Hey Parents, This Trick Could Have Your Picky Eater Trying New Foods
Most parents can agree that having a child who is a picky eater is one of the biggest challenges that come with raising kids.
It’s not uncommon, and picky eating is even something that children carry into adulthood.
Research from Nationwide Children’s states that “up to 50 percent of children are reported as picky eaters by their parents or caregivers.”
However, these days there are many methods parents can use to try and get their picky kids to eat a wider variety of foods. One of them is the “taste test” method.
Kacie Barnes (@mamaknowsnutrition) is a kid’s dietician who specializes in picky eating and has a large following on TikTok.
She recently responded to a video posted by Penny Ludy (@p_ludy) that shows her young son, who gets anxious around trying new foods, tasting spaghetti prepared three different ways in a taste test.
“The idea of a taste test is a really great one to try with a food that they already like,” says Kacie.
“This is not gonna be, like, completely new foods. It’s gonna be something that they’ve tried before, and then we’re just making these really small changes. That’s actually called food chaining.”
Penny laid out three different versions of spaghetti on a plate for her son. The first is plain spaghetti with nothing added, then spaghetti with sauce, then spaghetti with butter and parmesan cheese.
Penny’s son took a bite of each style of spaghetti one by one and told her what he thought. Although he was scared to try the ones with sauce and butter, he still ate them. In fact, he really enjoyed the pasta with sauce, rating it a ’10!’
Drazen – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only, not the actual people
Kacie encourages treating a food taste test like this, saying that having kids rate the food with a thumbs up or down or on a scale of 1-10 makes the activity more enjoyable and allows them to feel more in control.
If you were to try the taste test method with your child and they begin to show resistance, Kacie encourages allowing them to incorporate their other senses into the activity.
“Have them maybe touch one of the new ones if they can,” Kacie suggests. “Even just smelling the different ones can be a really good first step.”
If you’re struggling with your child’s picky eating, see if a fun taste test would help!
You can view the original TikTok video here.
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