Vegetarian toddler very picky

[Teaandwater]

I am currently childming a little boy who is 18 months, minding him 6 months. His parents are bringing him up vegetarian. Over the last month he has literally refused any dinner I have made, some of which where his favourites. I make everything from scratch and really make sure the meals I am cooking are nutritious and healthy.

I do a lot of batch cooking so freezer is full of his meals that he now refuses to eat. I have told Dad at pick ups that he has not eaten his dinner and he always seems a bit shocked even though he has regularly told me that they find it hard to get him to eat vegetables in their house.

I've actually started to dread dinnertime as I know he will refuse to eat I'm throwing so much food in the bin.

Any advice on what I should do?

Get the parents to provide you with his meals. That is what I had to do when mine were at the childminder.

The child doesn’t know what meat is, he’s never eaten any.

My vegetarian kids turned fussy at age 2. They wanted plain food with different bits separated so pasta on its own with sauce on the side (that they mostly wouldn't touch) and cheese separate. They would eat pizza and rice and noodles. I did a homemade satay sauce out of oil and peanut butter in a pot on the side with veggies on the side too with the noodles. They went off jacket potatoes for years but would eat homemade chips. Main protein from eggs and yoghurt. They always ate baked beans too, could you do a homemade version for him? I would support offering a variety of different foods including what you know he will eat. This is in line with the Division of Responsibility approach. (Worth a google). The challenge is, of course that responsibility is across you and the parents so you will need to discuss how best to proceed with them.

I’m vegetarian, but my children aren’t. I would still cook veggie for them though. A popular food was cheesy vegetable patties that I would batch cook and stick in the freezer, fry them on demand. You can put anything you want in them. Dips to make it exciting for them to try in different ones. Tempura veg too.

Why was that deleted as being against the guidelines?? How peculiar.

I’ve just come back and seen you think I am against a vegetarian diet! I’m not, I married a vegetarian, we eat a lot of non meat meals!
Having experienced low iron in a child (who’s not vegetarian!) but is fussy, I would recommend checking iron levels. My child’s were super super low, and a lot of problems were ‘ironed out’ (boom boom) when we addressed it.

Same!

You need SR_Nutrition on instagram she’s the expert!

Parents sound like they don’t want to deal with the eating. Maybe say that a later dinner might be better in his own home so he can then have a good feed. Yes they may prefer it but kids routines change and they need to adapt. Giving their kid dinner at 5:30 is fine as 4pm is a bit early.

tell them you can give an afternoon snack and they need to do dinner as it’s a waste of money for you otherwise. Or you can box up some food to go home. Childminders aren’t paid much so I can see how wasting the food would be annoying.

they need to parent. Maybe the kid knows that dinner time is close to home time and they want to go home. Do you send after pics of what kid ate

I wonder if you gave the parents a couple of your batch meals to try at home whether they'd have any more luck? And they could give you some of theirs? I must admit I'd be out of my depth if I had to cook all veggie meals from scratch, so credit to you for making the effort!

Yep - as the PP said, suspicion and refusal is a normal development stage, especially around vegetables and fruit - unfortunately for veggies!

We evolved to have a natural suspicion of plants as until very familiar they could be poisonous. Especially mushrooms! Toddlers will naturally go for high fat high calorie foods as an instinctive survival strategy and as small beings they do need higher calorie food rather than filling up on bulk.

A plain cheese omlette is fine. Cheese on toast is fine. Some pasta with cheese is fine. A cream cheese sandwich is fine. What about homemade potato wedges? (oven or air fryer baked) . Using wholemeal bread, and with a few raspberries and strawberries. Will he eat blueberries?

Would he eat little fritters? Crispy, with egg and mashed red lentils, as finger food?