Tuesday's Toddler Tidbits

I haven't posted a toddler tidbits in a while--things are about the same as those little menus I posted for a while under this heading. But I thought I'd throw out some of the idiosyncrasies of my toddler herd in regards to eating.

My kids are weird. I'm not complaining, mind you, just stating a fact. They don't much care for noodles/pasta (except for lo mein at Chinese buffets); they'll eat them, usually, but certainly not with gusto. Rice? Love it.

My kids also are not big fans of tomato/marinara sauces. Spaghetti, therefore, never makes an appearance at this house (my husband also prefers creamy sauces and such to marinara, so that doubles my incentive to NOT make spaghetti). What kinds of sauces will they eat? Pesto. Creamy peanut sauce. Stir-fry sauce.

Like I said, they're weird. Need more proof? When I put down a pb&j, apple slices, and cucumber slices in front of them for lunch, what do they eat first? The cucumbers. Weird, weird, weird.

But that may help to explain why there aren't many so-called "kid-friendly" recipes at first glance on this blog. Most of the recipes on here are ones my kids will eat, depending on their mood, the day, how hungry they are, their whims, the usual toddler stuff.

What do we expect from our children at dinner-time? That they eat what's in front of them if they're hungry. If they don't eat, we don't sweat it. If they eat all of one thing and want seconds, they must try the other items first (and sometimes eat all of the food on their plate if it's stuff they've eaten previously) before getting seconds of the favored item. That's it. No rules about numbers of bites, cleaning their plates, and so forth. It's worked pretty well so far. They eat lots of great stuff. And peer pressure works wonders at getting them to try things....