Well, he'll eat any pasta (ok, not any, I've never even tried lasagne for him but I know he wouldn’t eat it because it's something that is all mixed up due to the layers) so various pasta dishes from something simple like just stirring jarred pesto through for a quick lunch (I would serve some sides of veg or salad and chunks of cheese for him) or another lunch pasta would be (it's very cheaty):
penne or twists
dry fried sliced mushrooms then add a handful of cherry toms to cook
glug of olive oil or oil from jar of sun dried toms, chopped sun dried toms, chopped jar roasted peppers, chopped sultanas - all mixed like a salad dressing
mix whole thing together.
Hell eat this now with the little chopped bits of pepper etc that are stuck to the pasta. Previously I would have dressed the pasta like a salad then served the roasted peppers in one pile, mushrooms in another, toms in another.
That's the sort of thing I'll make for lunch or a super fast dinner if he needs EBT and I don't have time for our regular meal.
Lunch we often have sandwich or crusty bread with pate, humus, salad, cheese etc I don't always cook a hot meal at lunch.
For dinner though I would make various pasta sauces with toms and chunky veg (aubergine, courgette, pepper, onion), mince or meatballs, or sausage chopped up or chicken or turkey etc and I'll put enough sauce on DS's pasta to coat it so it doesn’t all stick together but then I serve the pasta in a pile and the chunks of veg all separated out into different piles on his plate. If he can see and recognise the items he will eat them. I'm just starting to experiment with leaving some meals a bit mixed up and asking at the table if he wants me to help him separate them.
We have lots of meals that are meat/fish with veg sides (meat and 3 or 4 veg) as this suits DS so well and really it's a healthy meal for us. Today I was too preoccupied with making his Halloween costume so didn't cook properly and we had oven chips (v rare here I'd usually make sweet pot or turnip/parsnip/carrot chips instead) with oven baked trout, steamed carrots and asparagus. He doesn't always taste the meat/fish but is so much more willing now than he was even a few months back. I serve him omelet for breakfast many mornings so that it doesn't matter at dinner if he eats protein or not, it takes the pressure right off.
Roast dinner he loves - lots of different veg, roast potatoes, yorkshire puds
slow cooked pulled pork, morrocan lamb, whole chicken he may or may not eat the meat but will eat the sides, corn on the cob, roast sweet potato wedges (like chips), tortilla wraps or flat bread, coleslaw (red onion, red cabbage, carrot, mayo - weird how he's started to eat this as it's a sloppy food but he loves the crunch of the cabbage)
stew either with potatoes or dumplings - always several veg in it and always chunky and served in piles for him
stir fry and noodles - DP often makes this, I'm not keen as it's hard to provide enough piles of veg for DS when I have to separate it all out but we manage and I am grateful for someone else cooking! DS likes the crunchy water chestnuts in particular
pizza - I use a garlic flat bread as the base and generally DS won't eat it if the are toppings on it, ho hum, so his toppings are served on the side! He has just started to try it out with toppings, anchovy, olives, cheese, pineapple
Not amazing menus but mostly fresh and mostly healthy...and the way I serve up it's mostly not sloppy and mostly in piles
The thing is, although he's never liked mixed or mashed up food he eats things that many LOs might not - olives, anchovies, sprats, rocket, romaine lettuce (and will try other leaves time to time too), spring onions, beetroot, brie, blue cheese (st agure, stilton). And he eats large portions of fruit and veg too. So i can hardly call him fussy.
I do sometimes worry about what he'll eat at school because I imagine shepherds pie etc but it's a while off yet and maybe by then he will accept those foods, or he'll just have to go hungry and eat when he gets home!
Oh dear, feel like I just took over the thread! sorry!
hope something helps!
