Why don't parents feed children what they eat?

[Gruffallowhydidntyouknow]

Twice this week I have had conversations with people that make me wonder why in the UK we are obsessed with children's food and feeing children bland foods.

One friend told me that they were furious at their mother in law, as they had been for Sunday lunch at the weekend and had had to go to Tesco to get food in for their children (5,7, 10) because it was ridiculous that they were being offered the roast beef dinner.

Another friend was bemoaning cooking two different meals as she had to cook something the children would eat and something separate for her and her wife. She laughed and said she couldn't wait until they were old enough to eat curry (8 year old twins).

I despair at the sight of pub menus as it's always beige and chips for the children or a token tomato pasta unless you are in a really nice place. Is that really how people feed children?

I have literally never made separate foods with the exception of not giving my children steak pre teeth.

I'm genuinely intrigued what makes people feed their children separately. Is it that people really believe that children won't eat normal foods? Do people think you "shouldn't" give children spicey foods, or Game/ an olive / duck / stir fry?

Is it that they were weaned on plain things and are now fussy?

I'm not talking about the tiny portion of additional needs selective eaters.

Children generally get fussier as they get older, before getting a bit braver again. It is not a tiny minority of children with sensory issues, it is quite a large minority. Children's tastebuds are generally a lot more sensitive than adults.

Food needs to be safe and not turned into a battleground. That will then create a safe environment for introducing more complex flavours.

I do wonder either some children if we give into fussiness too easily.

People panic if the child hasn't eaten and quickly swap the meal so the child learnt to reject and get something else.

A child can miss a meal without getting hungry if they eat enough over 24 hours. I definitely don't advocate starving them but at the fussy stage we had an eat or don't but there is nothing else motto and after a few days of boundary pushing they were warjng again. Not all children will do this but some I think are given into really quickly.

I also know people that fill children on snacks because they don't eat meals which becomes a cyclical problem.

Often people I know with fussy children you can see how it started. I do think you can be fussy either the boundaries of healthy foods Ashwell. At some point t the buggetxeaters were given a nugget or coco pops to know they liked them. I don't understand why that would ever be offered to a child who needs nutrition.

I also think there arevpeople that even before they had a fussy child they gave them nuggets and chips.

This is everything I learnt when weaning - make mealtimes a battle, the fussier a child will become.

Always offer a safe food and dishing up meals like you’ve described is the best way to overcome fussiness. Also, if a child chooses to put lots of cheese on their plate, lots of pasta and a small bit of bolognaise for example, then don’t make that a big deal. Soon, they will feel in control and start to accept more of the elements they aren’t sure on.

I feel like a preacher, but Solid Starts is amazing and created by a woman who’s eldest was a fussy eater (he’s 8 and only just eaten pizza as he’s started to accept mixing food/food touching), but the information they provide is a lifesaver.

I also thought this and weaned my kids on exactly what I and my partner were eating. Even steak pre-teeth! - they sucked all the juices out with apparent relish 😂

Then with eldest they hit a wall at about 3 and started refusing things - more and more foods that they used to eat happily and then wouldn't. And then became fussy about foods 'touching' so mixed up meals like pasta dishes, pies etc became harder. Then all fish apart from fish fingers went by the wayside (used to happily tuck into salmon and trout). We didn't do anything to prompt this, it just began. With my youngest, same thing happened but a bit earlier (perhaps as she saw her sister refusing).

In both cases initially we just kept on giving them what we ate - nothing getting eaten, already skinny eldest starting to look ill (youngest still breastfed so kept her chunk up better), other half actually putting on weight eating up all their leftovers (he can't stand wasted food). So then we started making 'what we're having'-lite - so the pasta and the meat and the vegetables of bolognaise but separated out on the plate, not mixed in the sauce for example - but still they'd usually eat all the veg and most of the carbs and hardly touch their protein. And then started hating different parts of the same thing, or different versions of the same thing - so my eldest now hates 'good' sausages, preferring the lurid pink Richmond types, my youngest won't touch them and demands 'Taste The Difference' type high meat content ones - and both of them refuse to eat 'the skin' so sit there peeling their sausages at table :( My eldest loves eggs and will eat them in any form, youngest won't touch them at any price. Basically it became bloody ridiculous and I was cooking three different meals at the same time only for most of it not to be eaten anyway.

