Meal for my child!

[rainer.sullivan]

Hi guys! Kindda new in here, By the way, can you guys give me tips on meal planning for my son. He's kind'a hard to feed!

[lil_earthmomma]

Welcome to MDC!!!

Some more info would really come in handy!

How old is your ds? What foods does he like? What exactly makes him ''hard to feed''?

[katiesk]

my dd is 14 months. she is very 'easy' to feed. i think this is partially because of how she has been introduced to food. she has always eaten whatever food we were eating. i have never made baby food, or special meals really. she started eating pieces of avocado when she was little, and different fruits and veggies and eventually pieces of food off our plates. i have never introduced non food items...for instance, boxed macaroni and cheese, lunchable type stuff, "nuggets", plastic cheese, etc...all of these weird food products that are marketed to kids.

we do make macaroni and cheese but it is with whole wheat pasta, good cheese, vegetables, real food flavor, etc.

i think it is good to introduce kids to a wide range of foods and flavors and cultivate their own ability to choose what they do and don't like - but with the parameters of what they should be eating.

dd likes strongly flavored things. she does not really like carrots, white potatoes, bananas.

things could change, obviously, and she could develop some unhealthy eating habits/preferences. but for now, she has a great variance of nutritious food that she loves.

i think if you are trying to help an older kid eat nutritiously, who may have some unhealthy eating habits formed, you can start with replacing the junkier items with the better alternative. for instance - french fries with baked sweet potato fries, boxed mac and cheese with home made (so easy!) etc.

but yes, more information would be helpful. i was making alot of assumptions...

[Thalia the Muse]

Lots of kids are more open to a variety of foods when they're around 14 months -- only to turn picky as 3-5 year olds. I think there must be some developmental thing they hit at some point, where they start fearing that many normal foods are covert attempts to poison them!