Help with toddler fussy eating

[Rubyandmilliecat]

My DD is 19 months and will not entertain fruit and veg when served ‘raw’ - she used to eat cucumber and she then went off that but would eat banana but even that’s becoming less reliable. Anything that children usually enjoy like berries, grapes, mango get shoved away or dropped. I am fairly relaxed and used to take the approach that as long as her diet was healthy it didn’t matter if it was restricted but it’s becoming so limited it’s getting increasingly hard to serve food she’ll eat!

Today for instance has been -

breakfast - boiled egg with a bit of toast (fine)
snack - banana (refused) - ok
lunch - cheese on toast (refused) - she then had a nap
snack after nap - two small plain biscuits
dinner - cos (refused - she used to eat this) mashed potatoes with sweetcorn - I got her to eat a bit of sweetcorn as it was with the mash but this is a risky strategy as it can lead her to refusing everything!

She used to reliably eat cheese, egg, cod, chicken, minced beef / lamb - so yesterday was a much better day and she had.pizza for lunch (home made; I didn’t order her a dominoes obviously) and spaghetti bolognaise. This is how I normally get veg in her.

Does anyone have any tips or ideas? I’m ordering a soup maker as I’m hoping this may help. What’s frustrating is she has an older brother who eats everything and I don’t want to limit his diet because of DD being so fussy!

Make the food that rest of the family want to eat. Make sure there is at least something she will eat on the plate. Serve. Let her eat what she wants. Remove. And that's it.

Don't remove food from her diet. Don't bribe, cajole, reward or punish. Food shouldn't become an issue.

Offer food in a variety of forms e.g. both hidden veg/fruit and pieces of veg/fruit. You can hide veg in a tomato sauce and use for pasta, pizza or just dipping. Fruit can be hidden in smoothies, ice lollies or milkshakes.

If she is underweight, not growing or unusually lethargic then you will need to change approach and seek medical advice, but the above is good for normal fussy toddlers.

Great advice from Nuff.

I'm just wondering how much milk she's having and is she having night feeds still?

Thank you. She doesn’t have night feeds. She generally has milk in the morning and before bed; she is a bit of a milk guzzler so I do keep an eye on that. If she’s ever really not eating much (teeth or illness) she has a bit more.

The approach above is generally what I have been doing but I think that what I’m getting a bit concerned about is that the ‘one thing she will eat’ is getting narrower and narrower and soon it’s going to be ‘beans’!

Ok so I'd cut out the morning milk, if you want to keep giving her some you could give her a small cup with her breakfast?

Between 1 and 2 it's recommended to give them 300 mls a day and this can be full fat or semi-skimmed. It also includes any milk used in cooking so if she has porridge that will count.

I can remember my first cutting out foods so in the end all they wanted was a cheese sandwich.

We stopped all snacks and ignored all complaining and they just started to eat.

You might want to do some activities with her what will build up her appetite too like swimming or baby gym