I just made what I wanted and let them eat or not - little kids don’t really need much food, not as much as adults think. Something like 3TBSP 3 times a day! And if they are not eating enough, and wanting junky stuff I made nothing sweet for a week or two to reset their palate.
And offered a lot of different flavors early, to help develop a palate. Olives, fruits & veg, spices, textures, variety.
But none of mine were really picky. Just sometimes stubborn to exercise their will, or because they thought to hold out for dessert foods. I can go months without sweets, child. You will get hungry long before I want anything sweet.
ETA - fake choices can sometimes work too. “Do you want carrot for your vegetable, or broccoli?” And when older I would sometimes ask them to make supper and we would buy whatever ingredients so they could make what they wanted, and the rest of us would eat whatever they made. Often, macaroni and cheese but sometimes they surprised me with lentil salad or something else healthy. But I was eating disordered as a young woman (restrictive - obsessed with calories) and I don’t want them to be like that, it’s not actually good to be that obsessive about perfect diet.
I just made what I wanted and let them eat or not - little kids don’t really need much food, not as much as adults think. Something like 3TBSP 3 times a day! And if they are not eating enough, and wanting junky stuff I made nothing sweet for a week or two to reset their palate.
And offered a lot of different flavors early, to help develop a palate. Olives, fruits & veg, spices, textures, variety.
But none of mine were really picky. Just sometimes stubborn to exercise their will, or because they thought to hold out for dessert foods. I can go months without sweets, child. You will get hungry long before I want anything sweet.
ETA - fake choices can sometimes work too. “Do you want carrot for your vegetable, or broccoli?” And when older I would sometimes ask them to make supper and we would buy whatever ingredients so they could make what they wanted, and the rest of us would eat whatever they made. Often, macaroni and cheese but sometimes they surprised me with lentil salad or something else healthy. But I was eating disordered as a young woman (restrictive - obsessed with calories) and I don’t want them to be like that, it’s not actually good to be that obsessive about perfect diet.