My 3 year old will eat only one vegetable willingly: corn.  But he will eat almost any fruit.  What, if any, fruits would be high in the nutrients he needs that are found in veggies?  Please help.

P.S.  I just found your site and look forward to using it often.

Sounds like my granddaughter a few years back.  I was giving her granny lecture #374 on learning to like more more vegetables and she pointed out she loved corn!   She was old enough to inform that while everything from wheat to sugar to apples to chocolate to beans to tomatoes were actually members in good standing of the vegetable kingdom, technically corn wasn't a "veggie"; it was a grain!

Just as children have fresh new hearing, sight and other senses, their taste buds are more sensitive.  Experts tell us that some people's tongues are crowded with taste buds that sense bitter, others are less sensitive.  Sounds like maybe you have a supertaster on your hands.  Fruit is sweet, corn is starchy, "veggies" are-- ugghh!-- bitter!   So you have two objectives on your hands:  to educate his tongue and provide nutritive support services until he accepts more veggies.    Here's some thoughts:

• Tomatoes are bursting with phytochemicals, antioxidants and vitamins.  Go heavy on pastas, serve ketchup, barbecue sauce, soups with a tomato base.  Add a pinch of sugar to offset the acidity.
  
  
• All berries are extremely high in nutrients.  Add to muffins, pancakes, yogurt, ice cream, cakes, or let him munch on them for snacks.   Blueberries and strawberries are tops for nutrition.   Grapes are excellent too, especially purple grapes, and sweet cherries.  (Watch pits and seeds with young children.)  
  
  
• Citrus fruits are powerhouses of vitamins and other goodies.  
  

• If he likes cheese, it'll be a lot easier.  Use melted cheese or cheese sauce to hide broccoli, spinach, anything else you like to serve.  Low fat - not fat free - is a good choice.
  
  
• Add small amounts of finely cut, shredded or minced veggies to dishes he likes.   See Sicilian Style Spaghetti Sauce with ground figs and carrots for an example.  
  
  
• Does he like soups?  Add extra veggies in small amounts to soups he likes.     Cottage cheese?   Serve mixed with crushed pineapple and a little finely shredded carrot.
  
  
• Getting enough fiber may be a problem.  An excellent solution is dried fruit.   Let him munch on figs, raisins and pitted prunes for a sweet snack, or reconstitute and add to baked goods and meat dishes.   Prunes and other dried fruits are fiber-rich and very high in the nutrients he needs.
  
  
• Enrich his diet with whole grains and beans.  If whole wheat bread is a problem (frequently is with supertasters), work up to it with "tinted" bread, getting it darker and more "whole" wheat little by little over the next year or so.
  
  
• Children like these who are supertasters and strong-willed often wear their parents down until they are being fed mostly trash beverages, sugared cereals, sweets, fats, fast food and a limited number of good food items. Resist the urge!    Make sure everything that passes his lips counts for something.  See Healthy Beverages. 
  
  
• No fruits completely make up for lack of veggies in the diet, especially cruciferous ones.   Fruits are higher in calories and sugars as well.   He must eventually learn to eat veggies for good health, and you'll have to help him learn to do like them, just as you teach him about other dangers and good habits.   See Help Along the Learning Curve for ideas.
  

• If you persist in sneaking small amounts of veggies into his food, hiding them under sauces or in meats, etc., it will get better eventually as his tongue gets educated.  Meanwhile a book that I can recommend is "Stealth Health".    The author is full of sneaky ways to use a food processor or blender and disguise nutritious vittles as junk food.

Keep us posted on progress.  Meanwhile, if anyone has any ideas, please pass them on and we'll publish them.

Jody....Hint and response

Thank you very much for your suggestions on alternatives to veggies with fruit and other hiding techniques.  I have already tried a few ideas and came up with one of my own.  We have started making our own pizzas at home using dough and sauce from a local Italian foods shop in Louisville, KY.  The sneaky thing I did was chop up fresh spinach very finely and placed it on the pizza sauce.  Voila!  My son got a good helping of fresh spinach as well as eating one of his favorite dishes. 

