The Week in Bentos: December 2-5, 2008

Mock turtle soup! Ha!

Your cookies are SOOO cute!

May I make a comment as a mother of 5 ?
Don’t you think your son is making a fuss over food just to have your attention? He has a young brother that I suppose you breast feed.
He is putting the pressure on you this way…
I would suggest to make absolutely no comment what ever he eats or not… Just do not say a word, like if you were not concerned.
When he sees he doesn’t have your attention this way he might eventually stop fussing over food.
I think when ever he would ask for food once home I would offer him his bento, nothing else till it is finished! You know our little children are very clever to turn us around there fingers!!!

My mother always told me a child will not let themselves dye of hunger! (she had 6 children) and as a child minder I can say that the more you are relaxed about food the better things go!
Bon courage! And I hope you don’t feel I intrud on your life, I would just like to help you to relax!!!

Love the bentos this week! I forgot about clemenites! I’ll have to see if my daughter will eat those. They’re a perfect snack!

Question though…..I read in your profile page that bentos can be controversial. How so? I never thought a lunch box would be controversial, lol.

(I got my husband loving bentos so much, we bought his coworkers some for Christmas.

Nicole, if you have 5 children who eat what you serve them then congratulations, you don’t have any truly picky eaters in your family. I serve up food, sometimes as cute as this, sometimes very plainly presented. I don’t make a fuss, I don’t comment. Eat it or don’t eat it but I plan to serve you a wide variety of the food that we eat. I hope that by serving food in an interesting way my son will be tempted by foods he finds less appealing and I know by experience that it works from time to time. And its this from time to time” factor that parents of picky eaters are going for in presenting food in this way. Sometimes lunchboxes come home full, sometimes empty, often somewhere in between. Picky eaters are often expressing their need for order and control through their food but this does not mean they are trying to wrap their parents around their fingers. Its as confusing for them as it is for us. If you were a picky eater as child then you have a strong probability of having a child who is a picky eater also.

Your son is very lucky to have such a concerned mother! His food is so cute!

I was a very picky eater and got to love all this food I hated!!
I cried to sleep or to vomit or what ever… and mum would say : no desert if you do not eat a bit of everything… and when the pudding arrived I did not like it!
I was very shye but asked the vegetable man if he could avoid bringing onions to my mother!
Now I love onions, eggplant, garlic, olives, etc… and I had each of my child to have a bit of everything at a meal. (but they never ate at school)
My triplets did not like salads… they were asked to have one leaf each time we had some, and one day I realised they were fighting about who would eat the last leaf!!!!!!!

I don’t have the same idea about a picky mother, picky child… my mother was and is very greedy!!!

I am so so greatfull to my parents allowing me to get to love all these different foods, that is the reason I wanted my children to love it all like me!(I did not like eating in fact!)

I thought breast feeding got your child to like different kind of food because your milk will not have always the same taste.
My triplets only had milk bottles and they were more picky then the two elder ones. Two of them will only like a few kinds of cheeses… (we live in France and have so many lovely cheese!!) they do not have the same love for food as the elder ones.
I thought you were upset with your son not eating! If I misunderstood, sorry!!