Feeding a one year old--need help!!

[mom2ariana]

For all of you health nuts out there, I desperately need advice on feeding ariana! for a long time now she has been on baby food. her normal routine has been 1 jar of fruit in the morning with cereal, and dinner was half a jar of gerber's meat and veggies and a whole jar of straight veggies. but now i can't get away from the baby food. she is losing interest in it, and dinner time is becoming stressful for me and her. she fights me to eat the food. i have tried EVERYTHING i can think of other than succumbing to her and giving her junk for meals. ive given her regular veggies (peas, corn, etc) that she can pick up. she wouldn't eat those. ive also purchased the little graduates plates with ravioli and veggies, thinking she would be more interested. no go. she refused to eat those worse than the baby food. the only veggies she has eaten willingly were little tastes we gave her of ours. and by our veggies i mean fried okra or asparagus cooked in oil. i refuse to feed her those forms of veggies, because all of the nutrients are cooked out of them. but i dont have a clue how to feed them to her if she wont pick them up herself and she wont eat them from a jar. i know she wants things seasoned now, but how do i season veggies for a baby so that she will eat them?

let me add that i have tried numerous times to fool her. i have tried hiding behind the counter and pouring her baby food on my plate, ive tried putting it in a bowl so that she gets away from the jar. NOTHING fools her. its like she inspects the spoon and if its green, she wont eat it. last night i had to put a french fry from my plate near her mouth to get her to open, then id put the veggies in. after she swallowed id give her a bite of french fry. we did this the entire meal till she ate about 90% of it. i dont want to have to fight with her every step of the way!

anyone have *healthy* (meat & veggies) ways of cooking food for 1 year olds?? HELP!

[LosingMyMindInGA]

From experience, most kids will go through a "picky" phase.  The worst thing to do is give in...it will create a very picky eater.  Keep putting the food on her plate, offer her healthy snacks.  When she gets hungry enough she will eat.  As hard as that is to do, a child will not starve themselves.  You don't want to make mealtime a stressfule time for her otherwise it will remain a hair-pulling situation.  If she's not likely the graduates, try some of the frozen meals like the healthy choice or smartones.  Just remember to KEEP giving her a variety of things.  She will eventually try them.  You don't want her to get used to the same foods over and over.  She will come to expect those and only those for meals.  Right now she is developing her taste buds and what she becomes accustomed to now will determine her palate later.  I made that mistake with a couple of my kids  Persistence is key.  Just make the food, put it on her plate, try to get her to taste it.  If she won't, let it go.  You might try giving her a dab of ketchup or ranch dressing, or other messy substance she will find fun.  This might tempt her to "play" in it and inadverently taste it.  

Spaghetti is something all of my kids love.  It's so easy to sneak some meat and veggies into it as well.  Just smoosh the hamburger and veggies up as small as possible and mix it in the sauce.  Macaroni and cheese too, you can throw in veggies and stuff with it.  Have you tried the tomato sauce version of ravioli?  Not the graduate kind, but like chef boyardee?  She may like it better with that sauce flavor.  If you find she likes breakfast foods, there's no harm in offering those for other meals as well.  

[NicoleW09]

Have you tried boiling the veggies? Like carrots and broccoli and stuff like that? When I cook asparagus I put a little bit of butter in the pan to keep it from sticking and I season it with basil and garlic powder (small amounts) It tastes good and it's not oily. You can even steam asparagus.

I don't know about the meats bc DH and I only eat chicken and we bake or grill it. I know when I was little my Dad would make us potato chip chicken. He would get bbq flavored lays and crush it up in a bag. Then dip the chicken in an egg and flower mixture, then coat it with the chips and bake. It was really good and we ate it, but he didn't put many chips on it. I know it's not exactly the healthiest thing ever, but we liked it.