Thanks again. I have told several people already about this site!

I was interested in your article about picky eaters.   My son Anthony was horrible as a baby and pre-schooler.  He went for 9 months once without eating anything but cereal.  It was very frustrating for me because I'm not accustomed to giving in to the demands of difficult children. 

His doctor counseled me to just not feed him anything until he ate the appropriate food.  This did not work.  He went for three days without eating anything.  I also tried forcing the issue, but everything that went down that way also came back up.

What I did find to be helpful was socialization.  When Anthony saw mealtime as a time of community and bonding he started being  less concerned with the food.  It helped him most to have very regular mealtimes and mealtime routines, and to eat with others his own age.  I  invited friends over with children his age and we all ate together.

It also helped to have someone else do the cooking for awhile.  He was convinced that my food was bad while someone else cooking the same item was a new and inviting experience.

Very smart, Amy.   It sounds like Anthony's terrible twos were really outstandingly bad.  You found creative solutions to his food aversions that worked for both you and Anthony!

Before I print this letter, I'd like to make some comments.  Having a rather primitive sense of humor (slapstick, performance art, practical jokes, etc.) as well as plays on words, I enjoy such shows as Funniest Animals, Funniest Home Videos and Candid Camera.  One episode, however, breaks my heart.  I can scarcely watch it.   It's a little girl being forced to eat green beans, one by one, while she howls and sobs.  I cannot fathom why a parent would do this, and even less, film it and put it on national TV!  To me, this is a classic example of child abuse; well-meaning, perhaps, but never-the-less...  

Also, to avoid confusion, let me mention that the letter writer with the problem is named Jessica S., the same as our contributing dietitian.  Jessica obviously has insights into her difficulty, both conscious and subconscious.  She includes two telling adages with her letter.  The first one, which I am going to feature in our "Inspirations" page:

 "A child's life is like a piece of paper on which everyone leaves a mark."  --Chinese proverb

The second one:

"Atrocities are not less atrocities when they occur in laboratories & are called medical research."  --George Bernard Shaw

I am a horribly picky eater.  I am a 20 year old college student and for as long as I can remember I have been a picky eater. I hardly eat any meat. I will eat chicken sometimes but the thought of meat usually repulses me.  I also just can't bring myself to eat or try new foods, or anything that looks remotely strange.  The majority of things that I actually do try to eat or have tried in the past, make me feel like I'm going to gag.  I do love fruit though and am trying to make myself eat more vegetables.  My meals usually consist of pizza, chicken, sometimes turkey sandwiches, spaghetti.... and fruit when available.  When eating at restaurants, I usually only find one or two items (if any) that I could even order.  This never used to bother me, but is getting worse and worse.  Even though I have trouble finding foods to eat, I always do eat meals so I am not withholding food in any way.  When I was younger, I was also picky but not this extreme.  My parents would force me to eat healthy.  However, now I have total control of my diet.  Any suggestions?

I am totally unqualified to give advice on this problem, although I've given quite a bit of personal opinions on how to help prevent it in the first place (The Princess and the Pea,    Is Total Control A Good Thing?,   Table Manners,  and Help Along the Learning Curve, Painlessly).   So I passed the question to eminently qualified and experienced dietitian Jessica Setnick. 

I have two suggestions for Jessica:    (1)  Seek a psychotherapist for long-term counseling, and (2) have an evaluation with a dietitian. 

The counseling is the important first step, because these food behaviors are linked to your feeding development, meaning that somewhere along the line your relationship with food was damaged.  Instead of learning that food was an interesting and tasty part of life, you got the message that food was an anxiety-provoking control issue.  Nothing you are doing is wrong, but since it is starting to bother you and interfere with your life, it is worth it to get help.  A therapist will not judge you;  their job is to help you figure out how your food and eating behaviors are helping you feel safe and in control, and how you can learn new, healthier behaviors to get the same results.  

