"Every family has one." Oh sure, but we have 2 & sometimes 3 picky eaters who refuse to eat what they're given, whether they actually know what it tastes like or not.
As expectant parents (many moons ago) we had these ideas of how we were going to teach our children. What rules & teaching methods we were going to use. As any parent knows, the majority of that kind of planning is thrown out the window as your little ones grow. Not that you aren't still instituting rules, but each child is so different that you need to get to know their personality & challenges to best teach them.
So here is where I'm going with this, our philosophy for dealing with picky eaters was going to be simple & stern. You eat what you are given for dinner, or you go to bed hungry. (This was adapted from my parents' much more strict & only ever enforced upon myself "Eat it or wear it" concept. Yes, I was a picky eater too.)
Our pickiest eater: Thing 2. The happy-go-lucky child who suddenly pulls on several generations of extreme stubbornness to utterly refuse to eat (or even try) something new, no matter how hungry she is. No problem, this just means bedtime without dinner. After going through this routine a few times, it dawns on me that a pattern has emerged: every morning after a skipped dinner, Thing 2 is getting sick all over the place.
Talk about adding insult to injury. Not only is she too stubborn to eat the food we offer & isn't improving or learning from skipping her dinners, we have to clean up after a sick little girl most of the next day. UGH.
Unfortunately, this has turned into some compromise in different ways as she grows. At times it was, "Eat what we fixed or all you get is plain bread." She ate a lot of plain bread... and liked it. Tried the, "I don't care if you get sick, you are going to eat this or go to bed hungry & start throwing up in the morning!" I think that worked once. Tried a few different things that have gone by the wayside.
So all of this finickiness has changed over time as to what she will or will not eat. The current struggle with both Thing 2 AND 1 is vegetables of course. They liked them just fine when they were toddlers, but one day just refused to eat them anymore. Thing 3 & 4 rarely have a problem with veggies.
Our new dinner plan: veggies FIRST, then main course. They can even pick whatever tasty thing they want for dinner, but before they ever get a smear of it on their plate, they have to FINISH their veggie.
Last night Thing 3 plowed through his broccoli like it was nothing (Yay!) and then went on to eat all his pot-stickers and a bowl of ice cream.
Thing 1 & 2 were less than amused by the selection & the amount of broccoli they had to get through (maybe about 1/4 cup). "I'll let you have some seasoning on it, what do you want?" The Johnny's seasoning salt was selected & applied & the girls claimed that it made the broccoli SO much better... and they sat & stared at their plates. The dinner awaiting them was none other than their coveted Ling Ling Pot-stickers (pan-fried!). Apparently this was not enough to tempt them to eat.
Although I'm not opposed to "spare" pot-stickers & I usually have a no-negotiation policy with culinary terrorists, I decided to give them a deal: Eat all the broccoli & get your 4 pot-stickers. Eat half your broccoli & get ONE pot-sticker. Eat 1 broccoli & you can eat a couple slices of plain bread to keep yourself from getting sick.
Thing 1 took me up on the half broccoli for a single pot-sticker deal.
Thing 2 decided on the plain bread route... but still had to get through 1 'horrible' broccoli floret. After a long time hemming, hawing, nibbling, grimacing, & complaining, it came down to this: "Guess what your throw up is going to taste like since you've already eaten some of the broccoli? REALLY NASTY broccoli. If you think it's bad now, just wait until it's coming back up in the morning just because you didn't eat enough of it."
Boo-yah! That was the magic touch & the last half of her piece of broccoli all went down (with a large glass of water). She never looked so happy to eat 2 pieces of plain white bread.
When Thing 4 awoke from her nap half-way through dinner she cleaned up the remaining broccoli off her big sisters plates. She thought she was getting her dessert first.
Tonight we had baby carrots. Thing 2's favorite veggie.
Thing 1 had to thoroughly drown them in Ranch dressing.
