Getting Kids to Eat New Foods

When my oldest child was still very young and just learning how to eat table food, he would often try to push food away if he was unfamiliar with it. I went through many months of trying without any progress to get him to eat new foods. He would cry about trying a new food and eventually, I would give in and allow him to eat those things that he was more comfortable with. That was fine, as long as what he wanted to eat was healthy, and I was able to keep the house stocked with his favorites. I ran into a serious problem at one point. I was unable to afford to feed him only what he seemed to like. I had to get him to try new foods, there just wasn't any option.

Now, I had absolutely no choice but to make him eat what I had to feed him. For him, it was either try the food or go hungry. This was the beginning of an important lesson for me that I have taken on in life and used with my other children since.

I decided that rather than make a big deal out of the fact that he was going to have to eat something he may not like, I would simply put it on his plate and see what happened. The first time, I remember, he tried to push his plate away; he even cried a little. I told him that he had to eat that food because he didn't have his favorites left. I sat down at the table with him, my plate in front of me, and ate my meal. I had the exact same food on my plate. My son, who had pushed his plate away, looked to me and asked me for a bite of mine. Seeing this as a great opportunity, I gave him a bite. To his surprise, he liked my food. I sat there, giving him small bites from my plate, and when he least expected it; I gave him a bite from his own. He found that he liked the new food after all.

As he got older, I still had my struggles with him and his aversion to trying new foods. When he got old enough to understand, I would put two small spoonfuls of the new food on is plate and tell him that he had to eat two bites of the food before he could tell me that he didn't like it. Normally, he found that once the food was in his mouth, it wasn't as bad as he thought it would be.

This two-bite technique has been very helpful with all of my children. The rule in my house is that no one can tell me that they do not like something that is on their plate until they have taken two good bites of it. If after two bites, they still do not like it, I allow them to leave it on their plate.

Occasionally, one child or another will tell me that they do not like something after the first two bites. When this happens, I allow them to leave it, but re-introduce the same food at another time. Normally, I will wait a week or two before serving that particular food again so the taste is fresh to them. More often than not, after trying a new food a few times, the kids decide that they really do like it.

Of course, there are some foods that some people just do not like no matter how many times they try it. If for some reason, one of my kids finds, after several tries, that he or she really does not like a specific food, I generally allow them to stop eating it until they are ready to try again on their own. For example, my oldest son does not like coconut at all. He has tried it many, many times, he just does not like it. I now allow him to skip things with coconut unless he asks to try it.

My two-bite rule and the re-introduction of new foods has been the key for me to get my children to eat new foods. The fact that they have to take two bites before telling me that they do not like it gives them the opportunity to first, taste the food, and second to get over their aversion enough to try a second bite. The re-introduction of a new food allows them to get used to the idea of eating that particular food again and as a result, decreases their personal, new food anxiety. I have found that the combination has really helped my children to discover many of the foods that they ask for on a regular basis today.