Fruit and veg, what on earth do I do?

[Lambzig]

My DD is 23 months and was very late to food and despite my best efforts is a tricky eater. I tried BLW but she just wouldnt even try anything so ended up resorting to purees at 7.5 months.

She wont eat any fresh fruit or raw veg or salad, but will eat the baby type cooked apple puree in small amounts. She will eat fruit yoghurt as long as it hasnt got bits in it. There is fresh fruit put in front of her every day, just about everything you can think of, and I and my DH eat it in front of her several times a day offering to share. She wont even try it.

Previously, she would eat cooked green veg as long as they were a bit chopped up, but she is now refusing to eat that too unless it is completely whizzed up in a pasta sauce or similar so she cant see the colour green.

I eat lunch with her every day, but she is just narrowing further what she will eat. She is now a bit constipated and I am sure its because she is not getting enough fruit and veg.

I was making her smoothies to sneak the fresh fruit in with lots of berries and mango and yoghurt, but my GP told me I might as well be giving her a bowl of white sugar (really, are they that bad?).

Do you have any tips to help me get her eating fresh fruit and veg again? Its what we eat, my DH doesnt like meat so we eat a lot of vege food and I usually cook from scratch for all of us, so its all around her, but she just wont try it.

I don't have this problem myself as DD isn't a toddler yet. But what you wrote her reminds me of a tv program on fussy toddlers. One of the toddlers have very healthy eating parents but he will only eat fish and chips, on the sofa. The dad went to a food with toddler thing at the sure start centre. What they taught him were games to play around food. Like brushing teeth with a slice of melon. They also let the toddler help with prepping the veg. And then asked him if he wants his special broccoli. The toddler completely turned around when they revisited the family in the catch up.

I remember watching that! - DS loves 'helping' me to cook (mainly putting things I've chopped into bowls), but still isn't keen on eating what we've cooked. I think it's a really slow process of becoming familiar.

My mum got DS to eat cucumber by asking him to kiss it first (I think she watches too much House of Tiny Tearaways!) as a way to get him to experiment with the taste/texture/feel of it without having to eat it. Similar to brushing your teeth with the melon. Sometimes peer pressure can also help - if they see their friends eat it - or if they are offered it in a different way. A friend chopped up bananas for her LO and mine and DS ate it even though he'd been refusing them for ages - apparently chopped is fine, it was big chunks he wouldn't eat!? (it's the other way round with apples, wierdly)

In the meantime, although I didn't feel very happy doing it, I 'hid' lots of veg in things - in the short term it helped! Mostly via pasta sauces. A friend of mine mashed or grated fruit into porridge for her LO.

Also, when we went to France on holiday for two weeks DH and I had croissants for breakfasts every morning and although we offered it to DS he refused every day until the last morning when he polished off a whole one. It took 13 'offerings' but then suddenly he ate the lot! It really does take a whole lot longer than we think...