Buckwheat Pancakes, Egg Salad and Processed Chicken Nuggets

This is Z's daily diet....isn't it great??? We went for his 18 month check up the other day and I was surprised to see that he jumped from the 30th percentile to the 60th :) The doctor said he must be eating really well and I just laughed and sighed.

As it turns out we have been giving Z way too much rice milk. He does drink water but usually he asks for milk and we give it to him. We hadn't really been paying attention to how much he had been drinking. We realize now that he was drinking about 48 oz. a day (our doctor wants him drinking only 24 oz)! Oops :) No wonder he wasn't eating...all his calories were coming from his liquid diet!

Well we have been working over the last few days to cut down his rice milk consumption and guess what...he now has more of an appetite! Oh well...I will be the first to admit that I am not perfect. I really do believe that each child needs their own manual or user guide. So now Z is eating more but we are still very limited in what he will eat. He just does not like food!

Z is just like me, a grazer. Rather then sitting down to eat three square meals he prefers to eat little bites all day long. For breakfast Z will either eat buckwheat pancakes (no syrup) or monkey toast (cinnamon toast). The pancakes must be buckwheat or Z will not eat them. He likes his pancakes to be brown and earthy (I often mix in squash, sweet potato or pumpkin to give him some extra nutrients). This makes it very difficult when we are out to eat because the pancakes there are usually made with white flour. He paws at them and looks at you with this face of disgust.

Z is very slow to eat his breakfast. It takes him about an hour and a half from start to finish. This meal is eaten while playing or sitting on the couch with me. It is the one meal he is free to roam with and thus it is the happiest meal of our day.

For lunch Z eats disgusting, processed chicken fingers. This was a mistake I made early on when trying to get him to eat solid foods. I gave him a chicken finger while we were out to eat and was very surprised when he actually ate it. Now he will only eat chicken nuggets if they look processed. I often buy the $6.00 boxes of all natural chicken nuggets and try to mix them in with his other nuggets. He pushes them away because they are not orange like his favorite nuggets. Even if I take the coating off...he can still tell the difference between all natural chicken and his horrible processed nuggets. I have even made my own nuggets...these were just tossed onto the floor......what to do???

At dinner Z eats a lactose free cheese stick, a container of vegetables (still baby food) and either egg salad or applesauce. Yes you read it right, the child loves egg salad. He doesn't really like scrambled eggs anymore but lives for egg salad! He won't eat it on bread but eats it right out of his bowl. So strange but it is delicious.

Snack time is fine in our house. Z loves to nibble on bananas, grapes, strawberries, oranges, Newman's Own Organic Cereal (the green box) and crackers. We have no problems with his snack choices and he seems to like a wide variety of healthy things. Thank goodness!

So that is my picky toddler and his limited menu. It is so funny to talk to my friends and hear about the different foods that their children love. One little girl only eats scrambled eggs and pasta, one will only eat yogurt, French toast and plain bagels and another little boy eats lemons! And then there are the kids that will eat everything you put on their plate! This is such a funny age and I just hope Z is getting the nutrition that he needs (at least he is getting a vitamin).