We apply a bit of general motivation, our eldest gets Stars on her star chart for “Trying different / new food” and for “Eating up her meals”, sounds lame I’m sure but Stickers are still among the most wonderful thing in the world so far as she’s concerned…
We tend not to push them to finish the whole plate off, especially if eating out as the portion in front of them may well be a bit big…
I’d much rather then got used to just stopping when full than become pre-teen gut buckets…
What we have found is that they are both keener on veg than on meat generally, so we go with that there’s normally plenty of different types of Veg on the plates for them to sample…
Fruit too, they love it currently so we keep the fruit bowl stocked and seldom refuse a request for an Apple, Orange, Banana or Grapes it beats being pestered for chocolate or sweets…
What we do insist on at meal times is that they at least try everything and decide honestly if they like it or not, if they decide they don’t like something we simply say “OK, just eat the other stuff” this generally works, sometimes the same food will be put in front of her a couple of weeks later and this time she decides she likes it all of a sudden, no point trying to force the issue or bully them into eating stuff, as soon as meals become a battle ground you’ve lost…
Chipping in with some positive comments like “You’ve done well” and “I’m glad you ate the pepper and sweetcorn, its very good for you”. seem to help.
It is all about tactics, remembering what they’ve said they like before, and applying a bit of pop-psychology to a four year old…
Accept that you will waste food, especially if your MIL is secretly plying them with sweets when you’re out (Grrrr!)…
Whatever you do Never mention Ice cream or offer tasty, pudding type incentives for finishing a meal or for eating something they don’t like, it doesn’t work, and once they know something full of sugar and fat is waiting in the fridge that’s it they are done with the main course and you simply end up inducing a paddy (My missus has yet to learn this rule properly)…
Those are my tips, I’m sure people will tell me they’re all wrong but they’ve worked thus far…
Edit:
My own Dietary evolution:
As a Child most things apart from Marmite
As an Adult most things apart from Marmite