If your toddler begged for mac and cheese, took one bite, and declared it disgusting, this episode is for you. Picky eating is one of the most common and most stressful phases of childhood, but the good news is there are real, practical things you can do before it starts and when you are already deep in it.

Dr. Mona sits down with Jennifer Friedman, registered pediatric dietitian, picky eating expert, and founder of Feeding Picky Eaters, to break down what actually works at the dinner table and why letting go of control might be the most powerful thing you can do as a parent.

In this episode, we cover:

• The three things you can do right now to prevent picky eating before it starts
• Why the feeding relationship matters more than any single meal
• How to get out of a menu rut without overhauling everything
• The stoplight food method to bring variety back to the table
• Why flexibility with food is a muscle, and how to build it in your kids
• The Division of Responsibility and why trying harder at the table often backfires
• How to let go of mealtime expectations so everyone can actually enjoy the meal

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00;00;00;02 – 00;00;23;29

Dr. Mona

Welcome back to the follow up. I’m Doctor Mona, pediatrician and mom, and this is the Monday episode series of the PedsDocTalk podcast, where we revisit a favorite conversation in less time than it takes your toddler to declare they hate the exact meal they begged for two hours ago. Picky eating is one of the most common phases children go through and one of the most stressful for parents.

 

00;00;24;01 – 00;00;51;22

Dr. Mona

But here’s the good news there are things we can consider before we ever get to that stage. And if you’re already deep in the beige food era, this episode is for you. I’m retiring this conversation because the feeding relationship we built with our kids matters so much more than any single meal or the food that they’re eating. Yes, I know as a pediatrician and a mom, I know how easy it is to fall into the pressure trap, the menu rut, or the just take one bite negotiation.

 

00;00;51;24 – 00;01;12;24

Dr. Mona

This episode is a reset. In this episode, I’m joined by Jennifer Friedman, registered pediatric dietitian, picky eating expert, and founder of Feeding Picky Eaters. We talk about three simple things you can do to approach picky eating before it starts. How to Get unstuck when you’re in a rut, and the factors that can increase or decrease the likelihood of picky eating.

 

00;01;12;26 – 00;01;32;21

Dr. Mona

My favorite takeaway? Flexibility with food is like a muscle. The more our kids get to practice it, the stronger it gets. And the same goes for us letting go of control at the table. To learn more about Jennifer, visit Jennifer Friedman nutrition.com or find our on Instagram and Pinterest at Feeding Picky Eaters. And if this episode resonates with you.

 

00;01;32;22 – 00;01;48;23

Dr. Mona

Make sure to download it. Share it on social and tag the PedsDocTalk podcast. Pedsdoctalk and feeding picky eaters so we can see that you’re listening. Okay, let’s jump into this Monday follow up.

 

00;01;48;25 – 00;01;57;04

Dr. Mona

What would you say? Starting off are three simple things that parents can do, or we can do to prevent picky eating from starting.

 

00;01;57;06 – 00;02;22;03

Jennifer Friedman

Yeah, definitely. So I love this. And one of the most important things that we can do, it’s kind of sounds a little bit woo woo, but it’s really focusing on kind of the feeding relationship and the dynamic that we have with our kids. So in short, if we can approach feeding as something that’s easy and light instead of something, you know, tense and that we’re trying to manipulate, that really goes a long way in helping things down the road.

 

00;02;22;10 – 00;02;43;09

Jennifer Friedman

It’s not that we as parents ever cause picky eating. Not at all. There are so, so many factors and we are one of them. But it’s not really that we can cause it, but we can really help make sure that eating and feeding is something that’s comfortable for our kids, and that doesn’t feel like something that they have to do or that we’re really trying to manipulate.

 

00;02;43;12 – 00;02;52;08

Jennifer Friedman

So that’s one of the biggest things that I see and sort of just have a comfortable, respectful feeding relation. Check.

 

00;02;52;11 – 00;02;58;29

Dr. Mona

And that’s can be hard for so many parents because they themselves may have not have been raised with that. Right. Like it’s such a cycle.

 

00;02;59;01 – 00;02;59;28

Jennifer Friedman

I mean, yes, I.

 

00;02;59;28 – 00;03;24;02

Dr. Mona

Use my husband as an example because again he was he’s gotten so much better, very selective. And there is that sort of how I was treated as a kid comes out in the dinner tables when I’m a parent. So I agree with you. It’s not like a we’re causing this, but it’s so important as parents that we have insight into, okay, I may not be causing this because it’s developmentally normal, but am I doing anything that could be making this a longer phase or, you know, making this prolonged?

 

00;03;24;02 – 00;03;37;00

Dr. Mona

Or what can I do to maybe guide my child? So I love it. I don’t think that’s putting fault at the parent at all. I’m a parent too. I recognize when I’m pushing too much and I need to step back. So I think it’s just insight that it’s so helpful for parents to hear.

 

00;03;37;02 – 00;03;45;09

Jennifer Friedman

Yeah, exactly. So yeah, it’s a biggie and definitely a work in progress because it’s so different than, you know, the clean Plate Club we were raised with.

