Picky Eater? Why Your Parenting Style Didn't Cause It | Katie Kimball

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You know, for most of human history, kids ate what the family ate.
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There weren't separate meals, endless snacks, or negotiations over every bite.
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Katie, are we accidentally creating picky eaters?
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Yep, we sure are.
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We sure are.
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I mean, James, what parent holds their newborn and says, man, I hope he's a picky eater?
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Like, not a thing.
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It's not something that we're trying to do.
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This is a new phenomenon, you know, new in the last hundred years for a number of reasons.
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I think the culture is making it a lot easier for parents to exacerbate picky eating tendencies because we have...
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Sort of this helicopter parenting.
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We need to keep our kids safe.
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We don't want to cause too much conflict.
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And so we're allowing the kids to drive the plane a little bit at the table.
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You know, we're maybe giving them too many choices where we need to remember we're the adult, we're the parent, and we should be making more decisions.
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The culture and food marketing is also making it so much easier for parents to short order cook, right?
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150 years ago, if a kid was like, I want a different meal, mom.
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What is she going to grab?
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You know what I mean?
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Like she's worked for hours braising this roast in the oven.
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Like there isn't a bag of chips that she can just go open.
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So those like I just our modern world is making it easier for parents to slide down that unfortunate slippery slope.
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Yeah.
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And I also believe that physiologically, like the onslaught of chemicals on our body, the onslaught of everything that our poor kids' bodies are having to fight in the environment because of the way the humans have, you know, kind of misused our world is
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it's increasing sensory sensitivities it's increasing our anxiety it's decreasing our resilience and all of that is sort of a soup that can be the genesis of picky eating and i think we'll talk about some of those bits and pieces but the good news for parents is the research shows that your parenting style can't actually create a picky eater you can't so that's like oh that's kind of a balm to the soul
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Can you dig into that?
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What does that mean?
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Because that's interesting.
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So you're saying your parenting style can't create a picky eater?
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Yeah.
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It's, yeah, it kind of, it actually kind of surprises me.
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And I have to just keep going back and like rereading this research that whether, you know, whether you're authoritative, authoritarian, or laissez-faire parenting, the picky eating will happen at the same rate.
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So it's not the way in which we parent.
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The kids are presenting something in their bodies that's giving them a propensity for picky eating.
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Now, I have definitely seen...
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parenting decisions that exacerbate the picky eating, right?
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So you can't create a picky eater, but I do think you can exacerbate it.
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But that's good news too, because that means if you remove whatever decisions you've been making that exacerbate the picky eating, you can also help your child get out of that pit.
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Yeah, I have to admit that kind of confuses me because I thought our generation really or whatever this age range is the way they are is because a lot of us were kind of pressured when we were younger and like, you can't leave this table until you've cleaned your plate.
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And there was this kind of expectation or stress put on us that there's starving people out there and you need to not waste food.
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And so that's why so many parents are lenient now and making multiple meals.
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But you're saying-
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That wouldn't matter.
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The pickiness would still happen either way.
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That's what the research says.
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I know.
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Like I said, it surprises me, too.
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But if we think about, like, you have to finish your food, children are starving, like, now back 150 years, that feels old school, right?
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Like, that probably was the way parents parented their kids 150 years ago.
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when we didn't see as much picky eating.
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There's something else going on.
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We're such complex beings, right?
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So there's dozens of reasons why we're seeing more picky eating.
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Like I said, we can't create a picky eater, but we can exacerbate it.
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And so the level of picky eating that we're seeing, the intensity of picky eating, parenting plays a role for sure, but it's not the genesis.
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Wow, you're blowing my mind right here because I guess I have for so long.
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I thought, well, it's created by that parent response.
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So what is the hypothesis of picky eating?
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And is it the other two things you mentioned?
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So it's exacerbated by behavior, but then is it the, you had mentioned the chemicals in our food systems, and then you also mentioned marketing.
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Is that what they're saying, those two?
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Are they saying those are the primary reasons or?
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Well, when I talk about picky eating, I talk about the five P's of picky eating.
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Pallet, pain, pressure, power, or sorry, palate, pain, processing, pressure, and power.
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And so those first three are physiological presentations.
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And this is where parents, a lot of times we don't understand where to look.
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We don't understand how to seek patterns in what our children are doing at the table.
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And or even to think like, maybe it's not about the food.
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Right.
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Like that's the title of my TEDx talk.
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Picky eating is not about the food.
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And I think I think that is a curiosity opener is why it's been viewed over 300000 times because people are like, that doesn't make any sense.
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How can picky eating not be about the food?
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How could it not be about the parenting?
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Because sometimes.
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It's physiological.
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And so we've got children who are struggling.
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When I say palate, it's in the mouth.
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Their tongue might be too weak.
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Their chew might be inappropriate, not strong enough.
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Their jaw might be too weak.
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The way that they swallow has formed differently.
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Is this part of our modern world?
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Yeah, a little bit, because we're giving kids, babies, all sorts of things to put in their mouths that we didn't give them 100 years ago, right?
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We've got these food pouches that change the way the mouth receives food.
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And if you think about a baby who's maybe receiving a lot of food, these food pouches, they're continuing the sucking motion into toddlerhood that really belongs in babydom, right?
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Right.
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And they're not chewing.
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They're probably on purees a lot longer than they ought to be.
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And so the shape of the mouth is actually changing.
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We know we have a lot of kids who are mouth breathing.
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And so that raises the palate.
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It just changes the way kids are able to chew and swallow.
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So I'm thinking of one family I worked with, a six-year-old girl.
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would hold food in her mouth, right?
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So she would eat the food, she'd chew it, and then she would just like push it against the roof of her mouth.
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And of course the parents are like, this is so annoying, just swallow, right?
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You're seeing it as like a bratty, stubborn, subversive behavior.
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She just had a weak tongue.