The reason I suggest meeting with a dietitian is to ensure that you are not harming your health with the way that you are eating.  A dietitian can help you determine how to eat adequately from among the foods that you like, until the time that you feel comfortable adding other foods.  A dietitian may also recommend   supplementation or a medical checkup to ensure that you are not deficient in any nutrients.     

To give you a head start in your counseling, you might read Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family, and compare the natural feeding relationship with the way that you grew up with food.  If you can find some examples of how your experiences with food, feeding, and eating were different from the norm, this will provide a context for you and your counselor.    

Changing habits is difficult, but over time you can help yourself with counseling so that you don't need the eating behaviors you don't like, and they will fade away.

Best wishes.

Thanks so much, Jessica, for your insightful suggestions.

Karen Danielson,  RN, who also contributes recipes and advice on healthful eating, is in charge of the student clinic at the local college where she lives in Pennsylvania.  Since Jessica (the letter writer with the problem) is in college, and Karen counsels students a large part of the time, in this case I asked Karen what she would advise if this young woman came to her for help.  Karen, as I do, feels food is health, food is pleasure and food is love, and while she isn't a specialist in eating disorders, she certainly encounters it frequently.   Here's her comments and some specific advice:

With most of my girls here at the college, the desire to get well and the recognition that they have a problem is key.  Badgering from well meaning parents and friends just intensifies the problem unless the girl herself is ready to seek help.  The patient has to "see the light" so to speak and when that happens there's a myriad of resources available.  

Jessica realizes she has a problem.  The first place she could go, if she feels comfortable, is to her school nurse.   Most school nurses are all too familiar with this problem and are able to direct the student to get professional help by a qualified counselor,  one that has gone to school for just that specific purpose.  

Our student health center is known as a "safe haven".  The students are told that by me, at a big Freshmen Orientation meeting.  Any one seeking services from us knows, coming in, that everything is strictly confidential, even from the Administration, unless the situation that comes to our attention is going to be life-threatening to the patient or someone else.  I don't know where Jessica goes to college but that's pretty much standard fare for all of them. Because the student is 18, we can't even discuss things with their parents without the student's permission, in writing. It may help Jessica to know this and to know that her secret will be safe.

Most professionals who deal with people who have this disorder are not judgmental and will not think she is stupid or unlovable.  She needs to know this. And if she gets hooked up with someone like that, or someone who makes her feel uncomfortable, drop him or her and find someone else, as she doesn't need it.

I agree with Dietitian Jessica Setnick that the other Jessica needs to seek professional help.  Do-it-yourself help manuals are helpful adjuncts, at times, but I would never recommend them as the only source of help, although there's an excellent  resource at  www.gurze.com, something that down the road may be useful to her.        

I hope I've provided some insight and that the info will help in some way.     

Jessica, you have taken several important steps already.  You know you have a problem.  You are (within the confines of your difficulty) trying to eat a healthy diet.  You want change.  It's not going to get better by itself.   I would like to urge you to take the next steps;  seek counseling, read books, and do everything you can to become truly free.   Jessica Setnick's suggestion about seeing a dietitian is an excellent one, because you may be able to accomplish a reasonably healthy balance of food within those items you are willing to eat while you work on allowing food in general to become the pleasure it's meant to be.

Let's hear back from you from time to time, and best wishes.  We care!

I was the picky eater as a child.  Unfortunately my parents didn't handle it well.  I don't know why I didn't like anything, but my parents decided to force me to sit at the table until I cleaned my plate.  So I did.  I sat and sat and sat and sat and sat and sat.  Finally my mom would come in and tell me to go to bed.  I had won! 

Anyway this continued for I don't know how long.  Finally my mom asked my doctor and he said I was healthy, don't worry.  Unfortunately the damage was already done.  Whatever it was that made me a picky eater didn't just go away when the battle was over.  I am now 35 and still a picky eater.  

I have tried things but I just don't like them.  I don't know if it's a texture issue or too many taste buds or what.  I also don't really enjoy very many foods either.  Most people I know LOVE this or LOVE that and seeing some delicious desserts will just salivate until they get a piece.  I'm not a big sweet eater.  Plain white or chocolate cake, not too much chocolate. I can't stand cheesecake.  

