Food fuss

Remember seeing another one of those spoilt brats that refused to eat just about everything and saying to yourself, when I have a child I´m going to make sure it´s not that fussy? Well, I remember thinking something along those lines many a time. And now here I am, trying every trick in the book to get Zoe to eat that delicious mix of mushed pumpkin, rice and chicken. I act as if I´ll eat some. No interest. I´ll offer it to her on a grown-up spoon. Squeals. I coax her to open her mouth and gently push a little in. She spits it in my face. I know she´s hungry because she hasn´t eaten anything for hours. She just doesn´t want her meal and she will express that if necessary very violently. There will be tears, tantrums and one big mess. Until I bring out the magic potion: yoghurt. Zoe loves her yoghurt and will eat as much as we give her. And once she´s got a couple of spoonfuls of yoghurt in her belly she will usually calm down and begrudgingly accept whatever else there is on offer - as long as every other spoon remains yoghurt. It´s not that she doesn´t try new things. She loves all kinds of fruit, prosciutto, oddities like gherkins, quark and jam, especially on dark german bread, and my mother will be particularly pleased to hear that she´ll never say no to brie de meaux. It´s just at meal time when the fuss begins. But there´s no doubt we´re going to steer clear of McDonald´s…