As a mom who spent eleven years losing dinner table wars, I know the desperation of sneaking veggies into sauce.
It took eleven years. It did not have to take eleven years...
The Broccoli Haircut is fifty things I wish someone had told me at the beginning, from a mother, not a dietitian. No shame, no three-day miracle, no "just one more bite."
THE RULE THE WHOLE BOOK IS BUILT ON:
"This broccoli needs a haircut" is not a lie, your child knows broccoli isn't hair. That's pretend play, and it works, because it moves the food out of the category "thing I must swallow." But "there's no carrot in this sauce" IS a lie, and it costs you far more than one dinner. There's a study on four-year-olds and trust that changed how I cook. It's in Chapter 14.
For parents of fussy eaters aged 1 to 10, and for anyone who has ever stood in a kitchen for two hours and heard "I don't like it" before the plate landed.
You cannot make a child swallow. You never could. Here is what you can do instead.