 

00;03;45;10 – 00;03;48;18

Dr. Mona

Oh my gosh. So much of us is crazy. Yeah, totally.

 

00;03;48;18 – 00;04;09;08

Jennifer Friedman

So it’s different. But it makes a big difference and makes it easier for everybody and more enjoyable. And that’s really what it comes down to. When it feels good, then it’s you know, it’s a lot easier for everybody. So that’s one big thing we can also work on really just exposure, exposure, exposure and making sure that we are offering them a variety of foods from the very beginning.

 

00;04;09;08 – 00;04;27;21

Jennifer Friedman

And even when we start to see maybe some of their selectivity come out. It’s important not to close any doors. You know, I see many, many parents and again, myself included, you know, they’re like, oh, they didn’t eat that. They didn’t get that every time. I’m just going to stop. They don’t like it. So what we want to really do is continue to offer that variety.

 

00;04;27;24 – 00;04;44;26

Jennifer Friedman

And with this there’s so much that we can do. We can eat these foods in front of them, and we can model what we want to see. We can eat them with them. And that is really so important to just keep the door open and sort of show them what we might expect and show them what’s possible and show them what we can do.

 

00;04;44;26 – 00;04;55;25

Jennifer Friedman

We know that our kids are always watching us and listening to us and wanting to do what we’re doing. So giving them the opportunity to meet these foods and then showing them how it’s done goes a long way.

 

00;04;55;27 – 00;04;59;16

Dr. Mona

Absolutely, I love it. So important. All aspects of parenting.

 

00;04;59;19 – 00;05;18;24

Jennifer Friedman

Yes, indeed. And then I would say one of the final things and of course, there’s so many things, but one of the other big things that we can do is just try to because kind of hands in hand with that one. But it’s getting out of like a rut with food. I think we very often we’re like, okay, you know, I serve this sandwich this way, and this is the way that I know that they eat it.

 

00;05;18;24 – 00;05;32;21

Jennifer Friedman

So I’m just going to keep serving it this way. And we just get into these routines and over time we start to realize, oh my God, like, we’re serving just the same stuff the same way. And so it’s all they eat, you know? Oh, they can’t have that noodle. If we go out, you know, to the restaurant and because it’s a different shape.

 

00;05;32;21 – 00;06;08;27

Jennifer Friedman

So we want to just continue to introduce variety. And that goes a long way in kind of flexing this flexibility muscle for our kids with eating. So those are some of the biggies. And with that I want to just go back to kind of that feeding dynamic. And when we aren’t pressuring our kids, when we’re giving them opportunities to engage, to meet these foods at the table, maybe even outside of the table, bring them into the kitchen with us or, you know, just really making it fun and easy and giving them the opportunity to meet a variety of foods in a variety of different ways that can help them feel good with food.

 

00;06;09;00 – 00;06;25;07

Dr. Mona

I love it. And you talked about that feeling stuck. I think every parent listening can feel that maybe for themselves and also even just for their children. What would be some ways to get unstuck when you’re in that menu rut, and why that variety is important to preventing and improving picky eating?

 

00;06;25;10 – 00;06;42;20

Jennifer Friedman

Yeah, definitely. So this is key. So even when we’re in this menu, right, you can think about you know sure there’s go on Pinterest whatever. Go on Instagram. You can find all these ideas, but you still want to stick to things that are working for you. And you don’t have to use all of these crazy ideas that you’re seeing out there.

 

00;06;42;22 – 00;06;58;27

Jennifer Friedman

You just want to be sticking to the foods that you know and like and making changes to them. So thinking about some of the families who I work with, I have them kind of create, you know, and you don’t have to be this strategic about it, sort of. But you can create a list of like the always foods that your kids eat.

 

00;06;58;27 – 00;07;19;06

Jennifer Friedman

So sometimes foods and the foods that they don’t tend to eat that maybe you’d like to work on kind of best like yellow, green and red list of foods like a stoplight. And from there you can think about bringing in rotation. And if you have enough foods, then every single day you can rotate those foods and try to avoid serving the same thing, you know, two days in a row or back to back or over multiple meals.

 

00;07;19;08 – 00;07;35;14

Jennifer Friedman

If you don’t want to be that strategic, that’s fine. If you don’t have that volume of foods for your child, that’s fine. You can think about just making small changes to the foods that your child is already eating. So thinking about changing the shape. So maybe it’s how you’re cutting that sandwich or offering the different shape of pasta.

 

00;07;35;21 – 00;08;00;10

Jennifer Friedman

Maybe it’s the color. If you’re offering different color cheeses on the grilled cheese, or the macaroni and cheese, or different shapes of chicken nuggets, different brands of chicken nuggets, maybe a different temperature of food can also affect something to do. You just want to kind of make these changes can be adding different seasonings, different preparation. The steamed broccoli or roasted broccoli and all of that is sort of enough to help keep your menu a little bit spicy.

 

00;08;00;11 – 00;08;20;21

Jennifer Friedman

We’ll say, yeah, and bring up that variety that’s so important to both prevent and improve. I think about this as a muscle a lot of time, you know, we are introducing the variety of foods and kind of flexing their ability to be a flexible eater and and growing that muscle by giving them these opportunities, then they’re going to be more flexible.

