I know I've done this thread before but I have to say it again......I AM SICK TO F**KING DEATH OF MY KIDS NOT EATING THE DINNER I SERVE.

[LadyTophamHatt]

There.

said it.

Ds1 ate quite well but my bin now has at least 2 dinners worth of food in.

If I serve up shite they'll eat it but I won't do it.....they can starve before I give in.

Ungrateful little f*ckers!!!

Mercy, it was quite gradual, he just stopped eating more and more things - I first really became aware of it in about January, when he was 18 months, and it has been going on ever since. In the previous autumn, he was still very interested in the food I ate - I remember that I didn't have to take food out for him if we were having lunch out, as he would be happy to share mine. Nowadays he wouldn't touch anything on my plate.

Moondog, I do console myself with the fact that he's eating fairly good food, just not a very varied diet, and he doesn't feed himself or anything.

It's awful when your child won't eat but I do think, and I'm so guilty of this , esp with packed lunches, that we offer our kids such a massive variety and actually they don't want that. They want the same tried and tested things. As long as they eat something healthy as well then I think we all worry more than we really need to. I mean I have the same breakfast and same lunch all the time. I have a varied diet but I eat the things i like on rotation. Why would a kid be any different?
My DD asks for toast every single night, "toast, milk, toast milk, okay, okay mummy, toast okay, toast milk okay" and so on and then she gets a bowl of spag bol and eats it all. She still asks for toast after though! I try and very her diet but I do really stick mainly to her favorites so I know she'll eat at least one really decent meal a day. I still insist of putting dried figs in her lunchbox now and then and sneaking in a grated carrot sarnis and now and then she shocks me by going for it but mainly it gets blanked so I make sure i also in c something I know she'll won't refuse.

As long as our kids are not making themselves sick, wasting away, becoming malnourished perhaps we are all guilty of worrying unnecessarily?

Hope thqat last line won't upset anyone. Have to go now so won't find out till later but hope you know me well enough to know I woul;d never mean to upset. I'm not belittleing anyones food concerns and I massively appreciate how upsetting abd frustration the whole food issue can be

TeeCee, thank you - that does help me get some perspective on it.

TC - I offer the 'tried and tested' and it's just hit and miss as to whether they'll eat it.

Tonight, cos I'm feeling lazy, they got baked beans, scrambled eggs adn wholemeal toast. Some nights, all 3 plates are clear and I don't have to say a word. Tonight, ds3 screamed as if I was suggested we cut his right arm with a rusty saw, ds3 ate about half of it without me saying anything but then refused the rest, ds1 ate about 75% of it.

I had a tub of ice cream out ready and it still didn't jolly them along enough to eat it.

So a great load of food in the bin again.

Sometimes I wonder if it's because I don't give enough variety but when I do offer something different, they won't eat it.

I honestly cannot think of anything else to do and I've just resigned myself to it.

All of mine are great at eating cereal, sandwiches (cheese, ham, jam), yoghurts, loads of fruit - snacky type things - but they are a nightmare when it comes to hot food.

I have no idea why - they were weaned on homemade food in the main - lasagne, spag bol, the lot and they used to wolf it down.

ANd TC is right - mine are all healthy and bright and a good weight (ds1 very skinny but he eats like a horse generally) so there's not really anything to worry about from that perspective. It's just frustrating to have to cook the same old, same old AND then throw it in the bin half the time. I hate spending the rest of the evening saying 'no' to any request for food but if I give in I'm just going to make it worse. So I don't.

Must admit - they do get a glass of milk before bed regardless. I would take this away as well but dh won't have it.

Maybe try smaller portions GDG?
If I'm not sure how they will react to something,I give them a very small amount thus less wasted.

Thomcat,you are spot on there.
We do eat pretty much the same stuff don't we?
God,I've been eating exactly the same breakfast without fail for about 5 years.

And as I said earlier,this huge choice is not good.
Who needs to peruse 50 different cereals? Thirty dfferent yoghurts? 45 different fruit juices?

We think that choice liberates us but too much actually enslaves us as we then waste so much time dithering over trivial decisions.

Also children are not able to understand and process choice like an adult can anyway.

One of the things that I have bizarrely really enjoyed about living in fairly remote places is that choice was limited and as a result,shopping to so much les of my time.

In Russia there was one kind of cheese,three kinds of sausage,two kinds of yoghurt and so on.

I try to shop like that at home.
My fridge contains milk,fruit juice,plain yoghurt,Parmesan and Cheddar,eggs,butter,some veggies,jams and pickles and that is it.

My ds is the size of a 3 year old and isn't yet 2, dd is skinny but tallest in her class at school. Both of them are rarely ill (touch wood) yet both of them eat like sparrows. For example for supper tonight ds had 2 new potatoes, 1 baby sweetcorn, 3 green beans and 1 mouthful of poached salmon. I have stopped freting(after 4 years) as it does no good. Just do small portions fruit is offered if hungry later and both have a glass of full fat milk before bed.

Well now I'm seriously pissed off..... I was responding to your thread saying how good it was so see someone else who's seriously f**d off about something today (I'm pee-d off with work) and just as I clicked on "post message" with a satisfied "ha - that feels better" it said I wasn't logged in and now I've lost the thread (in so many ways.....) So you're spared my little rant about bad days at work and how it's cathartic to share bad moods with other people but I will repeat that my ungrateful little... erm, darling son is also rubbish at eating and frankly if he starts tonight he'll go hungry. Grrrr....... GRRRR!!!!

Not to mention his table manners - don't even get me started on that!!! GGGGGRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!