It does make it easy not to worry about over eating but I worry about eating healthy.  I see all these recipes full of stuff I don't like.  I would like to try to improve my diet, but I need to do it slow and gradually.  Not just switching to something full of new tastes.  Does anyone have any suggestions on how to do this?

Also, I have 3 children.  My oldest son...eats very well.  Likes many vegetables, tries new things.  LOVES cheesecake.  Doesn't care for salad or spinach and a few other things, but has tried them and will try them.  My second son, however, seems to have inherited the picky gene.  At 9 months he stopped eating everything he used to eat.  As an infant he ate what I gave him.  From 9 months on (he is now 2 1/2) he eats only a few things.  My pediatrician said... sneak something he doesn't like into what he does like.  WRONG!  Now he won't eat mashed potatoes any more because I stuck a pea in them once.  I do believe it has a lot to do with texture.  But I don't know how to correct the problem.  He is like me.  He likes bland foods.  I will never FORCE him to eat anything.  I always thought that was where my parents went wrong.  Well, not allowing him to have it doesn't work either.  (Although brother is ecstatic because he always gets to eat little brother's dinner).  This child can go for days without eating.  His diet is mainly dry cereal (only certain kinds), bread, milk, juice, peanut butter (sometimes) pancakes, and once in a while a cookie and sometimes cake and some days cake is gross.

My third child now 14 months also eats anything we put near her.  In fact, you had better watch your plate.  If she can reach it it's gone.  There are days where she will refuse to eat certain foods, but it is nothing like her brother was.  She still eats vegetables and fruits, meats, etc.  My second son won't eat any meat.

So, I have two problems.  How to correct my own problem and how to encourage my 2 1/2 year old son to not fall into the same pit.  Peer pressure is probably not an option here.  We are all very independent with good self esteem and could care less what others think about us.  So, give me some other ideas.  How to start small.  What to start with. 

Wow!  There's a lot to think about there.   It sounds like you have a lot of insight about how you got that way, but can't seem to implement change by yourself.  

One problem may be that you and your middle son are "super-tasters" (See Got a Supertaster?).  Some people have an excessive amount of taste buds.  Studies on people who have aversions to bitter or sour foods have documented this.  It isn't a bad thing, necessarily, when you are older.  My dad taught me to enjoy trying strange things and I'll try almost anything and even sometimes eat something just because it's bitter, strange, even rancid tasting as long as I know it's wholesome, just for variety and curiosity.  (See "It's not too late for Father's Day".)   But in my case early experimentation was done with coaxing, with fun and with love, not by forcing me to sit at the table until I ate.

Textures are a different problem.  Somewhere you learned to be afraid of certain textures.  Personally I almost completely cannot bear wooden tongue depressors or anything else on my tongue that feels like one, even cheap wooden chopsticks.  That's not a problem because as a small child I learned to open my mouth so wide the doctor could see halfway to my stomach, just to avoid the terrible feel, and I have ivory and lacquered chopsticks if I feel like using them.   So I can sympathize.  In this specific case, I don't know why I have this aversion, I can only speculate.  

I also have an aversion to oysters.  I have tried to eat them and cannot swallow them.  Who knows why?  On the other hand, I have an aversion to tapioca pudding, but I can eat it  although much of the enjoyment disappeared after a fun-loving boy in grade school told me "You know what those little lumps are?  Snipped up mouse tails!"   I knew better because I'd frequently seen my mother make it, but really!  I must have been in a vulnerable frame of mind that particular day because boys' ideas of fun at the lunch table usually didn't bother me.

We all, as human beings, have problems and hang-ups.  None of the above interfere with my life in the slightest.  I don't care if I never eat an oyster.  Your problems do interfere with your life, so you would probably be happier finding help.  Also, you are missing out on one of the great joys in life, good food.  Plus a highly varied diet, especially one that includes many of the stronger tasting fruits and veggies, provides the most vitamins, minerals and vital antioxidants that help preserve long-term good health.  A psychologist or dietitian that specializes in eating disorders would be the best place to start.  I have forwarded your letter to Dietitian Jessica Setnick who is a specialist in this sort of problem, and I'm sure her comments and recommendations will be forthcoming soon.