 

00;08;20;21 – 00;08;34;04

Jennifer Friedman

If we are serving same things over and over, if we’re catering to their needs or letting them dictate if we’re scared foods. And, you know, like it’s a muscle, if we don’t use it, we’re going to lose it. So we always want to try to change things up a little bit.

 

00;08;34;06 – 00;08;49;01

Dr. Mona

Well, I love what you’re talking about there, and also what you talked about when we talked about the three simple things to prevent picky eating, because a lot of it is mindset and how we’re approaching picky eating. Right. So much of it is. And that’s what we talked about, is like the nature of parenting in general, like getting out of that rut.

 

00;08;49;01 – 00;09;06;14

Dr. Mona

How do we talk to ourselves through this phase that our children may go through or preventing in the first place? How would you say parent can let go of expectations and how can they start enjoying this process so they’re not so stressed with the okay, I have to do this and I have to do this, especially if they have a picky eater.

 

00;09;06;16 – 00;09;22;17

Jennifer Friedman

Yeah, it is really, really tough. And like I’m just thinking back to, you know, for meals like, you know, I kind of did quote unquote the wrong thing this weekend or I stopped myself. But like, I need this meal for our family. I mean, son had a big meltdown. And I’m sitting there thinking like, oh my God, it so long cooking like we’re supposed to have a nice dinner.

 

00;09;22;19 – 00;09;23;12

Jennifer Friedman

And it’s like, it’s just.

 

00;09;23;12 – 00;09;31;00

Dr. Mona

It’s not like that’s how it always goes. I feel like anyway, it’s been inverse relationship between how you spend in the kitchen versus if they’re going to eat it. I’m like, what.

 

00;09;31;03 – 00;09;34;03

Jennifer Friedman

Like like 100%. Yeah, 100%.

 

00;09;34;07 – 00;09;36;10

Dr. Mona

It’s so true. I think everyone can relate to. Yeah.

 

00;09;36;14 – 00;09;52;09

Jennifer Friedman

Like it’s part of it. Because when we have these expectations that it’s going to be amazing and it’s going to be best, oh my God, they’re going to love that. You know it’s not oh you’re going to be let down. Don’t have expectations. But we can go into it sort of without putting that pressure or that expectation on it.

 

00;09;52;09 – 00;10;13;19

Jennifer Friedman

Then we’re more likely to be surprised, more likely to be pleased and less likely to be disappointed and then less likely to try to, but should make something happen. So I think our expectations play a really big thing in it. And we, you know, you can’t put any two great, you know, value on any one food or one strategy or something like that.

 

00;10;13;19 – 00;10;36;06

Jennifer Friedman

You’re really in this for the long haul. No single food, you know, is going to be like the magic food. No single meal, no single strategy is really going to, you know, any one time make or break anything. You know, we’re really in this for the long haul. It’s, you know, a marathon, not a sprint. And the way that I think beyond kind of managing our expectations and thinking that everything is going to be like Pinterest, beautiful fairy tale.

 

00;10;36;09 – 00;10;54;03

Jennifer Friedman

Sometimes it might be, but more often than not, you know, I’d rather that we’re pleasantly surprised, but we can think about kind of staying in our lane when it comes to eating, and this is really a way that we can help everybody start to enjoy meal times more. There’s so many things that we can do, but really getting down to not overstepping our boundaries.

 

00;10;54;03 – 00;11;17;03

Jennifer Friedman

And so this is something that it’s called the division of responsibility. I did not make it, but it’s something, you know, many parents and feeding experts love to use. And it’s that we as parents cannot control what our kids are eating or how much they’re eating, or if they’re eating. We provide the food. So in that way, we do control the what we should always have something that they feel comfortable eating at a meal time.

 

00;11;17;06 – 00;11;43;01

Jennifer Friedman

But we can’t control if they’re eating something or how much. And the more that we try to make that happen, the more I backfire. It’s the less we enjoy the meal, the less our kids enjoy the meal, and that’s really the source of a lot of tension. So it’s really our job to provide the food and set the structure around the meal times when and where it’s happening, and then we just have to let go and model, you know, and when there is like kind of the right structure in place, our kids will do the right thing.

 

00;11;43;01 – 00;11;53;01

Jennifer Friedman

But the more that we kind of try to make it happen and try to get them to eat, the less they want to.

 

00;11;53;04 – 00;12;14;14

Dr. Mona

And that’s your follow up. Just a small dose of the real, relatable and eye opening conversations we love to have here. If you smiled, nodded, or had an moment, go ahead and download, follow and share this episode with a friend. Let’s grow this village together for more everyday parenting wins and real talk. Hang out with us on Instagram at the PedsDocTalk podcast.

 

00;12;14;21 – 00;12;30;04

Dr. Mona

Want more? Dive into the full episode and more at PedsDocTalk.com. Because parenting is better with support. And remember, consistency is key. Humor is medicine and follow ups are everything. I’m Doctor Mona. See you next time for your next dose.