Literally the ONLY meal they will both just sit down and EAT as it comes is roast dinner. So now we have that every bloody Sunday, and we were never a 'Sunday roast' kind of family!

Now they both get their main meal in the week at nursery/school, so I just give them a sandwich and salad when they get in and we only have the torture of trying to get a proper meal into them 3 nights a week. What goes on their plates often doesn't look much like what goes on ours; but we always eat together at the table, and they always eat all their veg (very boring plain steamed broccoli, green beans, carrots, peas, and 'cutted up' cucumber and peppers are always acceptable) and they have to have a hand-size portion of some sort of protein, even if its just a couple of fish fingers, a spoon or two of tinned tuna, a hardboiled egg, a piece of cheese or a slice of ham.

I could have just stuck to my guns I suppose but then I'd have a very skinny eldest and a very fat partner 😂I figure they'll grow out of it, They're adequately nourished, and I don't want to turn food into a daily battle-ground just so as I can be smug in Cafe Rouge while my little ones tuck in to their Spaghetti Puttanesca.

Certainly it has nothing to do with weaning them on bland food or thinking children 'shouldn't' have foods with flavour! It is well-documented kids get fussy at around 2/3, and it is hypothesized this has an evolutionary function as it is about the age kids are capable of finding and eating food on their own so it makes sense for nature to arrange matters so that if while foraging in a bush they find some unfamiliar berries the instinct is to go "don't know what that is, yuck no" rather than "mmm yummy" as they scarf down the deadly nightshade. My little brother ate olives happily until he was 2 then turned up his nose at anything green until he was nearly out of primary school ("I'm not eating that it's a leaf!"). It's just a thing. Parents can fight it, roll with it or get creative (or a combination of the three).

I'm sure your olive-eating little darlings have some childlike faults as well; let us hope your friends are a bit less judgmental :)

Do you actually think that parents want to spend their time cooking two meals and are making bland food for the sake of it? Many children have stronger taste buds than adults so unsurprisingly don't like the same food.

If you saw my 12yo in public... she would be ordering chicken nuggets. Maybe with an extra side, as childrens portions are sometimes too small now. Maybe Spaghetti bolognese.

However, at home, she eats a massive variety. Doesn't like huge chunks of meat like a steak or burger... but curries, pasta sauces, risotto, jambalaya, fish, Mexican, Chinese food as well as traditional British stuff.

However in a restaurant, she gets worried about ordering something and it coming in a sauce she doesn't like, or the portion being too big (she finds large plates off putting) etc. So she plays safe.

She's a really good cook too.

Her younger sister... very adventurous. Except... she won't touch chips. Only started eating mash at 7yo, before that no potatoes whatsoever. That was actually a lot more tricky to cope with!

As for children's menus... we lived abroad in two other countries. Of course they exist... smaller plainer versions of what the adults eat. Including stuff like nuggets. A common one on Germany was spaghetti with ketchup!

Some of the things DH and I eat are quite spicy, and others would suit more adult tastes. My DC wouldn't like a rich lemon asparagus risotto with salmon, and there would be wasted food and hungry children. They wouldn't be able to handle a Rogan Josh.

I don't want to stop eating the food I like simply because I have children. I make my children mild versions of a similar thing (chicken risotto with peas, and sweet potato and coconut curry). My children also eat at 5pm because that's when they are hungry and eat the best. I do not want dinner at 5pm.

When we have things like spaghetti Bolognese, cottage pie, and schnitzel, the DC have the same thing as us, just earlier.

I always gave my dcs normal food from weaning age. My kids ate curry and lasagne etc at age 2 (much to my mils disgust). My youngest has food issues but the other 2 eat anything, I always give my youngest a little bit of what we have to try it though

My son was good at trying things when we weaned him. Now at 2, he's fussy. I was the same as a young child. I wanted plain pasta with grated cheese, with some cucumber slices. My parents cooked me the same as everyone else. But I didn't like it. I was the 3rd so they'd done it all before, but I was the fussiest.

It's not down to nurture typically, it's nature. I still offer what we eat, but if my son won't eat it, I won't leave him to go hungry. My MIL said don't give in. But I won't let him go hungry. He gets fruit instead, which he likes (so I don't 'give in' and cook something else). I wasn't left to go hungry and I've turned out fine. I'm no longer fussy. The thought of eating some things made me feel sick, so I have understanding of how he feels.