Meanwhile, you're certainly doing the right thing not forcing your kids to eat foods they don't like, especially since they have to realize you have a problem too.  As far as your doctor's advice about sneaking things into your middle child's food, maybe he doesn't realize the extent of your son's problem.  I'm all for sneaking nutrition into food-- that's the basis of my website, The Sneaky Kitchen.  But when you have a REALLY picky eater you can do more damage than good that way, as you discovered.

Here's some related links (you may have already read them):

• Picky Eater Advice Page 1
• Is Total Control a Good Thing?

Your first paragraph above suggests that you are aware that your eating habits as a child had something to do with a power struggle between you and your parents.  It's great that you realize that, and as Bess pointed out, you may have started out with an aversion to some foods, but the control issues blew them out of proportion.  It sounds like your middle child's behaviors have increased your awareness of your own, and perhaps are even the reason that you would like to change.  I encourage you to separate the two of you in your mind, for example, just because both of you have brown hair does not mean that you get the same haircut.  You each have different reasons for changing, and because you are older, you will each need different treatment. 

As a 35 year old woman, it is very unlikely (I would say impossible) that you will be able to convert yourself into your definition of a "normal" eater right away.  You will need to delve further into when and why your relationship with food was damaged, and then work on developing it from that point forward.  Meaning that you have to re-learn how to eat and interact with food.  It may mean behaving like a child-- eating a bite of food and spitting it out if you don't like it, or putting something new on your plate and then changing your mind and eating something else.  You will have to re-learn that you are going to be the only one who will ever decide what, when, and how much you eat, for the rest of your life!  Ultimately you will be able to make choices based on whether or not you want to try a new food or want to eat something, not based on what your parents would have wanted (or more likely what you would have done in defiance of your parents).  To guide you on this process, I recommend reading How to Get Your Kid to Eat...But Not Too Much, by Ellyn Satter.  This will teach you about the normal progression of how children learn about food, and you may be able to identify some of the places where your feeding relationship was injured.  

At that point, a registered dietitian can help you with strategies to implement the changes that you wish to make.  Ideally you would see a dietitian who specializes in eating disorders.   Even though you may not have an eating disorder, dietitians with eating disorder experience are aware of the psychology of eating, and this is the piece that you need.  Because when we continue to do things that we don't want to be doing (e.g. smoking, overworking, eating in a certain way), there are always underlying reasons that make the behavior more difficult to change.  You will find out, as you try to change, whether your behaviors are just habits or whether they have more psychological value.  If it is easy to change, then I would call the behavior a habit, but from your email, I suspect that you will discover that you have some fears of changing.  It is important to figure out why you want to change, and then why you are afraid to do so (again, a dietitian or counselor can help you with this).  You may be afraid that if you change your eating behaviors that you will gain weight.  You may fear embarrassment if you tried a new food and then spit it out.  You may fear wasting food if you prepared something new and then didn't like it.  I am just suggesting a few common fears - there are many other reasons that you may have difficulty changing.  Once you are aware of what is behind your eating behaviors, you will be more adequately prepared to change them.  

Now, regarding your "picky" child.  The bonus of having similar eating behaviors is that you can understand what your child is going through.  That doesn't mean that you automatically know what to do, though.  The book that I recommended above will help you with guidelines for feeding all of your children plus some techniques to help yourself be less anxious about your "picky" child's eating.  It makes sense to check with a pediatric dietitian to ensure that your child is meeting his nutritional needs with his current intake and to find out if any nutrient supplementation is recommended.  Then it would be up to that dietitian to determine if behavioral changes are indicated, or if, in fact, your child is normal for him, even if he is different from your other children. 

Feeding children can be such an emotional issue.  Good luck with your journey; I bet you will learn a lot! 

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