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Her tongue couldn't sweep the food easily to the back of the mouth to swallow.
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Isn't that wild?
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We think it's about the food, we think it's about the power struggle, when really there's just something wrong in the mouth.
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you know?
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So that's one, like that's one.
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And then pain is the second P. And so we think about undiagnosed food allergies.
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And this is too where like the onslaught of chemicals in our world is affecting the way kids feel.
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We know statistically 10% of kids are constipated.
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That number has got to be way higher because of all the parents who don't know their kids are constipated.
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So they're not in the 10% reported.
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There's a lot going on.
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We know a lot more kids and adults these days
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have symptoms of disease.
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And so are we living at sort of this low baseline level of pain that we think is normal?
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My daughter is actually a really good example of this.
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In fifth grade, we did a food challenge.
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We removed dairy for a month.
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And about two weeks in, she had this moment where she thought, she tells me the story now, she thought, oh no, I don't even want to tell mom what's going on because I think what this means is I can't handle dairy.
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And she loved cheese and ice cream and yogurt.
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She loved dairy.
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What had happened was she suddenly realized that at the end of gym class and after going upstairs, she could breathe.
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So she had lived her whole life assuming that all the other kids had a lot of trouble getting a deep breath after gym class.
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She thought it was normal.
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But that was the presentation of how dairy interacted with her lungs.
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And so to this day, she's 18 now.
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That was fifth grade.
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To this day, if she accidentally gets a little bit of dairy, she knows for at least three days she won't be able to catch a full breath.
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But she thought it was normal, right?
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And so does that affect eating if you're in like this kind of low level of pain?
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It does.
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Because when your body kind of hurts, it's hard to like think about putting food in your mouth.
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And then the third physiological P is processing.
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And this is sensory processing disorders.
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You know, when in history did we have tagless shirts and seamless socks and headphones for kids who are overstimulated by noise?
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You know what I'm saying?
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We are seeing a huge absurgence.
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in people who are unable to handle the sensory input of modern life.
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And anything that's going wrong in your senses, whether you're over or under processing, any sense, it doesn't have to be in the mouth, but of course it can be texture and taste and smell.
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But any of the senses affect your eating because eating takes time.
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all of your senses.
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So if one's messed up, you're going to struggle to access food.
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So again, it looks like it's a food problem.
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It feels like it's a pressure problem.
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And it can be.
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Again, pressure's huge.
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Can definitely make picky eating worse.
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But if your kid's body is
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is saying no to food from the get-go.
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That's something you have to dig down to the root cause.
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And like I tell Fran, it's like, put your detective hat on.
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How can we look for these patterns and think what might be saying no in my child's body to this food and how can we work with that and root it out?
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Look, start feeding your body what it really needs.
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You deserve it.
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These points might be happening.
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So these kind of traits might be happening with your kid.
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And then we exacerbate it as parents with the pressure, right?
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We say, oh, just take one more bite.
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You can't leave the table until your plate's finished, right?
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exacerbating the issue and telling our kid, well, don't listen to your body and to your reaction, listen to what I tell you to do over your body, right?
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If that response is the one we want to move away from, what would be a better response?
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Yeah, better than just take one bite.
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Yeah.
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Yes.
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So we definitely want to move away from that because we can't follow through.
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Really.
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Like if you if you say that, if you say just take one, you have to take one bite before you leave the table or if you're like pleading.
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Right.
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Which parents really ought not be begging their kids.
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Just take one bite.
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Right.
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What happens when a stubborn child or a child with a food sensitivity that we don't know about says no?
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And they continue saying no.
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Like if we walk that all the way to the end, the only choice for the parent to follow their own rule that they just set up, you have to take one bite, is to force feed a child.
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And in modern society, like, we just don't do that.
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James, I got to tell you, I have said that, like, probably a thousand times.
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And I've never had anyone say, well, yeah, yeah, yeah.
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No, the parents should force feed the town.
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Yesterday, the podcast host on the show I was on was like, oh, I was raised Latina in the 1970s.
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My parents did hold my nose and put food in my mouth.
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And I was like, oh, oh.
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Okay.
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So that's a thing.
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But I'm guessing most of the parents who are listening to you in the year 2026 are like, yeah, that's kind of disgusting.
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Like I'm not going to force feed my child.
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Therefore, you can't say it.
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Rule number one of parenting, do what you say you'll do.
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If you can't follow through, don't say it at the beginning.
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And I also think in this day and age, like that's a little bit old school parenting.
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You have to clean your plate, especially starving children in Africa, all that stuff.
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That's like our parents' generation, what they would say to us.
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What our generation is generally accidentally doing is we're trying to flip that.
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We're trying to make it more positive.
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So we say, eat three bites of broccoli and you get your dessert.
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Yeah.
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That's still pressure, though.
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It feels positive.
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It's still pressure.
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Even praise, even saying, oh, good job.
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You ate all your soup.
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still pressure because we are judging the amount that goes in the child's mouth.
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And that's not our job unless we're willing to force feed.
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So if you're not willing to force feed your kid, you need to be hands off on the amount they eat.
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You should choose variety.
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You should choose what they eat.
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You should choose when they eat and where they eat.
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This is called the division of responsibility.
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It's not something I created.
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A sociologist named Ellen Satter
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you know, recognize that that's the parent's job.
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What, when, and where, that's it.
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The child's job is to choose whether they eat at all and how much.
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And it's when we cross those lines that we cause big problems.
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So anything you say that has to do with the amount of food going into your child's mouth, not your job.
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So that's something that we want to be hands off.
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How do you know when a child is picky versus genuinely struggling with a food?
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Well, we want to look for patterns.
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And so I tell people like, if you aren't a pattern seeker, if you're not someone who loves doing puzzles and, you know, like unraveling mysteries, find someone who is, you know, grab a friend who's a data geek and be like, can I talk to you about like what my kid is eating and see if you can see some patterns.
