Picky Eaters: Walnuts, Turkey Meatballs, Peanuts and Chicken Fingers

Many of you know, I've got some picky eaters for kids. We even did a FioS news segment once about it with Karen Ansel. From that, we received a great cook book and awesome tips. Yes, that was quite a few months ago and I'm just NOW getting into trying to break them out of their comfort zones. Honestly, I didn't want to struggle and fight with them, nor do I like to cook, so it was me being lazy. But we're making an effort to change our food choices, get rid of the processed foods and focus on foods we can make ourselves so we know what our kids are eating.

I actually made Veggie Stock myself. This was made and frozen to use in various recipes I will be attempting. One of the first was Tomato Vegetable Sauce. It's basically Tomato Sauce with a ton of extra veggies in it to amp up the goodness. This was put on their Spaghetti and meatballs this week.

More about that later. Let's start with our first attempt at a new food this week: Walnuts. Neither of my kids have ever had Walnuts before this week. The Boy LOVED them, kept asking "mo-re, mo-re" - amazing how he can turn a one syllable word into two. He has also eaten them every day since his first taste. I've got a winner there with him. My daughter? Not so much. The face she made was priceless and then quickly moved her eyes around looking for someplace to spit it out (without spitting it on the floor, she's got some class).

Our next new food was Turkey Meatballs. I found a recipe in a toddler cookbook. It originally had beef, but I just replaced that with Turkey. Easy and simple. This time, Little Miss liked them AFTER they cooled off. Her first bite did NOT go well, she didn't listen when we told her they were still too hot to eat and thankfully she didn't do too much damage. Once they cooled off, my husband asked her to give it another try and she liked it and asked for another bite. SCORE. The Boy, not so much. My husband tried to hide it in the angel hair spaghetti. Didn't work. The Boy wouldn't take the bite until he removed the meatball. My plan is to put them in my plate next time, because he always wants to eat out of my plate.

Amazingly, we did Peanuts. Little Miss has had peanuts in M&M's before, so I knew she wasn't allergic. My son, never had peanuts before. Little Miss LOVED them. She got to open them up and eat them. She enjoyed it. The Boy......it looked like he was eating them and liking them, since he kept putting them in his mouth. However, my husband went over and saw stuff on the floor and down the front of his shirt. The Boy was chewing them and then pushing them out of his mouth. Apparently, not a fan. And also, not allergic. YAY for that. We'll try again with peanuts with him in a few days.

Finally, this evening I made chicken fingers. Now, trust me, they were really good. The kids BOTH enjoyed them. They're breaded with my own bread crumbs made from wheat grain bread. They came out great. Juicy and not dried out at all. Amazingly, it all happened in my kitchen. Still in shock!