(Chokes on gutteral sounds and collapses coughing in heap under table before realising Lady Topham was sick to f**king death two days ago and now wonders why she has a ranting mad woman on her thread....)

Dino, yes ds was also 18 months when his eating tailed off - he's now 2.9. He would only eat home-made food from when I weaned him - would refuse the occasional jar, and somehow he just changed.

Moondog, I agree re too much choice. Even as an adult I get overwhelmed in supermarkets quite often.

TC - as Dino says, the last line of your post does put things into perspective. Thank you

thank God for this thread! DS is 2.3 and has just started the picky eating thing. He's never had junk food and I aint starting now! It's just soul destroying when he turns his nose up at my lovely meals! A Dad once said to me that kids never starve themeselves, so I don't fuss if he doesn't eat. Sadly, puddings are out now .

Mind you, he was slightly like this last winter - I do wonder if having a permanent winter snotty nose puts them off their food?

ages ago ds1 went through a Loooonnnnnnggggggggggg phase (months long) of barely eating anything. our paediatrician jsut said it was my job to provide healthy food, not to worry about if they ate it. If you only provide healthy then that's all you can do. You can take a horse to water and all that. As long as you don't let them then eat rubbish if they're hungry half an hour later.

I think there's 2 different issues here.

1. Parents of really little kids (say around 2 ish who barely eat & that's a worry and frustrating and stressful)
2. Parents of older kids (say 5 upwards) who are cheesed off this their kids being fussy little f*kers, excuse me, who turn their nose up at 50/60/70 % of (mainly) evening meals.

I was in group one, and now in group 2. Not at all concerned that they're eating enough, but find it a pain in the arse to stand and cook only for it to be moaned at by 1, 2 or 3 people every night.

Saying that, I have a major success last night which I can't believe. I made stars out of puff pastry, and marinated medallions of porc in mustard and brown sugar, then seared them on a griddle, served on the stars, with red wine sauce and stir-fried vegetables. I could not believe they ate it (well, 2 of them did), and asked for more and even said they loved it!!!! And it looked lovely and Christmassy, so that's getting added to the list.

my dd is 4 and she will eat almost anything, but only when she wants to!
She says she doesnt like certain things but will eat them somedays, i think all children just seem to go through fazes when they eat loads and then eat hardly anything and this is when us mums worry.
My mum always says to me 'think of what they eat over the whole week then worry if its really bad!!'
Also my dd really likes chicken but is not too keen on other meats so i tell her that we have beef chicken, lamb chicken and pork chicken or just chicken and now she eats all of them!!

Moondog said: Olive,that is pandering. Big time.
Why does it matter if they don't eat their food?

It matters because I sodding make it and they should sodding well eat it.

And if 'pandering' gets them to try new stuff, bring it on.

I do agree with moondog to a large extent. I try to be reasonable with my children and I am happy to understand if there are things they genuinely don't like but sometimes they are just being whimsical. Every week DS says he doesn't like parsnips (I do them along with other veg because DH and I love them and DD enjoys eating them with her fingers like chips or crisps), every week I say try just one, every week he eats the lot.

Ernest, your post is interesting - and well with last night's success!

tonight - lovely organic mushroom risotto using up things from veg box. Had to nip out for the wine. Stood at the stove stirring for 20 minutes.

Result?

No one ate it except me (too mushroomy / ricey / flavoury) apparently. Even DH didn't have any as he felt a bit sick.

I can't throw it away so am on my 3rd bowl.

They had a piece of bread and a satsuma each.

How pissed off am I?

VERY

someone tell me my risotto sounds nice or I will cry and eat it all and then be all fat and feel sick.

i would love to say it sounded nice but have tried risotto before (would like recipe)
my ds (age 5) has just started being really faddy with his food
when he was a baby he would eat anything and all the time he was really cute and chunky
now however he has ceased finishing half of whats on his plate refuses to try anything new and pretends to have a tummy ache if you say he can't have anything else (sweets mainly) after

My DD was a real pain at eating - so much so that her grandma would spoonfeed her (she's 3 for f*s sake) so I read a book and now give her two choices for main course, both things I know she likes, then if she doesn't eat it, just take it away with no comment and there's nothing else to eat til the next meal or regular snack time. It took a while to get it through to her but the power's mine, all mine (manic laughter

Dimpled thighs, I love mushroom risotto!!

But no-one else in my little family does sadly. Well, dh will eat mushroom stroganoff which is reasonably similar.

I just like mushrooms and rice

mercy - come round for dinner then, so we can like it together!

tinkerbellie - do you want recipe?

yes please could make it next week for tea
ds won't eat it but whats new, at least every one else can have something nice!!

okay tinkerbelle

I used the rrecipe from the back of the box (riso gallo organic arborio risotto rice) there usually is a recipe on the packet, but this will give you an idea before you go shopping!

320g risotto rice
1 litre chicken stock (I used cube)
1 onion, chopped (I used leeks from veg box)
40g butter
1 glass white wine
any other ingredients you wish to add (I added mushrooms and garlic)

1. IN pan on medium heat melt butter and saute onion until soft (I did mushrooms too), add rice and stir to coat and become transparent (About 2 mins)

1. Add wine and stir unti labsorbed / exapourated (again 2 mins). Then add ladle of hot stock, stir again until absorbed / evapourated. Keep doing this for aout 20 mins until rice is soft and creamy but grains still firm in centre (I didn't know what this meant so set timer for 20 mins then stopped!)

1. Stir in parmesan / knob of butter, test for seasoning, cover and leave for 2 mins then serve.

Hope you like it - it was really nice despite my ungrateful family rejecting it!