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So, for example, one pattern you might see is kids who...
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can't handle food that's hard to chew, raw vegetables, what we call real meats, like a grilled chicken breast.
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They'll eat a chicken nugget or a sausage or a hot dog.
225
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Basically, it's pre-chewed meat, right, James?
226
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That's like it's been chewed up for you.
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They can eat softer foods and maybe they can eat crunchy foods like chips and crackers because those are more meltable.
228
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but they can't handle those hard to chew foods, that you might say, oh, that's really interesting.
229
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Maybe we should get a physiological workup from a speech language pathologist or an oral facial myologist and see if everything's working well with the mouth, the jaw and the tongue.
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That would be one pattern you can see.
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If kids are really drawn to a food light or a food group, especially like gluten and dairy, we've got a lot of parents out there who will say, oh, my kid's a carbitarian.
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You know, all they want is the pancakes, the rolls, the cereal, you know.
233
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Sometimes if you do have a food sensitivity, the gluten proteins or the dairy proteins that are leaking through the gut and they cause a weird sort of almost opioid reaction that causes you to be drawn to the very food that hurts you.
234
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Again, super strange.
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So I would tell a parent, like if you've got a kid who just feels like they're addicted to either gluten or dairy or both, see what happens if you remove it from their diet for a week.
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And if they have any changes in their behavior, a pattern that would say that it might not be as physiological, but it might be more psychological, it might be more of a power struggle issue between you and the child is if you're seeing power struggles everywhere else too, right?
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You're not only having issues at the table, you're having issues about it.
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homework, friendship, screen time, bedtime, if the power struggles are everywhere, right?
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That's, that's a pattern in itself that says, okay, now, now mom and dad, like it takes two to power struggle.
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So if you can pull back and stop the opposite of just take one bite is my favorite, most important, shiny, flashy phrase that every parent needs in their pocket.
241
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And it's very simple.
242
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It's just, you don't have to eat that.
243
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right?
244
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I want all kids everywhere to hear from their parents.
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You know, this is what's for dinner.
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You don't get to go get something else, but you don't have to eat this.
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You may.
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You don't have, you know, each individual item, you don't have to eat that.
249
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And so that gives the children the agency and the choice and the ability to really create a relationship with food without the relationship with their parent getting in the way.
250
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Does that make sense?
251
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Yeah, because now that's resonating with me.
252
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Like the other stuff, I'm like, this is different way of thinking.
253
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But now I'm really, okay, that piece resonates with me in the sense that that's the control as parents, you're in a sense offering that we have.
254
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So we have the control of what food we bring into the kitchen.
255
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We have control over what food is on the dinner table.
256
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Being mindful of that, being a little bit of that detective and making sure that the foods kind of are supporting if there is a physical thing going on with their kid, that they're not making that harder, but you're actually supporting the kid's palate or whatever that might be.
257
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But for the most part, you're controlling what goes on that dinner table.
258
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And then you're simply saying what you're saying,
259
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you don't have to eat this.
260
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If you don't eat it though, there's no other food.
261
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Like, are you like, how strict does the parent be post that?
262
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Cause that's where it gets a little messy, right?
263
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It does.
264
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It does.
265
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And that's why there's a whole book, right?
266
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Like the picky eater playbook has all the plays for all of the different things that the kids are going to throw at you.
267
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You're like, okay, now I have an answer for that.
268
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When yes, when the kids like, well, can I just go get a PB&J?
269
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Like, I'm gonna go get some yogurt from the fridge, which I love that this is everyday ancestral.
270
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Again, 150 years ago, could the kids say that?
271
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There was no fridge for some, you know, back to go too far back.
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There were no fridges.
273
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Well, exactly.
274
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And there's not an apple sitting there and there's not a banana and there's not packaged snacks that they can pop into.
275
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You know what I'm saying?
276
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Right.
277
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And so it's so when we look like you do, we look back at what our ancestors ate.
278
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Let's look back at how our ancestors ate.
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They ate at specific times.
280
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They ate what was available at.
281
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And then the food was gone.
282
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It was done.
283
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And so kids didn't have, kids and adults alike, didn't have the opportunity to just go get something else.
284
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So I do push parents to be very strict that you choose what is served because you're
285
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If someone in the household is a nutritionist, and no one is, but the parent has the fully formed brain and, you know, we've been through seventh grade health class, we understand how to balance a meal much better than the eight-year-old child who really just wants that mac and cheese or really just wants that highly palatable bag of chips.
286
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Or even the 15 or 14-year-old who's... Because we're dealing with that.
287
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She doesn't want to eat.
288
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Or she's coming in at odd hours because of her new schedule now that she's in high school.
289
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She gets done so much later than when we eat.
290
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And then she's coming in and she's just kind of like eating very random foods.
291
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Like...
292
00:19:19.948 --> 00:19:35.569
ground chicken with just a little bit of lettuce on top and then drizzling mayo and then i i don't know it's just it's like she's creating finger foods at least it's all food that's real but it's still like i don't even know what i wouldn't i don't even know what to call it it's bizarre
293
00:19:36.453 --> 00:19:37.534
At least, yeah, at least it's real food.
294
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I say when kids are coming in at different times, and yes, high school, it gets crazy.
295
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And when she can drive, it'll be even worse, just to let you know, as far as like not seeing her as much at dinner.
296
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But we, I mean, we always just still say like, this is dinner.
297
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Like, if dinner's been put away, it comes back out.
298
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You know, if she's coming home half an hour to an hour after dinner, like we usually try to leave that food out.
299
00:20:00.728 --> 00:20:03.730
That just happened to us last night too, our sophomore in high school.
300
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We got home at eight o'clock and we had eaten at six, but we were like, when are you coming home?
301
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Like, should we leave food out?
302
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So he still ate the same meal we ate.
303
00:20:13.200 --> 00:20:19.507
And I think there's a, there's like a little bit of a philosophical structure to that, that I call team one meal.
