To stop making my kids dinner?

[CarbsAreNotMyFriend]

Hear me out. I probably won't let them starve.

But it is soul-destroying making dinner every night for them to then moan and whinge, complain about any sign of a vegetable, look at the plate like it is diseased, and ultimately most of it ends up in the bin. I feel it would be easier to cut out the middle man and scrape their dinner straight into the bin.

I don't serve them anything controversial. Just things like bolognese, lasagne, chicken & rice, pasta etc. But you'd think I was serving them chopped liver.

WIBU to just give in, serve them anything in breadcrumbs or in a bun, and give them a multi-vitamin for desert? 😁

OP watch the film “Spring and Port Wine” proper old fashioned parenting!

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@ladsholiday presumably they’d only ‘starve’ until the next meal, which would be something different and then they could eat that. If the children I nanny for really actively dislike a particular thing (one hates mushrooms, one can’t stand prawns, for example) then it’s not on the menu. But criticism over something they’ve had and enjoyed previously, or saying something is the wrong shape/too flavoured/I don’t like it anymore/they make it differently at school, well I’m sorry sunshine, you can eat it without being rude of you can bugger off from the table and go hungry. Of course I wouldn’t serve the same meal up reheated, but the choice is eat what I’ve made the efforts serve to you ( I can cook well so no excuse there) or you’ll be hungry until breakfast time. No one is ‘starving’ in their beds. And they’re not allowed to say they don’t like something without trying, and then trying again a year or so later, because children’s tastebuds change.[/quote]
I agree their tastebuds change. I was the same as a child, my tastebuds are completely different now. I'm hopeful!

@SmidgenofaPigeon

Fish fingers are fine though! Nothing wrong with fish fingers. Sustainably caught of course.

I thought the same until I saw seaspiracy!! Awful!

@Shehasadiamondinthesky I doubt my dd will go blind through eating a fish finger but thanks for yours and @LemonRoses smug posts !!!

@Mummyoflittledragon

My dd was incredibly fussy. It started as a baby when she decided she would only eat Greek yoghurt, breakfast cereal and puréed fruit. I think she’d also eat baby rice too, but no nutrition in baby rice. I could hide a certain amount of other food in the yoghurt (eg a tsp of bolognese sauce) but she’d spit it out if I added too much so her diet was very much milk and yoghurt. After months of the yoghurt, it changed to toast. She had a lot of different food on toast to try and balance her diet, even puréed veg. Then the toast phase passes and she accepted to eat spag bol, cottage pie or eggs for dinner. So I batch cooked for her and froze in tiny pots. This it for a looooong time. She wouldn’t eat anything (apart from toast), which required chewing until 2 1/2, when she tried a nugget. I cried. I could finally take her out for food even if it was only McDonald’s.

From about 2/3, I also started doing picnics. IE deconstructed cold meals. She loved them. From time to time, I’d add foods she didn’t eat. And eventually she started to eat them. At about 5, she started to eat veg as a side. Peas and sweetcorn, I think. At this stage, she declared she hated potato. So meals were picnics (of the 5 things she’d eat), nuggets, eggs or spag Bol.

Over the years, I’ve given her things to try from time to time. And she’s occasionally asked to try my food and realised she likes it. Eg at 12, she really likes stir fry veg as a side. Some people say their children will et anything at friend’s houses. This was not true of dd. She did try Indian food at a friend’s house when she was maybe 6 and now loves Indian takeaway. But that was more, would you like to try a bit of this, rather than as the main meal.

You just have to keep plugging away. Give safe foods then offer / serve foods as an accompaniment from time to time. Dd often wouldn’t entertain them even sitting on her plate and pushed them onto the table or my plate as she got older. However, slowly but surely she improved and eats a relatively varied number of foods.

I absolutely do not agree with the eat when they’re hungry philosophy. It isn’t true for some children, who would starve themselves. My dd would just cry and scream and I refuse to make food a battle. I don’t think that’s healthy.

Great advice, thank you!

@CarbsAreNotMyFriend

Can I just clarify that my children are VERY well-mannered. We are hugely strict on manners. When I say they moan, it's not that they say it's disgusting. They will say 'I'm not hungry', 'how many more mouthfuls' etc. I might have badly-worded my original post, as it was immediately post-dinner and I was also being slightly droll.

I’d call that bad manners. I’d also not have that conversation. Unless it’s a compliment about the food they talk about something else. None of this how many mouthfuls nonsense past toddlerhood, first mention of not being hungry, sulky faces they leave the table and the meal is over for them. No anger, no threats just accept they are choosing not to eat the perfectly good food you have provided.

@CarbsAreNotMyFriend oh god... I’ve been psyching myself up to watch it...

@sandgrown

OP watch the film “Spring and Port Wine” proper old fashioned parenting!

Do I want to?! I'm not down for watching anything that will make me feel crap about my parenting!

OP this book explains why some children do (not) eat a wide variety of foods, and has fantastic strategies for introducing new foods
www.amazon.co.uk/Food-Our-Children-Eat-Like/dp/1841154776?tag=mumsnetforu03-21

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@CarbsAreNotMyFriend oh god... I’ve been psyching myself up to watch it...[/quote]
You have to watch it. But prepare yourself for losing fish fingers from your arsenal of meals! I had just recently started eating salmon (I was really proud of myself as I wasn't a fish-eater) and have had to stop that!

[quote notanothertakeaway]OP this book explains why some children do (not) eat a wide variety of foods, and has fantastic strategies for introducing new foods
www.amazon.co.uk/Food-Our-Children-Eat-Like/dp/1841154776?tag=mumsnetforu03-21[/quote]
Thank you! 🙏🏼

Completely forgot about the sauces and textures, this is where the British cuisine is very different compared to the Mediterranean one, for example.

