Argh - how do you deal with your child's picky-eater friends on a sleepover?

[Miaou]

Dd1 has three or four good friends, two who have been on sleepovers and one who has been to tea. They are all really picky eaters (well to my mind anyway) - eg they only eat white bread, yoghurts if they are a particular make/no bits, pizza if it is bought, cheese if it is orange (huh?), etc etc ... Now I'm all for accommodating different tastes and would like to serve up something they will eat - but sometimes that just proves impossible! And I don't think it is unreasonable of me to not buy in special bread/yoghurts etc, particularly as we are on a very tight budget.

Yesterday dd1's sleepover guest went home having eaten one slice of pizza, a few Pringles, a slice of toast and a small bowl of soup with a slice of bread, in 24 hours!!! (She kept asking for something else to eat but all I had to offer her was fruit, which she declined!!)

Argh - baby crying - and I had so much to say on this subject - please add your thoughts/ways of dealing with this!

Let them go hungry, that's what I'd do. If she was really hunry she'd have eaten the fruit.

FGood grief, that is her problem for being so damn fussy. If the parents object to her not being fed processed food, they can send her with a pack up!

Guess what. I bet they don't bother

Mega wind-up no. 1, this is. Has happened quite a bit in our house, too, so you're not alone. I tend to try and provide a good range of food at each meal, and if anyone doesn't eat it, that's their lookout. At age 8 they're old enough to know that isn't acceptable behaviour, although clearly lots of them have never had it pointed out at home that it is in fact downright rude to openly reject food that someone else has gone to the trouble of preparing.

I too have encountered the "Oh, I only eat Munch Bunch yoghurts" routine. And dd1 has a classmate (not close friend, mercifully) who will only (and I mean only) eat chips, sausages, chicken nuggets or fishfingers. The only acceptable alternative is a white bread jam sandwich, with no butter. Aaaargh. Maybe those who reject your food should be made to sit and watch 30 mins of Gillian McKeith instead?

I have, however, scored a significant sucess with a 'make your own pizza' session -- I make the pizza dough and roll it out into the appropriate number of mini-pizzas. They can then apply the toppings of their choosing from the available selection (cheese, tuna, olives, salami, whatever we have in). I think they're more likely to eat it if they've had some involvement in making it.

But it is insanely annoying, and does make me wonder what some parents are on.

DD has a friend who has never eaten a single thing in our house. Her mum sends croissants with her as that is all she will have for 'lunch' - 7-days a week. Her fussiness doesn't extend to sweets/chocolates/crisps etc. however as she will eat any variety of sh*te.

Might be a somewhat moot point now however as her mum got a bit twitchy yesterday when I said Yes XX can come to sleepover however she will have to eat and if she doesn't you will have to come and get her as she ain't staying here having had no tea/supper or breakfast. Mum then supplied a very SHORT list of acceptable meals - none of which we would serve so slight impasse reached .

So in answer Miaou let her go hungry. Even my apples are the wrong type apparently and oh I refused to chop them up to much horror. They are 5 BTW, I don't chop apples up for my 20 month old. I am getting all ranty here - sorry!

my twins are having sleepover birthday parties. and the food is going to be pizza. its going to be friday after school and tey are going home at midday the next day.

they can chose the pizza and come to an agreement. all i need to know about is allergies. dont want to kill a kid.

i once has a girl - my good friends daughter come to our house to tea. her mum said " she doesn't like her food touching" and i'll be fcked if i'm fussing about with her food when i have 3 other kids to make tea for. her beans were on her mash - and guess what. she ate it - why? she ws hungry after school. her mother was amazed. i just told her i can't be arsed fkcing about with kids.

this kid was always eating shyte too. and she was fat becuase of it. some mums should just have a word with themselves.