304
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And when we all eat the same meal, even if it's at slightly different times, it's a little bit of a philosophical structure to that.
305
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It shows family unity.
306
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It's really saying to the kids, like, we are family.
307
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We eat together.
308
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You know, we clean up together.
309
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We do things together.
310
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And when we allow kids to eat a separate meal, it's kind of saying the opposite.
311
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It's saying we are fractured.
312
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You know, and so even if if like so for kids who are really, really struggling and parents might hear Katie Kimball say, oh, eat, just serve the same thing.
313
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Eat team one meal.
314
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And they're like, nope, like that is not going to happen in my household.
315
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Child will have a complete meltdown.
316
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You know, she will run away from the table.
317
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And so there may need to be a transition period where you continue to make mac and cheese or the frozen pizza or the chicken nuggets or whatever the short order cooking had been.
318
00:21:06.623 --> 00:21:08.705
but you serve it to everyone.
319
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And you as the parent should take a bite of that mac and cheese on your plate.
320
00:21:13.148 --> 00:21:13.808
You don't need to eat it.
321
00:21:14.469 --> 00:21:15.910
Same as the kids, you don't have to eat that.
322
00:21:16.550 --> 00:21:20.773
But just to demonstrate that this is a unified activity.
323
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Family dinners are family dinners and everyone is served the same thing and everyone takes a little bite of everything and everything.
324
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on their plate, they don't have to eat it, but they need to be exposed to it.
325
00:21:30.841 --> 00:21:43.872
Because that exposure of getting a bite on your plate and maybe as you serve those mashed potatoes, your knuckle knocks into the side of the pot, that's really important for those kids who are struggling to have a relationship with that food.
326
00:21:43.892 --> 00:21:45.714
If you don't have a relationship with a person, then
327
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and you never hang out with them, you're never going to build a relationship, right?
328
00:21:50.499 --> 00:21:55.021
So if you don't have a relationship with the food, you got to hang out with that food.
329
00:21:55.061 --> 00:21:56.621
It's got to get on your plate.
330
00:21:56.641 --> 00:22:06.284
You got to pass the dish at dinner and get that aroma, you know, and the smell of it at least so that the kid has a chance to build a relationship with that food.
331
00:22:06.504 --> 00:22:12.406
If we're always feeding them the same thing that they want, like they'll never expand their palates.
332
00:22:12.426 --> 00:22:13.326
They don't have an opportunity to.
333
00:22:14.005 --> 00:22:16.009
You mentioned your book is a playbook.
334
00:22:16.049 --> 00:22:26.887
So does it talk about when they're younger, maybe introducing them to earlier parts of the process, like the meal planning, the grocery shopping?
335
00:22:27.687 --> 00:22:27.907
Yes.
336
00:22:28.307 --> 00:22:31.009
So that's actually like the supercharging at the end.
337
00:22:31.349 --> 00:22:34.350
So the playbook works through a process starting with snacking.
338
00:22:34.890 --> 00:22:35.731
How do we speak?
339
00:22:35.771 --> 00:22:36.911
What are the words that we use?
340
00:22:36.971 --> 00:22:37.952
How do we start the meal?
341
00:22:38.512 --> 00:22:41.713
Then the guts of the meal, you know, what do we do like actually at the dinner table?
342
00:22:41.733 --> 00:22:42.374
But isn't that weird?
343
00:22:42.694 --> 00:22:44.615
Dinner's not till like part four.
344
00:22:45.815 --> 00:22:54.827
Because there's so much that happens outside of the dinner table that's really critical to helping kids be ready to build that relationship with food.
345
00:22:55.127 --> 00:23:03.157
But then, yeah, like right there at the end, it's like if you're doing all the right things, setting up the environment and your routines and your habits are amazing in the home, you're going to be able to do that.
346
00:23:03.377 --> 00:23:08.959
How you can supercharge it is to get the kids involved because of that exposure, because it's awesome.
347
00:23:09.299 --> 00:23:12.661
James, when kids are working in the kitchen, the pressure is gone.
348
00:23:12.861 --> 00:23:20.064
Like there's no perceived pressure to eat like there is when you sit down at the table, you know, and maybe you're handed a plate of food.
349
00:23:20.084 --> 00:23:23.145
And if you've even been told once or twice in the past, like you have to eat that.
350
00:23:24.145 --> 00:23:28.669
That stress could be carried with the child at the table, but it's not in the kitchen.
351
00:23:28.969 --> 00:23:36.696
And they get, you know, as a chef, the sights and the smells and the sounds and all of that immersion in the food.
352
00:23:36.716 --> 00:23:37.676
So, so good.
353
00:23:37.696 --> 00:23:40.098
It's like an inoculation almost for them.
354
00:23:40.479 --> 00:23:48.125
And then they can go to the table and be much more likely to take that bite on their own without saying, without the parent having to say, you need one bite.
355
00:23:48.883 --> 00:23:53.025
In a sense, it's like moving kids from fear to curiosity.
356
00:23:53.585 --> 00:23:53.965
Yes.
357
00:23:54.705 --> 00:24:10.852
So how can parents, how can you support parents in getting their kids to be more curious, particularly if they're already way past, you know, the young age and they are, you know, in that 10 to 14 and they're still in fear?
358
00:24:12.252 --> 00:24:12.773
Right, right, right.
359
00:24:12.813 --> 00:24:15.776
Well, and obviously, yeah, I love to say that from fear to curiosity.
360
00:24:15.916 --> 00:24:24.826
When you're afraid of something, when you're feeling nervous, when you're feeling stressed, like all of those things shut down the appetite physiologically.
361
00:24:24.846 --> 00:24:26.327
That's obviously the opposite of what we want.
362
00:24:26.808 --> 00:24:30.812
So for curiosity, first of all, the parents have to remove...