I think many children struggle with sauces and having many favours and textures blended or mashed up together. I come from
Spain and you serve plain pasta, with sauces and cheese on the table for everyone to add if they want to (unless you know the whole family would love tomato and tuna on it). The sauce is meant to add flavour to the pasta, doesn’t just cover it and make the poor spaghetti drown in Bolognese.

Everything is cooked al dente and conserves its texture, especially rice, pasta and veg. Ingredients are, for most meals, served separately or at least prepared in different ways which means everything is still ‘crunchy’ and fresh, not mashed, puréed, or converted into a sauce.

Something like cottage pie, very few children would love eating that because it really is a heavy, mushy, slightly bland (in texture, not flavour) dish. Oh, and mixed up. Roast dinner is the perfect example of something a child would struggle less eating, because things are cooked and presented separately, and one can choose which ones to eat.

Texture and presentation are a big put off for kids. Adding white sauce, melting butter and cheese or pureeing something for virtually every meal makes a dish heavy and less appetising.

@CarbsAreNotMyFriend I do need to watch it. Salmon too?!🙈

Ps that said, I love British food! Not trying to say it’s no good, just gave my view on why children struggle to eat it compared to say, Italy or France or Spain.

OP, I really wouldn't sweat this. I was getting upset a few weeks back at my 3yo turning their nose up at a pasta dish I had made and then I remembered that, when I was that age (and until I was much older tbh), I didn't like many fruits and vegetables and treated dishes with a sauce that wasn't ketchup with deep suspicion. I was also very wary of unfamiliar foods. As an adult, I can only think of one food I still don't eat and that's bananas (though I'll have them baked and cooked in recipes).

Children have twice as many taste buds as adults and so flavours are twice as intense for them. It's worth remembering that when they're trying unfamiliar flavours... it may just be too intense for them.

In your shoes, I would do three things:

1. focus on making sure you serve a healthy selection of foods your DC will eat. My DC is not good at trying things like stews and curries, but they will eat a lot of things including salmon, chicken, fish fingers, chilli, broccoli, peas, carrots, sweetcorn, potatoes, sweet potatoes, kidney beans, pasta, rice, noodles, cheese, peanut butter, baked beans and almost all fruit. This is enough to get him through until he becomes less fussy/ age 18, whichever is earliest .

2. make sure different meals are on offer as they may surprise you by trying it. Instead of serving them individually, I'd put everything in bowls in the centre of the table and ask them what they'd like. They may end up with plain pasta or rice and vegetables and nothing else for a bit, but they'll soon get bored of it.

3. Cut your losses by serving picnic meals a few nights a week. My DC will eat carrot sticks, cheese, chicken bits, cucumber etc. without much fuss and that's fine a couple of times a week.

@UhtredRagnarson

Would it be a difficult evening? Yes. Tantrums and crying? Possibly

Tantrums and crying? From your perfectly disciplined chicken? Surely not! How on earth can you allow that?

Front the OP’s children On the basis of the Op, safe assumption that would be their response

Why is rice and vegetables seen as boring on this thread? That’s a healthy, complete meal if you add some protein on the side. A ‘picnic’ type of dinner is still a dinner - bread, some veg and eggs or hummus, pudding - it’s nutritious and filling. Dinner doesn’t have to be cooked in a big pot and served hot, it needs to be any food that will be served at dinner time and eaten. It’s a bit like going back to infancy and saying fed is best. Doesn’t matter how cooked or not the foods are.

[quote SmidgenofaPigeon]@CarbsAreNotMyFriend I do need to watch it. Salmon too?!🙈[/quote]
Afraid so! 😬

It can be so hard Some day's

When my DS was doing this I did "fake away" for example I made veggie nuggets instead of chicken nuggets and I placed the veggie nuggets in a happy meal box with home made chip's. Anything I could "fake away" I did. making our own meals and placing in a takeaway container made a huge difference.

Also changing colours of things he
Wouldn't eat mashed potatoes so I turned blue or green worked for him.
Coloured pasta as well
Rainbow cheese toast
Alot of dessert you can hide veggies in.

"Not veggie Dip" I just use to mash alot of veggies together and we would put them with corn chip's and crackers

Some day's it was hard but good luck

@Shehasadiamondinthesky

He won't eat peas though. They make him gag. I don't know why peas are evil but apparently they are.

So there you go!! He won’t force down anything! You acknowledge there are things he can’t eat. So why is it so difficult for you to understand that other people have things they can’t eat either?

@EileenGC. I agree with you. I've decided not to worry if my DC won't eat a stew, curry or risotto. He eats most carbs and a relatively wide range of proteins, fruits and vegetables. So overall a healthy diet even if it seems slightly boring to me !

@CarbsAreNotMyFriend whatever makes your like easier.... mine will only eat chicken nuggets and so on and I do sneak in veg.

They still eat fruit and whatnot so it's not a massive deal.... I'm all about making my life easier

Front the OP’s children
On the basis of the Op, safe assumption that would be their response

Ahh so never from your children? Sure. But you’ve decided OPs children will tantrum. I wonder why you’ve assumed children might respond like that...

When my kids were little we had “freezer Fridays” where they could have anything they wanted from the freezer (nuggets, sausages, fish fingers etc) on a Friday if they ate well mon- thurs it took the emotion out of mealtimes. I also wouldn’t force them to eat but if they ate enough protein and veggies they could have a yogurt after dinner if they didn’t eat there was nothing else until breakfast. After a couple of rumbling tummies at bedtime they soon made sure they ate enough at dinner time lol x

Ds has asd and it has taken me 13 years to just relax and let him have fish fingers, nuggets, chips every day. He won't eat mash or rice or pasta. Me and dd eat a good variety, and that's fine. The days of battles at the table are over! Good luck, OP.