Beyond I don't like it
Last week we had prawn tacos with avo, spinach, and apple slaw, which sounds like a bizarre combination but it was really lovely. M saw dinner and immediately said "I don't like this".
One of the things I love the most in the world is seeing my child eat my food. Food that I selectively choose to make, and then took some time to prepare. It can be heartbreaking to spend time, sometimes hours preparing a meal, just to see M sit there, move the food around the plate, not actually picking anything to eat, and not even tasting it.
So where do we go from here? There is no need to let mealtime be dominated by this moment. Instead it is an opportunity to engage with our child. First you can start with: "why don't you like it?" Some other good prompts might be "is it the taste?", "What does the taste remind you of?", "is it the texture/the way it feels in your mouth?" (e.g. crunchy, smooth), "how about the flavour? is it sweet, salty?" Start a conversation about the food that is not a binary, like or dislike.
As I mentioned many times before, we follow the rule: "we decide what to serve and when and they decide what to eat and how much". But we also follow a second rule: "you don’t have to like it but you do have to try it, at least two bites for each type of food on the plate". The idea is that familiarity makes us like things so the more we try, the more we learn to like it. Just like the case of bitter greens and myself.
We try to always have some foods on the plate that M will like, so she doesn't refuse everything on the plate and it is not too confronting. The basic idea is to serve a new food amidst other familiar liked foods every few days, and in different ways to build familiarity over time. This is not a quick fix. It takes time. But it is possible. There are other things we can do to help with this, like keeping a schedule and no snacking between meals, but I can talk about that next time.
In the history of our family meals, there are a few notable meals that all of us did not like, for example a dessert pasta that M will never let Lachlan forget about. But in most cases, once she actually decides to try the food, she usually (not always) likes it. As was the case with our aforementioned prawn tacos 🌮
Here are this week’s recipe suggestions for you to try:
Papaya mousse - quick and healthy dessert, except that you need to soak the cashews for a few hours before, and refrigerate it for a few hours after, but who's counting. Maybe make this at lunch to have as dessert after dinner?
Shaved fennel summer salad with peaches and pesto - this one is for summer
Winter berry smoothie - and this one is for winter
Aglio é olio - one of our default "we don't know what to cook and we need something now" meals. Also anything with garlic is a plus. This is enough for 2.5 people.
200g angel hair spaghetti (or whatever pasta you have)
1/4 cup EVOO (extra virgin olive oil)
5 cloves of garlic, sliced
1 tsp chilli flakes, to taste
1 tbsp chopped fresh herbs (for example, parsley), optional
Pecorino cheese, grated (or any other hard cheese you might have)
How to?
Bring a large pot of salted water to boil. Add the pasta and cook until it is tender but still a bit chewy. Reserve some of the pasta cooking water.
Meanwhile at the same time, heat the oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook until aromatic but not brown, stirring occasionally, about 2-3 minutes. Add the chilli flakes.
Once the pasta is ready, transfer pasta to the pan with a bit of the pasta water. Increase heat to high and cook, stirring until the sauce emulsifies, becomes creamy, and coats the pasta, 2-3 minutes. Remove from heat, stir in the herbs, serve immediately with a sprinkle of grated cheese, and enjoy!
Our meal plan from last week can be found at: https://foodfamily.app/public/meal_plans/52a4e7bc-321d-45c4-8195-d9760cdfe7db
Once again, please let us know if you make any of these recipes, how you found them, what you changed, or just drop us an email to say hi.
Thanks and see you next week,
Elle, Lachlan, M, Ginger, and Edward