363
00:24:31.513 --> 00:24:32.273
the power struggles.
364
00:24:32.293 --> 00:24:35.594
They have to remove their relationship from the kid's relationship with food.
365
00:24:35.634 --> 00:24:40.496
We want to use the language of exploration and we want to use growth language.
366
00:24:40.836 --> 00:24:47.958
So rather than saying, like, never let your kid hear you say, oh, well, he's a picky eater or whatever, but we want to use growth language.
367
00:24:47.978 --> 00:24:48.358
You know what?
368
00:24:48.378 --> 00:24:49.319
You're just learning to eat.
369
00:24:49.999 --> 00:24:53.280
You haven't figured out how to eat soup yet.
370
00:24:53.780 --> 00:24:54.441
And that's okay.
371
00:24:54.481 --> 00:24:55.901
Like your taste buds are still growing.
372
00:24:56.162 --> 00:24:59.504
Can you kind of hear that like future growth mindset?
373
00:24:59.524 --> 00:25:04.667
So we really want to use that growth language and make that part of the family culture so that the kids understand this is a process.
374
00:25:04.927 --> 00:25:06.548
It's like learning to read, right?
375
00:25:06.648 --> 00:25:11.412
If you've got a kindergartner and he's struggling to read, we don't like give up.
376
00:25:12.272 --> 00:25:15.056
We don't say, well, you know, reading's just not for him.
377
00:25:15.096 --> 00:25:16.118
It's just never going to happen.
378
00:25:16.258 --> 00:25:16.859
Like, we don't.
379
00:25:17.119 --> 00:25:19.963
But for whatever reason, parents will sort of do that with vegetables.
380
00:25:20.264 --> 00:25:21.786
Yeah, like, she just doesn't like vegetables.
381
00:25:22.487 --> 00:25:23.208
I guess, I don't know.
382
00:25:23.368 --> 00:25:25.692
Like, maybe she'll just go to college without liking vegetables.
383
00:25:25.732 --> 00:25:26.133
Like, no.
384
00:25:26.153 --> 00:25:26.213
No.
385
00:25:27.614 --> 00:25:49.868
like growth we we all can can grow and so when we talk at the table we want the discussion to be positive it doesn't have to be about the food but it shouldn't be about parental stresses school academic stresses social stresses right do do all of that if you're like the dinner table is a great time for any conversation if everyone is already eating well
386
00:25:50.228 --> 00:25:50.788
You know what I'm saying?
387
00:25:51.308 --> 00:25:54.009
You can even talk about, so you can say, kid, how's school going?
388
00:25:54.309 --> 00:25:55.350
How was that test today?
389
00:25:55.850 --> 00:26:00.832
If your child can access food, if your child's struggling with food, no, don't do it.
390
00:26:01.932 --> 00:26:02.312
Don't do it.
391
00:26:02.332 --> 00:26:04.293
You got to keep the dinner table conversation light.
392
00:26:04.333 --> 00:26:10.855
And if you do talk about food, it shouldn't be how much they're eating, if they're eating, blah, blah, blah, all of that.
393
00:26:11.216 --> 00:26:14.717
It's like, oh, like this, um, this roasted broccoli is,
394
00:26:15.277 --> 00:26:16.978
has a little bit of sweetness, I think.
395
00:26:16.998 --> 00:26:17.818
Do you guys notice that?
396
00:26:18.219 --> 00:26:20.580
It can be, if that makes sense, it can be about the food.
397
00:26:20.900 --> 00:26:24.822
Or like, oh, oh, like I don't know, the baby carrots today feel a little slimy to me.
398
00:26:24.862 --> 00:26:25.863
Are they slimy to you guys?
399
00:26:26.503 --> 00:26:29.525
Like I like it, I like them when baby carrots are more dry or whatever.
400
00:26:29.585 --> 00:26:36.709
Like you can talk about the qualities of the food, but not value qualities, not how much you're eating, not if this is healthy or unhealthy.
401
00:26:37.089 --> 00:26:44.513
We just wanna have, again, that curiosity so that we can have a relationship with food and keep it fun and light.
402
00:26:45.598 --> 00:26:55.322
I'm sure there's no one-size-fits-all, but how quickly, from your experience, do kids shift once parents start making these adjustments?
403
00:26:56.002 --> 00:27:01.004
Yeah, it can be as soon as the first day, but it also can take up to two years.
404
00:27:01.424 --> 00:27:05.485
The process of learning to eat has 32 steps, and it takes two years.
405
00:27:05.846 --> 00:27:11.628
So if your kid got stuck somewhere in that process, you have to accept the fact that it might take...
406
00:27:12.388 --> 00:27:14.230
two years to really get back on track.
407
00:27:14.250 --> 00:27:24.959
But most people will see some sort of change, some sort of like, oh, my kid like willingly put that bite on her plate and she was always really resistant to that.
408
00:27:25.119 --> 00:27:29.603
Or my kid actually like put something, you know, put peas in his mouth and he spit them out.
409
00:27:29.643 --> 00:27:30.604
That's a real story, actually.
410
00:27:30.884 --> 00:27:35.508
You know, one of my, one of the people I worked with said, you know, he put peas in his mouth and he did spit it out.
411
00:27:35.849 --> 00:27:36.889
But I'm counting that as a win.
412
00:27:37.510 --> 00:27:38.810
Because he didn't use to put peas in his mouth.
413
00:27:39.050 --> 00:27:39.991
So that's important too.
414
00:27:40.051 --> 00:27:47.613
Like parents, psychologically, we need to make sure that we do count any little step toward the relationship with food as a win.
415
00:27:47.673 --> 00:27:51.474
It's not like we don't want our goal to be he ate his whole meal.
416
00:27:52.014 --> 00:27:56.375
The first step is to make sure that the snacking isn't sabotaging the dinner.
417
00:27:56.935 --> 00:27:59.760
And so for some kids, that's literally been the problem.