Message withdrawn

Aaarghhh... My 7 yo dd has 1 friend in particular who's fussy beyond belief. She has well educated parents, but they seem to pander to the "white bread only, no not those apples, not that strawberry jam " type thing, far too much. Even if I produce something ostensibly suitable, having consulted the child, she may or may not eat it... Have to say that though I'm not stopping the invitations , she comes round a bit less often these days. Poor child is always ghostly pale, often a bit spotty etc.

Do you have to do the sleepover thing?? Or couldn't you get the mum to send some pre vetted food?

I would not have kids to my house who are that fussy in their eating habits. I don't mind providing something popularist eg pizza and ice cream, especially as it is only very rarely that I cater for another child anyway, but if they wer really fussy, I would not have them for a meal.

And as for sleepovers...no way. Not until they are teenagers, if they absolutely must. (Thank God it seems to be a female phenomenon and I only have one daughter).

Having said that, if a child did come to us for a meal and didn't eat any of it because they didn't like it, I have to say I could not care very much at all. Their health and nutrition is not my concern. I would just tell the parent they hadn't eaten much and lave them to sort it out.

Kids who come to ours get the dish of the day and that's it. If they choose not to eat- fine but cannot be bothered offering numerous choices. Mine know the score so why should they see me pandering to their friends if I won't pander to them. Obviously I don't give them a prawn vindaloo but don't give them fish fingers either. Some people I just don't offer to feed e.g friend who cooks separate meal for each of her dds. Most of these food preferences are in the kid's minds . Real dietary ones aren't an issue but kids who have been allowed to eat what they and and nothing else need to know that the world doesn't work like that . Harsh aren't I!

i would serve the same nutritouse meals as i would normally serve and they can eat or go hungry.... same rules as the 2 i look after!

i would give them something "normal" like spag bol / cottage pie / sausages (the same nice free range we always have, no cheap crap with no herb , spice or TASTE! ones) with mash and veg, raost chicken, pots and veg etc rather than something like kedgeree or chilli (that my 2 LOVE!)
we dont have nuggets / breaded reconstituted crap shaped princesses / or "smiles" / alphabites / (or even chips)etc in the house and i would not purchase them to feed another child (or another animal of ANY form actually)

children who refuse food are NOT hungry, no child has ever starved themselves to death through choosing not to eat nice edible food.... if they dont like it they can full up on crap when they get home to their house!

(IMO letting children only eat crap and junk IS child abuse!)

I think if they won't have any of the food you provide, they just go without. If you start catering for all sorts of tastes and weird eating habits, you'll go beserk!
When we have little friends for lunch or supper, I make what I'm making anyways and if they don't like it they can go right to pudding which is usually a piece of fruit or maybe yogurt. If they are hungry they will eat!

also would give "normal" veg, ie broccolli, green beans, peas , carrots sweetcorn as IMO MOST children eat those.... rather than sprouts / mange tout / baby corn etc

Im lucky as the kids who i look after at the moment are at a school where they ALL eat school dinners. They have 1 meal each day + a veggy equivelent and thats it.... eat it or be hungry...

by the end of the 1st term in reception most of the fussier kids (who didnt spend meal times at school in the nursary) have broadened the foods that they eat!

dd1s friends are pretty good but she did have one for tea who didnt want the chicken drumstick or the potatoes or the veg OR the fruit and yog pudding. I offered her pizza or a sandwich as I felt really bad at her going home with nothing. she said a sandwich. I said would you like 'marmite, cheese, jam, honey or peanut butter'. she said 'oh no I only eat ham sandwiches' (we didnt have ham).

In the end she had a piece of plain bread (didnt want butter only 'spread' - which we dont have)

I felt like a gaoler. When her mum came to pick her up I told her and the mum said 'oh you could have done sheperds pie, she likes that'. Cheers.

Ds has a friend like this too and he often comes to sleep over. He only lives across the road though so I get his mum to feed him before sending him over, even if they've been playing together all afternoon. Failing that, I go ahead with my plans for tea and if he's not keen, he fills up on bread and butter - white bread, naturally!!

