‘Especially don’t start with sweet applesauce, because that will make it harder for you to get those green beans in later.’ ‘No mashed potatoes, just a head of cauliflower in the hand.’ “Build it up slowly.” ‘Let them eat with the pot as soon as possible.’ When your baby is allowed to start solid food around six months, the advice is flying around you as a parent. What is wisdom?
This is what the experts say
Can you ‘mess up’ your child by starting with fruit snacks? In a study by the University of Wageningen, babies were divided into two groups: a vegetable and a fruit group. After the three weeks, the vegetable babies ate more vegetables, but as much fruit as the fruit babies. In other words: you don’t have to get used to fruit, but you do to vegetables. ‘However, a year later this effect had worn off’, says Shelley van der Veek, assistant professor at Leiden University. ‘So there is no hard evidence that starting with vegetables is best in the long term, but it certainly can’t hurt.’
Repeated exposure is necessary for babies to get used to vegetables. ‘They have to taste something ten times before they get used to the taste,’ says Van der Veek. “Start with two or three vegetables, such as broccoli, carrots, and green beans, and alternate them.”
According to the popular Rapley method, you can easily give food in pieces, so that the child can suck and try it out for himself. ‘The philosophy behind this method is that a child likes to have autonomy while eating. They feel the structure, smell the food and determine the pace themselves. There is something to be said for that’, says Van der Veek. For some children, the transition from milk to such a boiled carrot in the hand is too big. “Some kids love it, some don’t.”
“Two things are important: patience and self-confidence,” says Italian Ivan Svara, co-author of the book Little gourmets. Italian cooking for children 0-3 years. ‘Children are intrinsically curious about food. So never get discouraged. It is normal for a child to refuse food at times. Hang in there and try to prepare the food in a different way.’
A child becomes picky around 1.5 to 2 years of age. Not only because of the ‘no phase’, but also because of food neophobia: fear of eating unknown things. From an evolutionary point of view, this makes sense, because children start walking and can therefore put poisonous things in their mouths. ‘It is wise to introduce as many flavors as possible before then,’ says Van der Veek.
How do you handle it?
Playing with food should never be discouraged, says Ivan Svara. A child who sniffs, kneads, or crumbles food is exploring, not naughty behavior or wasting food. To stimulate curiosity, parents can create playtimes with vegetables separately from the meal. ‘Get a clean cloth and a head of lettuce,’ says Svara. ‘Create a place where your child can play quietly, preferably near where you prepare the meal yourself. The discovery can begin.’ A nice side effect: such a leaf of lettuce often ends up in the mouth.
Van der Veek himself had a picky eater at home. ‘I am a psychologist and then I approached it as an anxiety disorder and built it up in small steps: first lick a piece of bell pepper, chew the next time, then chew and swallow. You don’t suddenly put a tarantula in the hand of people with a spider phobia either.’
“Keep it relaxed,” says Svara. “It’s not a question of quantity, but of quality.” Eating is more than eating a meal. ‘It’s being together, exchanging stories, setting the table while the smells from the kitchen meet you – it’s all just as important as the food itself.’