418
00:27:59.780 --> 00:28:05.549
And the parents just didn't realize that like snacking so close to a meal or snacking after a meal was making dinner optional.
419
00:28:05.869 --> 00:28:11.478
And they say, oh, my gosh, Katie, like I implemented eating times that were more structured.
420
00:28:12.359 --> 00:28:22.775
And then like he ate his dinner, you know, he ate chicken for the first time in six months, stuff like that on the first, on the first day, just because he had an appetite.
421
00:28:23.035 --> 00:28:27.903
Then like you said, that's not everybody's deal, but for some kids, that's all it takes.
422
00:28:28.597 --> 00:28:32.240
Yeah, a hungry enough kid will typically eat more, right?
423
00:28:32.380 --> 00:28:35.063
And the snacking is a really good point.
424
00:28:35.143 --> 00:28:39.306
What other good intentions are parents doing but then backfires?
425
00:28:39.887 --> 00:28:51.316
I would put snacking as one of those, them thinking having all the fruit out on the counter and all that kind of stuff is helping the kids, but to me that's a potential backfire.
426
00:28:51.557 --> 00:28:53.378
What are some other things that are a...
427
00:28:54.479 --> 00:28:55.940
I'm doing the best I can.
428
00:28:55.960 --> 00:28:58.521
I have the best intentions, but then it backfires.
429
00:28:59.382 --> 00:28:59.702
For sure.
430
00:28:59.742 --> 00:29:02.683
Especially parents whose kids are struggling on the weight scale.
431
00:29:02.823 --> 00:29:03.984
They get really anxious.
432
00:29:04.484 --> 00:29:07.646
Oh, every time my kid says, he's hungry, like I got to feed him.
433
00:29:08.146 --> 00:29:08.446
Right?
434
00:29:08.946 --> 00:29:12.948
Or every time she thinks, if she'll eat that apple, I have to give her the apple.
435
00:29:13.869 --> 00:29:19.792
But if we think about ancestral eating, again, we're not snacking.
436
00:29:20.612 --> 00:29:21.553
in the covered wagons.
437
00:29:22.473 --> 00:29:24.754
You're sitting down and having a real meal.
438
00:29:25.255 --> 00:29:32.778
And if we just look at the way our body is designed, our body's designed to oscillate digestively between eating and then not eating.
439
00:29:32.818 --> 00:29:40.782
Because if stuff is happening at the top of the digestive system, if you're actively eating, then the rest of kind of the system pauses.
440
00:29:41.443 --> 00:29:45.445
And so if you're actively eating every half hour, every hour, your stomach's like,
441
00:29:46.365 --> 00:29:48.987
yo, I don't have time to do my job here.
442
00:29:49.108 --> 00:29:50.649
I need a rest.
443
00:29:51.269 --> 00:29:53.771
And so we really do need at least 90 minutes.
444
00:29:54.072 --> 00:30:00.497
And for older kids, up to three hours where our digestive system gets a rest so that it can digest.
445
00:30:00.597 --> 00:30:10.546
And now while your kids will feel better, they'll digest their food better, and they'll be able to come to the meal that you so lovingly created with an actual appetite.
446
00:30:10.926 --> 00:30:14.468
And so, you know, there are people out there who will say, like, just let them get hungry, then they'll eat.
447
00:30:14.608 --> 00:30:16.429
Duh, I solved the whole picky eating problem.
448
00:30:16.989 --> 00:30:17.990
That's not what I'm saying.
449
00:30:18.410 --> 00:30:23.633
But I'm saying you will sabotage the picky eating problem if the kids don't have an appetite.
450
00:30:24.033 --> 00:30:24.273
Right.
451
00:30:24.353 --> 00:30:25.494
So it's just kind of step one.
452
00:30:25.514 --> 00:30:31.617
It's like, let's make sure the stage is set correctly for all the other good things you're about to do at the dinner table.
453
00:30:32.394 --> 00:30:37.937
Where does the kind of transparency around the food fit in for you?
454
00:30:37.957 --> 00:30:42.659
Because there's some parents that are like, I like to tell my kids everything that they're eating.
455
00:30:42.699 --> 00:30:50.282
And then there's other like, yeah, I love, you know, sprinkling pluck on the food and not telling them there's organ meats in it, that kind of thing.
456
00:30:51.650 --> 00:30:52.870
Yeah, you know, it can be a both.
457
00:30:53.010 --> 00:31:01.052
And I think we want to be cautious about legitimately hiding food, like as as a sneaky thing.
458
00:31:01.112 --> 00:31:03.792
I think there was a book years ago called The Sneaky Chef.
459
00:31:03.832 --> 00:31:14.494
And it's like, because if the child finds out, and you've broken that trust, they're going to look at every single food you serve very skeptically.
460
00:31:14.834 --> 00:31:16.995
And that goes now we're going from curiosity back to fear.
461
00:31:18.155 --> 00:31:18.436
Right.
462
00:31:18.556 --> 00:31:20.418
So we do have to be very cautious.
463
00:31:21.238 --> 00:31:23.681
Do the kids need to know everything?
464
00:31:24.281 --> 00:31:25.302
Not necessarily.
465
00:31:26.424 --> 00:31:31.809
But we don't want to be hiding food like for the sake of hiding food, if that makes sense.
466
00:31:31.869 --> 00:31:34.351
And if a child were ever to ask, oh, like what's in pluck?
467
00:31:34.752 --> 00:31:35.393
You better tell them.
468
00:31:36.694 --> 00:31:38.837
Full and complete, full and complete honesty.
469
00:31:39.057 --> 00:31:49.069
But that doesn't mean that you can't like, you know, sprinkle pluck or some organ meats or mix, you know, broth powder or something into a casserole.
470
00:31:49.309 --> 00:31:55.156
You don't have to like FDA disclose every ingredient when you bring the food to the table.