Have to say that I was fussy like that as a child too - not about particular brands etc, but just didn't enjoy a wide variety of foods, despite my mothers best efforts.
I do eat most things now though. It did make me nervous about going to friends houses for tea, so I've always felt that food battles aren't worth it and I wouldn't want to make someone elses child feel embarrassed about what they do and do not eat, but at the same time not totally pandering to their fussiness. There's always bread and butter in the house and that'll satisfy most.
Luckily for me, none of my squad are too fussy and I offer a little of everything and encourage them to taste things. Today we've had a breakthrough with ds2 and cucumber - he's always been offered it and often tried it and spat it out, but today, he actually asked for some as we were all having some, and he ate it and asked for more - hooray!

I agree with Robin. I can't tell my kids that they eat what I've cooked or go hungry, and then fiddle about accomodating other peoples kids whims. The only option for snacks in our house is fruit, and DDs friends ( some of whom do come here and ask for sweets as soon as they get in the door) just have to get used to it.
The worst culprit is a child with lots of allergies, which I can cope with, but who also eats tons of sweets etc, which I won't give. She tends to eat more of her meals at my house than at home now, as she's actually hungry by tea time.

I don't do sleep overs (because the child my DD wants to stay routinely stays up 'til midnight) but I would apply the same take it or leave it approach.

dds best friend eats pasta and fishfingers. she only ever comes ruond during the week when kids tea has to be seperate from adults' anyway...so I do them fish fingers and pasta - I don;t have to eat it myself or cook it especially - and it's easy. I always put some veg on the plate too which mine eat but friend donesn't. Not my problem. If as she gets older she comes when we'd normally all eat togtehr then I'd giver her whatever we were having. If she really rejected it she could have some bread and butter.

ah you're all rotten

offer them both something else you lot of meanies

I'm not mean. If I remember I do usually get some cake or something nice for pudding

no I didnt mean you

I meant people that get all stroppy and inflexible about ever offering strange children a choice and making them feel welcome in their home.

and btw if dd1 ever tried to say 'well you gave Camilla a choice' I would say well she was a guest.

Can I put the other side of the coin? I have an INCREDIBLY fussy eater (age 4) and an incredibly good eater (age 2). Both have been treated the same from the outset. Ds often eats nothing at friends houses, because he is very anxious about food. He won't eat any of those 'normal' foods suggested here - won't touch pizza, ham, chicken nuggets, most fruit, vegetables. And being at a friends house makes him even more anxious and less likely to eat even things he likes. I always try and say to parents not to worry about him not eating anything, and not to cook anything different for him, because tbh even if I gave a menu it's still a lottery whether he eats it.

He doesn't eat crap - hardly ever has biscuits/cake/crisps (like once a month, if that). They don't even have puddings. But when a child won't even eat yoghurts, what do you do? He is skinny as can be. So please don't assume that just because a child is fussy it is because a parent has pandered to them. Dd will eat anything and everything.

I have a fussy eater (dd1) and she gets very worried about eating at other peoples houses MAINLY as one mum refused to offer her anything except sausages (which she HATES) and said she couldn't get down until she had tried some.

I also have a fabby eats anything, not bothered about food in the slightest child so I am taking no responsibility for dd1s fussiness

snap tortoiseshell

glad it's not just me!

That's how I feel Enid - I would always want them to feel welcome, even if I know they're fussy, because I know how I used to feel. Most will eat a slice of bread and butter though and some sort of pudding. Would never go out of my way to buy anything special in though just because they were coming.
We invite some children round who we know will eat spag bol/shepherd's pie/ roast dinner etc and I go ahead with that. Others we invite, I know it's a chicken nuggets and frozen potato rubbish of some sort (which I always have in the freezer, but never use if it's just us) and beans, which is a safe bet that they'll eat and mine won't suffer the odd 'freezer meal' as they don't have their chums round too often.