheese, biscuits (!), rice pudding, cereals and the odd ripe pear.

Proper meals get rejected though waffles and fish fingers get eaten.

We buy nice quality food too. Batch
cooking is a waste of time as what he wolfs down one day he'll refuse the next. I'm so frustrated!!

I have 2 DCs so whilst I did worrying and soul searching about the right approach with the first one, by the time second one hit this stage I didn't have time to worry about it as he just has to fit in with the rest of us as we have school runs and play dates to get to etc.
he gets given the same as his sister, we all eat together, he sits there and if he eats he gets a well done, if he doesn't we don't mention it, still include him in conversation. When we are all done we clear plates and the pudding gets dished up, same again, if he eats it great, if not fine. Cleared away and off they go. If he whinges he's hungry it's tough frankly. I never give him stuff I know he really dislikes. I never make an alternative. I can't afford to tbh, we are on a tight budget.

Funnily enough he's getting better the longer I keep this up, I think he's realised the only person losing out if himself

God I feel your pain. Ds 3 is just the same. Fish fingers and waffles baked beans, toast, biscuits but no cheese no meat except spag bol . Won't do sausages or chicken nuggets any more. Difficult with cereal fruit veg etc...... won't do eggs. Feeding when hungry does help but frequently I just let him have more toast to avoid the battle.

I agree with the poster who suggested giving him 1new food and another couple of well known foods. So sausage casserole and one waffle and some peas.

If DS won't eat dinner I put him calmly away - then offer it again half an hour later. Eventually, when he's hungry enough, he will eat it all. Or sometimes I read him a story while he's eating so he's distracted and doesn't really realise he's eating and forgets to object to it

My son has a really limited diet, but I'm lucky that he loves vegetables so I have been feeding him essentially the same meal every day for the last couple of months as it is balanced and healthy and I know he will eat it. Every day, I also add something to the plate that he does not eat - cocktail sausage, piece of cheese, spoonful of baked beans etc. He has resolutely refused to try any of them, and often insists that I remove them from his plate and sometimes his sight, which I do with no fuss at all. Today, out of the blue, he picked up and ate a piece of sausage, with no drama, not a word spoken about it on my part beforehand and no promises of a reward, and I nearly cried with delight!
I know every child is different, but I have spoken to a LOT of fussy eaters about this (and I was one myself as a child) and a LOT of parents and none of them can remember ever eating anything that they were cajoled/forced/bribed/blackmailed or punished about - everyone without exception has agreed that they just 'did it' when they were ready, so this is the approach I have taken, and it looks (albeit very early days atm) as though it might be paying off!

DS would have lived on pasta and cheese when he was 3 if I had let him. We all eat the same, if it doesn't get eaten, it's tough. No alternatives.

Don't offer anything bar what you have cooked of he refuses children won't starve themslefs

You are not a anodes and should not take orders this is the road to hell my sil did this with my niece and now she eats nothing but shit she had dairy Dunkers on Christmas Day instead of Christmas dinner and my sil says she wished she been firmer as it's a lot harder and now a battle at six

I think a lot of the time it's a control thing at this age.

Dd was a great eater but has gone downhill from 2yo. One day she'll like something and the next it's 'yuck' without even trying it,even if its the same thing. So frustrating. Sometimes I feel like I should just bypass her plate and scrape it into the bin directly from the pots.

I don't make a fuss if she refuses but I get her to 'help' me (chuck the veggies into the pot or crack the eggs or something) and make a fuss when I'm putting it out about how we are eating dinner that she has helped make. That works sometimes.

For six months DD(3) ate fusilli, parmesan in lumps and satsumas. Nothing else except rice krispies for breakfast. Then one day: "I bored now. Can I have some Bambi?" "Er, what?" "Bambi like at Christmas. Wiv peaches please". Dug out some muntjac and dried apricots and made a casserole. Odd child.

I am experiencing the exact same, almost identical list of preferred foods. I have no advice but I just keep cooking stuff. And offering it, I would say about every fourth day she will eat a whole plate of good food, in between it's all the stuff you mention.

Hoping it doesn't go on forever and trying to keep calm.

Aged 2 huh? It's not called 'terrible' for nothing.

I took the fight out of mealtimes. If the DDs didn't want to eat what I'd made I offered toast as an alternative (not with anything nice on it, just buttered toast and a glass of milk). In order to be able to reject their dinner they had to try one bit of everything on the plate. They could have more if they wanted to and found it yummy, but I didn't pressure them. Every now and then I let them pick what we're having fo

DD2 is just 4 and is heading into another fussy-eating phase . She's trying to dictate what I'm allowed to put on her plate when serving up. Two days ago we had spag bol and she had a moment. She screamed that she hated it and wanted plain pasta. I carried her through to her room and asked her to calm down for a minute before rejoining us and having one mouthful. She creeped back in looking at me reproachfully. Then sat on my lap, ate my dinner while saying 'yummy'.