471
00:31:55.768 --> 00:31:57.711
Do you think the distinction is taste?
472
00:31:57.772 --> 00:32:04.423
Like if it's something that's going to potentially alter the texture, the look, or the taste, then that should be disclosed.
473
00:32:04.463 --> 00:32:06.908
But if it's not, then there's no harm, no foul?
474
00:32:07.942 --> 00:32:08.302
It could be.
475
00:32:08.342 --> 00:32:11.363
I don't know if I would make it so black and white like that.
476
00:32:11.444 --> 00:32:18.466
It's more of if the child asks, you know, what this is, that you need to make sure that you tell them.
477
00:32:18.947 --> 00:32:21.088
And that's where having the kids involved in the kitchen is really good.
478
00:32:21.928 --> 00:32:23.208
Because then they can just see.
479
00:32:23.248 --> 00:32:25.710
It doesn't even have to be a conversation, right?
480
00:32:25.750 --> 00:32:33.433
So like when I make meatballs, I do not tell my family I put shredded zucchini in the meatballs, but I'm also not going to hide it.
481
00:32:34.113 --> 00:32:44.265
It is somewhat helpful for the picky eating relationship for food to potentially be hidden because at least you're getting like your gut bacteria are getting fed that food.
482
00:32:44.325 --> 00:32:50.653
And when they're fed that food, if it's good gut bacteria and they're happy, they'll actually give you more of a taste or a craving for that food.
483
00:32:50.673 --> 00:32:51.534
So that's really cool.
484
00:32:52.094 --> 00:32:52.355
But.
485
00:32:52.875 --> 00:32:57.197
If it's hidden, the child is not actually creating a relationship with that food.
486
00:32:57.277 --> 00:32:59.518
So we need a both and, right?
487
00:32:59.878 --> 00:33:06.321
You need to like serve the zucchini so the child can see it as well or let them know that there's zucchini in there.
488
00:33:06.341 --> 00:33:11.563
So they at least know that they are building a relationship with that food for the long term for their life.
489
00:33:11.783 --> 00:33:14.084
So again, it's not a it's not a problem to hide food.
490
00:33:14.324 --> 00:33:15.725
It's definitely a problem to lie to your kids.
491
00:33:16.665 --> 00:33:19.847
What does success actually look like with a pick eater?
492
00:33:22.839 --> 00:33:25.162
Success looks like they're curious about food.
493
00:33:25.462 --> 00:33:27.925
They're willing to try something new.
494
00:33:29.246 --> 00:33:31.068
The power struggles, the stress at the table.
495
00:33:31.268 --> 00:33:34.872
I think the biggest success, number one, is that the stress at the table goes down.
496
00:33:35.953 --> 00:33:40.618
And so that's what, you know, when I work with parents, we'll do like a five-day challenge.
497
00:33:41.159 --> 00:33:42.240
And you can do this with the book.
498
00:33:42.560 --> 00:33:44.961
Like the book is written in 30 chapters, the Picky Eater Playbook.
499
00:33:45.202 --> 00:33:47.863
So you could read, they're very short, one chapter a day for 30 days.
500
00:33:48.164 --> 00:33:49.124
That seems a little intense.
501
00:33:49.424 --> 00:33:50.605
It's also in seven sections.
502
00:33:50.885 --> 00:33:54.608
So you could do like one section, which is thematic, a week for seven weeks.
503
00:33:54.868 --> 00:33:56.709
That would feel probably a little better.
504
00:33:56.769 --> 00:34:03.894
But when I work with parents with this five-day challenge, at the end of the five days, 85% of parents say their stress is reduced.
505
00:34:04.574 --> 00:34:14.860
To me, massive success because, again, it's laying the groundwork for future continued improvements in the child's relationship with food.
506
00:34:14.880 --> 00:34:17.522
Because if everybody's stressed, nobody has an appetite.
507
00:34:18.382 --> 00:34:20.864
You know, so if you can remove that stress, massive success.
508
00:34:21.444 --> 00:34:29.309
If a parent could change just one thing at tonight's dinner that would help their child build a healthier relationship with food, what would you have them do?
509
00:34:30.577 --> 00:34:31.417
Well, it wouldn't be the dinner.
510
00:34:31.817 --> 00:34:40.860
I would start with that snacking and making sure that you've got 90 minutes to three hours between any snack and a meal and that the snack isn't meal sized.
511
00:34:41.621 --> 00:34:56.286
OK, so for all kids, unless they're a severe, extreme picky eater and they are actually having weight problems, we want to make sure that the snack just satiates the hunger and allows the chat and then that you have that 90 minutes to three hours for the appetite
512
00:35:00.929 --> 00:35:03.700
could be sabotaged if you don't put that first step in place.
513
00:35:03.861 --> 00:35:04.665
So that's step number one.
514
00:35:05.852 --> 00:35:06.172
Love it.
515
00:35:06.713 --> 00:35:11.316
One thing we noticed, and I love your point about become a detective.
516
00:35:11.797 --> 00:35:12.917
Don't just assume.
517
00:35:13.338 --> 00:35:14.318
Look at the patterns.
518
00:35:14.879 --> 00:35:21.404
And one of the patterns we noticed was that everyone was really hungry right around 4.30, not 5.
519
00:35:21.644 --> 00:35:28.289
We assume that dinner's at 5 or later, but everyone was just going crazy with snacks at 4.30.
520
00:35:28.349 --> 00:35:30.351
So what we did was we just moved dinner to 4.30.
521
00:35:31.491 --> 00:35:31.751
Nice.
522
00:35:32.552 --> 00:35:36.775
I mean, now we were fortunate and we could because we, you know, we're home early enough to do that.
523
00:35:36.795 --> 00:35:46.982
But it's like, that was absolutely a case of us kind of being detectives and noticing the pattern of not just our kids, but the whole family, all of our hunger.
