I actually food process and GRIND up the chicken to mimick the consistency of the processed stuff but so I KNOW what is in them and can modify as needed.
I've done this quite a few times with little success. Hence my initial question regarding texture or salt (or something else). He did eat a small amount of some chicken that I ground and made into little patties (with various flavours etc added) but on the whole most of it is wasted or eaten by me and DP and really although we do enjoy the food on the odd occasion we aren't really burger or nugget eaters. I do love cooking and I don't mind making additional items for DS (for him to eat at a different time to the family meal because I still think the family meal should be what we eat which any way is adapted to his needs, a compromise of sorts) but I do find it a drag to go through a whole cooking stint purely for DS to then have him only eat one tiny bit or reject it the same as he would if I just gave him what we are eating.
Will he eat more at different meals?
Oh yes for sure. DS has:
first thing, milk
hour later, breakfast, usually large
mid morning a LARGE snack which really is like early lunch (I seldom eat at this time and sometimes this is at play group where mums don't eat anyway), something like a sandwich, lots of pancakes or lentil mini loaves, bean burgers, oaty flap jacks, something I have made as a thing purely for him and which can be served cold and taken out and about without too much hassle.
mid afternoon (around 3pm to 3.30pm) dinner, this is our family meal, the main meal of the day where we all (if DP is here, otherwise just me and DS) sit down to eat a properly cooked meal together. The timing of this meal is to suit DS, not me. He eats a huge amount at this time. This is the time when he gets freshly cooked veg, pasta dishes, home baked pie, fish, chicken etc.
5.15pm his supper. This is a light snack plus a tiny sippy milk. Sometimes just fruit, sometimes cracker and cheese, depends what he has had in the day and how hungry he is. I don't eat at this time either so sometimes I give a bean burger or pancake or whatever has recently been made or defrosted but he doesn't eat a lot of them, just a little. Really this is just to make sure he isn't hungry going to bed.
(if DP and I are hungry later in the evening after DS's BT we have something light and easy to rustle up or something naughty like a cake with sugar in it!)
Understand the theory that different meals every night could be off putting...DS is the opposite, I cannot get away with giving him the same meal two days running. No point in making large quantities of spag bol here as he will only eat it the first day. The second day he just looks at me in disgust, 'What's this? I've been working my a** off playing and developing ALL day and you couldn't even be bothered to cook a fresh meal? You lazy, good for nothing.' He then requests his fruit and if it isn't forthcoming asks to leave the table. He's quite a character.
However, I do always include in the meal something I know he likes in terms of veg so the entire meal is not something new and different to him.
