Written by Jenny Rapson

My son Jonah, my third child, is almost 13 months old now, and so far he’s proved different from his siblings in almost every conceivable way – some good, some bad.  But the BEST way that he is different from his big brother and big sister is that he eats.  He eats very well, and he eats almost everything I put in front of him!  When my older two were little, I always said they ate “barely enough to stay alive”. My five-year-old is still extremely picky and my almost-eight-year-old, though much better than he used to be, still eats far less of a variety of foods than his baby brother does.  Now, at dinner time, when I’m making the other two peanut butter sandwiches, I just put whatever “adult” food I’ve cooked for my husband and me on my baby’s tray and the boy eats it!  It’s fabulous!

So, what made the difference with Jonah?  Why will he eat just about any food, when his brother and sister were picky from the get-go?  I have a couple of theories on that.  First, I made all of Jonah’s baby food in the Baby Brezza, whereas the other two only had store-bought food.  This encouraged me to make Jonah a wider variety of foods from the start, more than just was available in the store.  With the Baby Brezza I could make all kinds of mixed purees and expose him to a wider variety of flavors and textures.  (I know there are many different varieties of baby food available in stores, but when I was buying it, I was much less adventurous with what I purchased.  Making my own, I had fun experimenting with all the combinations.)  Secondly, I started giving Jonah some table food at nine months old.  I gave the other two kiddos only baby food up to twelve months .  (Sophie didn’t get any teeth until she was 14 months old. I didn’t realize how much mashing babies could do with those gums!)  I feel like starting Jonah on self-feeding with finger foods as soon as he was able also helped him to be more open to what I put on his feeding tray.  Of course, I could be totally wrong.  It could just be his personality, or genetics – my husband is the least picky person I know, but I was somewhat picky as a child.


Whatever the reason, I am so thankful my baby boy is an awesome eater!  It makes meal time so much simpler and gives me confidence that he’s getting the nutrition he needs.  It’s nice to see him stuffing his mouth with veggies while I’m cajoling his sister into eating hers.

Do you have picky eaters, easy eaters, or both?