524
00:35:48.140 --> 00:35:54.565
Yeah, sometimes parents have to be creative with moving around food or moving a snack, especially.
525
00:35:54.585 --> 00:35:56.927
Like a lot of kids are getting off the bus maybe at 4.
526
00:35:57.768 --> 00:36:02.511
And if dinner's at 5 or even 5.30, there's no time for a snack.
527
00:36:02.551 --> 00:36:04.873
But we feel like there should be that after-school snack.
528
00:36:04.893 --> 00:36:07.355
So yeah, sometimes you just have to get really excited.
529
00:36:07.455 --> 00:36:12.819
creative on how to make sure that they're not over hungry and hangry and melting down.
530
00:36:13.439 --> 00:36:17.883
Although that is so step two for me is to put out vegetables and the whole process.
531
00:36:17.903 --> 00:36:19.624
But in general, it's to put out vegetables first.
532
00:36:20.224 --> 00:36:24.868
So if I had kids who were hungry, literally just a half an hour before the meal, I would probably just put out a veggie tray.
533
00:36:25.308 --> 00:36:31.293
And then that's, you know, that feels like a success too, because for most picky eaters, they're having struggles with veggies.
534
00:36:32.073 --> 00:36:36.136
And so if veggies are the first thing that's hitting that wonderful hungry appetite,
535
00:36:37.756 --> 00:36:41.359
It's something easy to have on the dinner table ready to go once they get home.
536
00:36:41.459 --> 00:36:41.920
I love it.
537
00:36:41.960 --> 00:36:42.860
That's such a good tip.
538
00:36:43.361 --> 00:36:44.522
Well, final question.
539
00:36:44.722 --> 00:36:50.647
If you could wave a magic wand, bring back one ancestral practice, what would that be and why?
540
00:36:53.169 --> 00:36:57.713
Parents and children working together consistently throughout the day in the home.
541
00:36:58.614 --> 00:37:05.500
And having that side-by-side bonding and focus on just building life skills and building relationships all day long.
542
00:37:06.893 --> 00:37:07.373
I love that.
543
00:37:07.673 --> 00:37:08.934
Thank you so much, Katie.
544
00:37:08.954 --> 00:37:11.675
This has been really enlightening.
545
00:37:11.715 --> 00:37:18.417
I mean, you brought up so many things I've never heard of and really never looked at, you know, picky eating in the way you described it.
546
00:37:18.937 --> 00:37:21.738
Your book, everyone's got to check this book out.
547
00:37:22.639 --> 00:37:28.661
It's available if you're listening to this after November 10th, but it's available, it launches November 10th, right?
548
00:37:29.508 --> 00:37:33.149
Yes, but yeah, it's in pre-order if you're listening before November 10th, 2026.
549
00:37:33.589 --> 00:37:40.832
You can pre-order, head over to RaisingHealthyFamilies.com slash Picky Ancestral for your folks, and they can buy the book there.
550
00:37:40.852 --> 00:37:44.633
They can also get some juicy bonuses if we're still in the pre-order phase.
551
00:37:45.834 --> 00:37:46.134
Awesome.
552
00:37:46.174 --> 00:37:52.476
And then you also do like a kids cooking kind of summer camp, correct?
553
00:37:53.076 --> 00:37:54.616
Can you share a little bit about that?
554
00:37:54.697 --> 00:37:58.998
And I'm assuming people just go to the same website to learn about that too, right?
555
00:37:59.580 --> 00:38:00.181
Yeah, yeah.
556
00:38:00.201 --> 00:38:01.783
I mean, get connected with me.
557
00:38:01.843 --> 00:38:02.944
We have a kids cooking class.
558
00:38:02.984 --> 00:38:06.108
We have a teen cooking class that's new this year in 2026.
559
00:38:06.148 --> 00:38:07.009
That's super cool.
560
00:38:07.590 --> 00:38:09.292
We have a chef teaching about 15 lessons.
561
00:38:09.332 --> 00:38:11.574
It's not you because you don't live near enough to me.
562
00:38:11.594 --> 00:38:12.215
That was a bummer.
563
00:38:14.257 --> 00:38:17.822
But yes, if a child of any age is ready to cook.
564
00:38:18.482 --> 00:38:19.043
We can help.
565
00:38:19.403 --> 00:38:30.029
And then we do a lot of life skills camps in the summer as well, where that blows out from cooking to gardening, finances, entrepreneurship, emotional regulation, anything you can call a life skill.
566
00:38:30.530 --> 00:38:33.952
We've got over 450 of them in the vault in video form now.
567
00:38:34.942 --> 00:38:35.483
Amazing.
568
00:38:36.063 --> 00:38:38.566
Well, thank you again for sharing your wisdom.
569
00:38:39.026 --> 00:38:40.588
We'll put all this in the show notes.
570
00:38:40.928 --> 00:38:41.269
Wow.
571
00:38:42.250 --> 00:38:45.273
It's time for us to bring the curiosity back to the dinner table.
572
00:38:45.313 --> 00:38:49.357
I love that because I always end every episode with reminding people to be curious.
573
00:38:49.397 --> 00:38:52.881
And so now, be curious at the dinner table, everyone.
574
00:38:52.901 --> 00:38:54.243
Thank you so much for joining us.
575
00:38:55.433 --> 00:38:58.854
Thank you so much for joining me on Everyday Ancestral.
576
00:38:59.674 --> 00:39:03.894
If you enjoyed this episode, hit subscribe so you don't miss the next one.
577
00:39:04.274 --> 00:39:09.195
You can find the show notes, links, and resources mentioned at eatpluck.com.
578
00:39:09.235 --> 00:39:14.356
That's E-A-T-P-L-U-C-K dot com.
579
00:39:15.076 --> 00:39:19.937
And hey, if you know someone who'd get something out of this, share it with them too.
580
00:39:20.457 --> 00:39:24.478
Stay curious, live well, and keep it ancestral.