I’ve got 4 children (age 7- teenager) and they’re all very good eaters. I’m not sure why… luck? We’ve never made a fuss about food, try it if you want to, don’t if you don’t want to. We picked our battles and didn’t pressure them to eat things. Whether that’s helped, I have no idea. Our diet is quite varied (dh used to be a chef) and they’ll all have food with spice and heat to varying extents. We eat together several nights a week, depending on club finishing times. The nights we don’t eat together, they’re not necessarily being fed bland stuff - more likely something quick like a jacket potato with chilli.

That said, we’re not bothered about a bit of bland stuff in an otherwise healthy diet. I quite enjoy the occasional bit of crap food and I’m ok with my kids doing that too. I’ve no problem with them choosing pizza from the kids menu if we go out - if I’ve also chosen something less than healthy I’d be a hypocrite to say my kids had to have the salmon and steamed veg. I’m glad that my kids will eat anything - including beige stuff. I’d hate to have a child that looks down their nose at what’s offered on play dates or at parties. It’s just food and everything in moderation.

I have no idea what other households did or do. My own DC ate what we ate, with the exception that I eat only very tiny amounts of meat (being an almost vegetarian, but did not impose this on DC). So, this meant we did not eat very spicy food when they were young. I always put greens / brussel sprouts on their plate - just a small spoonful - 2 brussels, etc. They would ignore them, and I would ignore the fact they ignore it, until one day when teenagers, they would suddenly complain their greens/cabbage was too small, etc and wanted more!!
(I am still fussier than the DC, which I blame on being forced to eat school dinners.)

However, more to the point, I always believed in us eating together as a family.
This was hard when they were young, as my DH did not get home until late and was very irregular in his work hours. Instead, I cooked one meal for all of us, and saved his (DH) until he got home, but I ate mine with the DC. I was not waiting until 10.00 pm to eat, etc. And I was not cooking two separate meals.

This also meant when DC were very young we ate early - around 5.30 pm, gradually moving the time later as they got older, and I started working (first part time, and then full time).

Obviously this does not suit everyone. Everybody has different circumstances.
This suited me at the time.

I think there is a misconception that ‘fussy’ children prefer junk food.

My son is autistic with pda, as well as having GERD and PoTS (which we definitely get judged for when out because we will be pouring salt on his food which does seem terrible if you don’t know) and hE-DS.

He has ‘safe foods’- ie, ones he knows he can eat and usually not feel too bad afterwards, and he has foods which he can enjoy texturally/taste/smell wise- but they aren’t generally junk food.

So, people say he is ‘fussy’ because he won’t eat a sandwich, but he will happily eat a slice of ham/cheese/tuna/beef/chicken/any fish with a bowl of salad and a slice of bread and butter… he just doesn’t like it all mixed in a sandwich.

People think he is fussy because he had to have a packed lunch not school dinners- but that was because he would only eat the boiled/raw/steamed veg, not the burger or fishfingers or cheese pie… he would be perfectly happy with organic lentil stew and steamed veg with wholemeal seeded bread I sent in….

Im not saying that to show off, im just saying that food issues are definitely real and not visible- you would never know to look at him across a restaurant that we are ordering beans off one meal (because it’s safe when his GERD is bad) , smoked salmon off another menu item (because he might eat it and it’s high in salt which he needs) and then 4 rounds of white toast because if all else fails that’s at least something he can eat (90%) of the time.

Equally he might look utterly spoiled because he is having an adults sirloin steak meal, with a child’s pizza and extra veg on the side… because he is finally able to eat after 2 weeks of flare ups and he body is desperate for calories.

I think you are conflating 2 things @Gruffallowhydidntyouknow , plain food with unhealthy food.

My DC and my nieces and nephews eat very healthily, but very plain food. Things like chicken, hummus, carrot sticks, cucumber, sweetcorn, peas, wraps, baked potatoes. My DC are a bit older and will eat curry and stir fry noodles now.

There is neuro diversity in our family and sensory issues. We've all found that offering the plain healthy foods is best.

Buffet style is also best, it seems a British thing to give a child a full plate of food, which can be intimidating. Far better to give children a choice, they eat more that way.

Mine often won't eat what we are eating. They are 4 and 6.

