About Mini Pie (my daughter)

She's quite the picky eater. If it's green forget it. If it at all resembles vegetables or most fruits she won't have anything to do with it. As she gets older it's getting easier to get her to eat her veggies and fruits, but not without a fight (of course). She'll poke and prod at them and literally take over an hour to finish dinner. This is usually met with frustration (but not resistance) from myself. Mini Pie is 6 years old, an only child (with no plans for another Mini Pie to join the family anytime soon or at all! I'm done!), and an only grandchild on my side. My father, who dotes on her, tries to get her to eat her veggies and fruits but caves more than I do.

That usually leads me back to my childhood, when I was a picky child who hated almost all vegetables (and still do, but I eat them), but loved fruit. I also hate (not hated because I still hate it) fish. Whenever my father would come up with a culinary creation in the kitchen it was usually something I dreaded. All I can remember is dread whenever dinner was almost there- dreading the bland fish stew my father concocted, or the leg of lamb he didn't cook correctly, or the vegetables he cooked that I gagged down.

I keep thinking back to these moments and try to gain some wisdom from them when it comes to dealing with a picky child. Now, don't get me wrong, it could be worse- it was, when she was 2-4 years old, but it's slowly getting better. I just hope she outgrows her pickiness.

Of all of the dishes I create, Mini Pie loves homemade macaroni and cheese (okay, what child doesn't love that?), my crockpot red beans w/pork, ziti (as long as it doesn't contain chunky red tomatoes, hee!), chicken or pork adobo, pretty much anything chicken that I make, and pretty much anything I make that doesn't involve veggies IN it. I don't make homemade macaroni and cheese often (in fact, the last time I made it was before we moved into our current home, which was in late May, so sometime before late May!), and I have been trying to come up with different dishes to appease the picky eater and my husband who has complained in the past of the lack of variety in our diets. So far everything is working like a charm, but we'll see!