I haven’t shared much in the kiddo food department in a while and that’s mostly because not much has changed.
He prefers mainly carbs to start the day, which is odd since he used to LIVE and DIE for eggs. Now he’s over the eggs. Whatever. He alternates between home-made quick breads, waffles, pancakes, donuts, and oatmeal. All with a bunch of fruit (usually blueberries or grapes). And bear in mind this is after his pre-breakfast snack of apple slices. And then typically sunflower and pumpkin seeds until he’s full.
GF pancakes with coconut flour, GF all purpose flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and a pinch of sugar.
GF banana bread with coconut oil, coconut flour, GF all purpose flour, bananas, applesauce, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt.
GF oats with chia seeds, cinnamon, applesauce, and raisins.
Lots of the same ingredients just in different ratios and presentations.
Lunch is the meal that he’d likely skip if I let him. He’s never really interested in it.
What he eats depends largely on what I’m eating (if I didn’t get a chance to eat when he was napping, we eat together and he often wants whatever I’m having).
Smoothies are a fairly constant lunch item because I can squeeze in lots of nutrients in a small cup. He usually tells me what he wants in each smoothie and then goes to the backyard to pick the chard for it (99% of the time he asks for lettuce). 50% of the time he asks for humpty dumpty in the smoothie too. I have no idea where this came from but he thinks it’s hilarious so I just go with it.
I always add at least one sweet fruit (bananas, strawberries, applesauce) that acts as a mask for the other stuff I sneak in (beans, hemp seeds, lettuce, etc.). I only put in one “weird” thing per smoothie and it’s usually a source of protein so he gets something beyond carbs in the smoothie. For the liquid I use (canned) coconut milk for fat.
New favorites for lunches include rolled up deli meat. He is now on board with sliced deli meat, including ham (his former number one), turkey, and salami. I roll them up and he eats it like a burrito. Not totally on board with canned tuna yet, despite loving baked fish (mainly salmon).
Carrots, celery, cucumber are common lunch veggies because they are almost always in my lunch too.
He also loves rice cakes, which again, is something I eat for lunch frequently too.
Home-made bars are my desperate go-to because he loves them. I make a new batch as soon as one runs out.
His most recent obsession is “mama bread” with avocado which he would have for every single meal if he could (and sometimes does when my fridge’s diversity and prep work is lacking).
He isn’t yet to the two bread sandwich stage yet, so open faced slices are where it’s at. He chooses the topping he wants from avocado, to sunbutter, to jam, to butter (soy free Earth Balance). He definitely goes through phases. Avocado being the most expensive one. 😉 Pictured above is The Essential Baking Co bread by the way – which is still our go to gluten free (allergy free) option, although Udi’s is a good runner up.
Since dinners are the meal I blog about most frequently, I’m sure you all have a general idea of how those go. We try to eat as similarly as possible (allergen free) because it makes my life easier when I’m cooking. However, he isn’t super into “assembled” meals so he tends to eat the components of the meal separately before I put them all together for Kyle and myself. Example: beans, bell peppers, rice and avocado on the tray individually, as opposed to a burrito bowl. He has recently taken to mixing things into grains (like avocado in quinoa) so that may be a stepping stone for the future…
Anyway. He basically eats the same things we eat for dinner…and if I make a meal with allergens, I just plan ahead to make an extra servings of something earlier in the week that he can/will eat.
I continue to try to expose him to as many new things as possible, especially with seasonal produce, like the zucchini above. Trying different ways of cutting/serving it helps. Sometimes he won’t like something one way, but he will take to it obsessively another way. He loves zucchini bread but was so so on zucchini noodles. He liked them sliced and sautéed in bacon fat and salt (duh), too. He is moody with his willingness to be an adventurous eater – sometimes he will be super excited to try something, and other times I have to invoke the “you have to at least try one bite” rule. And if he does and doesn’t want anymore that’s fine with me. It took 250,834 tries but he is now a big broccoli fan. It’s like one day it just switched. Maybe that will continue to happen with other foods too. Until then, I just sneak various rejected foods in his smoothies in gradually increasing amounts in the hopes that his taste buds will become used to the flavors. I also cook with him and act super excited and positive about new foods while I’m prepping them (I’m usually cooking and prepping future meals while he’s eating). It works fairly frequently, but not always.
His design, not mine.
