How to Get Picky Toddlers to Eat: Parenting Hacks That Encourage Trying New Foods
It can be hard to convince picky toddlers to eat anything other than chicken nuggets or mac and cheese. Toddlers can be extremely stubborn, so parents will often have to get creative to get their children to try new foods. At some point, the airplane and the choo-choo train just aren’t going to work anymore. So, here are several parenting hacks to get toddlers to expand their culinary horizons.
Parenting Hack 1: Make It Fun
One way to persuade kids to eat new foods is to make it fun. Parents can buy pre-made foods that are fun shapes, like dinosaur-shaped broccoli bites, or parents can make/cut food into fun shapes themselves. When plating food for toddlers, arrange it into fun shapes or designs on the plate. If children make faces at vegetables, next time make faces out of the vegetables–like in the photo above. Try connecting new foods to one of the child’s favorite cartoon characters–lasagna is Garfield’s favorite food, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles love pizza, etc.
Make a game out of it, if need be. For example, make a homemade Twister-style color spinner, and match the colors on the spinner with similar-colored fruits or vegetables. Make the spinner by flipping over a paper plate for the base and coloring sections to match the foods. Next, push a thumbtack or pushpin through the center of a paper clip in the center of the paper plate to complete the spinner. Then everyone takes turns spinning the spinner and eating the food that matches the color the paperclip stopped on.
Parenting Hack 2: Eat It First
When trying to get toddlers to eat new foods, a parent should always eat the food first and keep a neutral face. The toddler needs to see the parent eating it, but not feel like they are being pressured to eat it themselves. Children of that age are very curious, and they do not like being left out of things. Most of the time, if the toddler sees the parent eating it off their own plate, the child will want it too.
At that point, let them try it for themselves, but do not try to coerce them. More often than not, they will choose to try it. Don’t be discouraged if a child does not like a food on the first try. Studies, like this one from the National Library of Medicine, show that children often have to try a food ten or more times before they begin to accept it.
Other Parenting Hacks For Picky Toddlers
Here are a few more parenting hacks to try with those picky toddlers. If a child does not like a food the first time, try preparing the food a different way the next time. For instance, they may not like those processed fish sticks, but maybe they will like fish if it is grilled or baked instead. Sometimes it is all in the name. If they love chicken, or just saw Finding Nemo, call that salmon “pink chicken” when they ask, “What’s for dinner?”
Finally, young children often want to help. When it is safe to do so, let them. For instance, even at that age, they can put fresh green beans or grapes into a colander for you to rinse. A child is much more likely to eat food that they helped prepare.
