Get Your Kids to Eat Anything, With Emily Leary | Book Review

My daughter has always eaten reasonably well, and had a home-cooked meal almost every evening since she was weaned at six months old. We did baby-led weaning with her, partly in hopes of her enjoying a variety of food and not being a fussy eater, and partly because I am lazy and didn’t fancy making purees all the time and trying to spoon feed it into her.

Baby-led weaning went well and I loved seeing my baby trying to master the pincer grip and trying to pick up some toast or a piece of pineapple, and then, later on, covering her face and the high chair in spaghetti bolognese.

But as she got older she got more and more fussy and refused more and more types of food. She has always been bad with fruit – she will still only eat bananas and nothing else, which I find so frustrating. I think as my daughter has got older and become even more opinionated and determined in what she does and doesn’t like, I have perhaps got a bit too settled in cooking the same types of meals week after week so that I know she will eat them.

I’ve been lucky enough to get my hands on the brilliant Emily Leary’s new book – Get Your Kids to Eat Anything – an achievable ‘how to’ for parents in the battle to overcome picky eating and ‘make new the norm’. It’s come at the perfect time to encourage me to branch out with our family meals and to think about food differently, as well as encouraging Ava to, as well.

Emily is a great food blogger (who also happens to live in Nottingham!), and has a lot of experience making tasty food that kids will eat. Emily really knows her stuff – she has been a food writer and recipe creator since 2011, on her brilliant, award-winning blog, ‘A Mummy Too‘, and regularly writes and presents for publications and brands.

‘Get Your Kids to Eat Anything’ is so much more than just a cookbook; it is a practical, easy-to-follow programme to help get give children (and adults!) a healthy and adventurous attitude to food. The emphasis is on making ‘new the norm’, with new tastes and textures, so that children don’t become so set in their ways with foods that they are used to, that they straight away reject something ‘new’. This means that when children are presented with something unfamiliar to them, it is expected and therefore they are comfortable with it.

Emily guides you through this process in 5 phases in a straightforward way, with the aim to foster a love of food in our children. I am such a big foodie, and I want my daughter to have that passion and taste for food too, so we can experience it together and she can enjoy a healthy and varied diet. Each phase includes a clear explanation of what you’re going to learn and achieve, clear advice and two weeks of delicious recipes.

The 5-phase approach consists of:

Phase 1: Unfamiliar into the familiar. Introducing unfamiliar colour, flavour or texture into familiar favourites.
Phase 2: Educate. Experimenting with food, and understanding where it comes from and why it’s important.
Phase 3: Fun. Putting the fun back into food and building enthusiasm for food variety.
Phase 4: Into the unknown. Discovering new ingredients and flavour combinations.
Phase 5: Cementing variety. Learning techniques to keep your family meals varied long-term.

There are great recipes in there too though (over 70), with beautiful, tempting shots that make you want to stop what you’re doing and go and make them immediately, and simple but incredibly tasty ideas for meals for your family, to help you ease away from the meals you tend to make week in week out and instead make new the norm.

We made the curried fish fingers and sweet potato chips a few nights ago (I will share the recipe soon!) and it was so delicious but also straightforward to make. I love that this book has inspired me already to get back in the kitchen and actually cook from scratch again. This was actually the first time I have ever cooked with fresh fish (other than say cooking a salmon fillet) so I was a little bit apprehensive before I started. But Emily’s instructions are so easy to follow and it went so well and was so good!

I love that I can now make my own fish fingers, that are healthier and tastier; and despite the fact that Ava rejected them at first she then did go on to eat them all, which is brilliant. The spices were mild enough that they were flavourful without being overbearing for young palates.

Next I want to make the Savoury Lunchbox Muffins – yesterday I got together with Emily and a few other lovely Notts bloggers and Emily made some of the recipes from her book, as a little celebration of her book release – and these muffins were amazing, so so tasty, and they’re so easy to make too. They’re the kind of thing I’d always like to have in for Ava as a healthy snack option but never get round to doing – but these are so simple (they even use frozen vegetables so you don’t have to prepare them), and you can freeze them and then microwave them, so I really think they’re something we will always have in.

Get Your Kids to Eat Anything is not just another cookbook, but a “how to” guide for parents in the ongoing struggle to overcome picky eating and make new the norm. I think it’s such a great way to help gently guide you through the process and encourage fussy children to explore and enjoy food in a different way. I love that within the phases you are encouraged to take your children food shopping with you to explore different ingredients, do some food tasting, grow their own herbs and so much more to make the whole experience fun and interesting, whilst helping to develop a love for food. Ava loves things like this; she is currently growing things such as rocket and celery at school, and she takes great delight in telling me how they did it and what they are doing next. It’s so lovely to see, and I can’t wait to do more things like this at home.

Get Your Kids to Eat Anything is out today and available on Amazon here.

I have bought an extra copy of Emily’s brilliant book to give away to one of you! I love supporting other bloggers, but I also think it’s a really great book and programme that can really help parents so I want to share it with you!

All you have to do to enter is complete the Rafflecopter widget below – good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I was sent a copy of ‘Get Your Kids to Eat Anything’ from Emily, but all words and opinions are mine. I have bought the giveaway copy myself. See my full disclosure policy here.