So last night we had pork meatballs and chorizo with veg and I made a tomato based sauce. I did plan to give the kids the pasta with some sauce as they don't eat meatballs. Turns out the chorizo had made the sauce a bit spicy so I let my eldest try it as she isn't that fussy. It was too spicy so they ended up eating plain pasta 🙈

They will eat lasagne and spag bol sometimes a chicken roast dinner.

Youngest will eat curry if I make it but eldest won't. They won't eat fajitas, chilli con carne, chicken in white wine. I make them a plain cheese quesadilla when we have prawn ones with Cajun spice.

I'm hoping as they get older and they begin to try more things with a bit of spice and I only need to do one dinner a night!

We do a mixture and I think that's fine. DC are people too, why should they be forced to eat something they don't like? Four nights a week we all eat the same thing together. Three nights a week DC will have something that they like but I don't fancy, like fish fingers or tuna pasta, and later on I eat something that they wouldn't like. Isn't it the same for families in general? When DP is working I cook things that I love and he doesn't really like that much, and when we eat together we make something we all like.

This isn't just a British thing, very common in European countries like Italy, and also in America (both north and south). I just don't have the time or resources to make a whole buffet every evening, a full plate of something they like is just fine.

Yes why does it jump from won’t eat a roast to will only eat nuggets. I was brought up on beige food and so don’t have any of that sort of food in the house so mine have never been into it (apart from pizza, they love pizza).
My toddler is going through a fussy phase now but I still give her what we have every night, some times she’ll eat it, some times she won’t (there’s also no pressure). But if she really won’t touch it I’ll first ask if she’s hungry as often she just isn’t hungry, if she is ill give her something like fruit and yogurt etc. I’m not about to start making her a separate meal of chips and nuggets!

Consistency, and as she said, no alternative given. You can tweak it - but basically, same food. One of my boys doesn't like gravy, no no gravy for him. But same everything else. Problems occur and become more and more entrenched, when parents give giving alternatives, and more alternatives. Then it becomes a vicious circle and a very negative 'game' of power.

But seriously - what is wrong with chicken nuggets and chips? This isn't coming from a place or defensiveness as my DC actually don't like that meal. But if you use good quality nuggets and nice chips, put a bit of veg on the side, why is that a problem? Many European cultures have breaded meat as a staple for children, chicken or pork cutlets for example.

Lots of people here using the word "beige". Do you literally mean you don't like the colour of it, or is it just code for "boring"? Surely what matters is whether it's nutritious and whether the DC will eat it. It obviously isn't boring to them. We don't apply the same logic to any other aspect of our lives, either. You wouldn't complain that the DC's interests, books, activities are boring to you. Just like anything, if you have the resources and fits with your schedule, sometimes suiting everyone means something different for DC. I struggle to see why this is confusing.

Obviously children need a balanced diet. It would be very bad to feed them chicken nuggets every night. It would be bad to feed them any single one thing every night though.

"Feeding children" covers such a huge range of different stages. As you can see from a few posts about well my baby loves all vegetables and eats raw tofu happily - and the my 13 year old eats off the adult menu happily (yeah they're basically an adult!).

If you've ever met a strong-willed toddler or pre-schooler, you should surely know that you've got no hope of forcing them to eat something they decide they don't like. Dealing with my friends kids, my goodness the number of screaming fits that result even from cutting a sandwich "wrong" so it doesn't look like they expect it to be. That toast is too burnt, why is there a brown spot on this banana, I've eaten this every week for a year but now I hate it, and yes no point getting restaurant spag bol because it's not how it's made at home.

It's death from a million frustrating cuts, and I understand why they're often just given one of a few limited 'safe' things that there's a decent chance they'll actually eat.

You don't have to be starving and desperate to be hungry 🙄

No, and you don’t have to eat just because you are hungry.

I’m with you, that said youngest don’t like spice ( neither do I to be fair) so curry is tricky, eldest likes it hot. I do family style service so food in middle on big plates and we all serve ourselves. If you take it you eat it, which helps teach portion control, perfectly acceptable to have seconds or get a tasting spoon for a dish you are uncertain of.

My almost 2 year old will eat everything I eat, curry, chilli, prawns, muscles but also will eat the 'bland' foods but my 5 year old is the complete opposite and will only eat a small handful of foods. The meltdowns are not worth it if I was to serve him just a roast dinner of which he will eat none of so if I give him pizza or noodles I know he will eat and won't be hungry and I'd rather him be full than worry about him eating a wide range of foods!