Kids And The Eat Or Starve Approach To Os

frugalfairy_3

Kiwichick, I think you're doing brilliantly and are a great mum for trying so hard to encourage your children to eat well and healthily. Mine are all grown up now but I remember the battlegrounds very well - I think mine were lucky in that they really didn't grow up in the turkey twizzler era and so it must have been easier for me and my contemporaries (although I'm sure I didn't think so at the time!)

Having said that, I have more trouble with OH now not wanting to eat OS food than I ever did with the children :rolleyes: I'm afraid I just ignore his whinging - he's old enough and ugly enough to make his own food choices so if he doesn't want his dinner, he just goes without (or goes foraging;) ). I HAVE found that he doesn't moan about the HM bread etc any more now, I've just been plugging away, quietly baking my own and not buying supermarket bread so that's all there is to eat :rotfl: I WILL WIN this battle!:rotfl:

FF xx

Chell

kiwichick wrote:

I have just had DS and DD2 helping me to make a curried parsnip soup for DH and I. Whilst I'm not expecting either of them to try it due to the instense flavour they both had a kids knife and sat on the floor with a chopping board each hacking away at red onion. They loved it, the same as they love it when I let them help me make cakes or similar so it is something I WILL keep up.

I never make seperate meals for the kids, I am too lazy.:rotfl: If I made the soup I would add a small amount of the spices, serve up the kids meal then spice it up for DP and I. Parsnips are very sweet, I used them all the time when weaning DD, maybe your kids would love it.

Lucie_2

judi24 wrote:

This thread has given me loads of ideas about the younger kids but what do people do with teenagers who refuse to eat something?

I'd say at that age she is old enough to cook her own dinner! Not in an "excluded" way, but in a mature help-around-the-house way. Get her to have a look through your recipe books to see what she would like to cook, or get her to make her favourite dinner for all the family once a week. Even if it's only jacket potatoes & cheese, it's a start. The BBC food website is good, you can type in 2 or 3 ingredients into the recipe finder (eg chicken, cheese, potatoes) and it will suggest recipies based on those foods. That way she won't feel as if she's being forced into eating food she doesn't like.
You might get the perfect result of the younger ones refusing to try her food - then she'll know how you feel!

Punky

Kiwichick - Annabel Karmel also does family meal recipes - my OH loves them!

Sarahsaver

I would not make separate food for everyone, but if mine help they can have something a little different. Last night we had chicken and veg pie (HM) with carrots and new potatoes. DD made her own pie because she wouldn't eat the chicken. She made a cheese and ham pie with the offcuts from our big pie She's just turned 9 years old.
DS (6) likes to make coleslaw, and littlest ds (5) is a dab hand with puddings:)

Chipps

I never cooked different meals for children & us, but did (still do) allow for dislikes - eg if you don't like peas you get extra carrots instead.
I have one real fusspot who hardly eats any veg, so we have carrots pretty much every meal.
But one thing we did do when they were little was to arrrange the food in an interesting way sometimes.
I notice yours like potato faces. What about making faces with the food you want them to eat? Looking at the posts, bambywamby has said pretty much the same thing, so I am not the only one who has spent ages arranging food on plates.
Also someone else mentioned about role models, as children sit at the table & watch how others eat. Is it possible for you to eat together as a family or with friends/extended family sometimes so they get an idea of how meal times should be conducted? Sorry if you do this already & I have just skip-read the posts too fast!