Palate Training – How to Get Your Baby to Eat Everything

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Since chronicling Harrison’s foray into real foods the past 8 months, I’ve gotten many questions about Harrison’s meals and how we got him to eat so well and with such variety. Growing up, my brother was an extremely picker eater. My dad was always picky and later in life has gotten even worse. I’ve seen so many parents struggle and struggle and struggle with feeding their toddlers and kids anything but complete junk food. I knew I wanted a different way. We saw what Sean’s cousins did with their two kids – palate training – and were in awe when their nine-month old ate a vegetable curry from a market in London. 

Ultimately, we had to have a plan. Our world has so much to do with food. Cooking is my hobby and passion and trying new foods is such an important experience for both me and Sean.

I was also concerned about nutrition and the addiction to sugar. It’s in EVERYTHING and 100% impossible to avoid. But I believed there had to be a way for a child to eat a variety of foods – not just the “beige foods” (bread, chicken fingers, french fries, macaroni and cheese, hotdogs, etc.) and sugar. Enter Palate Training.

Palate training is based on the idea that, by introducing foods in a certain way, we can teach babies to fully taste and enjoy mild grains and vegetables before having sweeter fruits and salty snack, meats, etc. There is a nutritionist on Instagram who shared this program @DrLauraLefkowitz,  – she doesn’t post anymore and there is no website with a full list or process but we followed what Sean’s cousins did and also scrolled far back on her Instagram for more details.

I’ve gotten MANY comments and questions about palate training so I thought I’d put together . a blog post about what we did those first few pivotal months and our ongoing approach as Harrison grows into a toddler.

There are a few key things to keep in mind as you start out:

  1. Think about baby’s sensitive taste buds – until they start solids they’ve only had breastmilk or formula which has a very mild taste.
  2. Don’t overwhelm their taste buds at first! Ease them into solids and choose very mild, simple flavored grains and vegetables.
  3. Don’t start with sweet or salty foods. It’s too much for baby and having sweet things just sets them up to always prefer that and ignore other things on the plate.
  4. DO NOT mix fruit with vegetables or grains. Your baby will not learn what vegetables taste like if they’re always mixed with apples, pears, oranges, etc.
  5. Mixing vegetables and grains is ok once baby has tried and accepted each food on its own.
  6. Wait at least three days before introducing a new food so you can watch for any kind of allergic reactions, etc.
  7. Please do not give your child pouches. They’re always composed of vegetables mixed with fruit which goes completely against the palate training concept and they can affect children’s appetites because the act of chewing releases enzymes and works with the brain to let them know they’re full. The way purees are sucked from the pouches often leaves it sitting along the gums which can cause dental issues. Also, sucking is not helping your child learn how to eat – from a spoon, by chewing, etc. Please read this post from Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta for more on this.

If you decide palate training is right for you, consider making your baby’s food. Store bought foods – even organic ones – always have things added in. The vast majority of foods can be steamed in a steam basket on the stove or in the microwave, then pureed in a blender, food processor or nutri bullet.

I’m a working mom and my husband works as well. I made all of Harrison’s food so this is just encouragement that you can do it, too! I would spend about an hour or so on a Sunday, steaming and pureeing veggies and grains, packing them into Tupperware and freezing whatever we weren’t going to feed Harrison over the next couple of days. 

We followed the order below for foods. I used fresh vegetables as it made sense but other things, like peas, I bought frozen and pureed. 

In order:
  1. Brown rice cereal – I recommend buying organic rice, putting a cup into the blender to make a powder/flour and then cooking that with at least 2 cups of water (more as needed to get the right consistency). This is one of the only foods that needs cooked this way.
  2. Oatmeal – I actually bought the organic powder oatmeal at the store based on the nutritionist’s original recommendations. It worked well because I could add this oatmeal to purees like zucchini that were always watery to help thicken them up a bit.
  3. Green peas
  4. Zucchini
  5. Quinoa
  6. Carrots
  7. Butternut squash (or really any squash – yellow, pumpkin, acorn, etc.)
  8. Pears
  9. Green peas with fresh herbs like mint, basil, cilantro
  10. Avocado
  11. Sweet potato
  12. Apples/applesauce
  13. Green beans
  14. Beats
  15. Beans
  16. Mango
  17. Lentils
He always preferred some things over others but if he refused or didn’t eat something right away, we just got him to taste it and then kept offering it for a couple days in a row. Then we’d add back into the rotation a few weeks later and try again. He didn’t love carrots at first. But we kept trying and now he eats them well. DO NOT take an initial “no” as a “no” for forever. Kids sometimes need to be exposed to a food as many as 10 times before they’ll accept it. To this day, Harrison will often put something in his mouth, taste it and then spit it out. Sometimes he’ll realize he liked it and then begin eating it, and other times he just doesn’t want to eat that right then. We’ve all experienced not wanting to eat something at a certain time – he’s no different. We simply don’t accept that he truly doesn’t like something at this stage. 
 
After completing the above list, we started giving him food that wasn’t pureed – eggs, salmon, rice, bites of potatoes, beans, mango, blueberries, melon, chicken, etc. One challenge has been that some grains (looking at you, quinoa) that he loved pureed are just really difficult to eat in their non-pureed form for a kiddo with not many teeth and an inability to use a spoon. We still serve Harrison some pureed foods each day as a result. 
 
Kids want to eat what we eat. This has made both Sean and I think through our choices when dining out. We choose more vegetables or soft foods to share with Harrison, and limit (not eliminate) fried and sugary foods so we don’t even have them on the plate for him to want. This has worked well for everyone!
 
Harrison still can’t eat everything we eat. Some things, like pork, beef and most chicken are still too tough and chewy for him without more teeth. Other things can be really difficult for him to eat with his hands – soups, curries, saucy dishes, etc. We will still feed him and offer him what we can but we usually supplement with other food. An example of this: we recently had grilled chicken with coleslaw and grilled green beans. The chicken was too tough even though we could tell he liked the flavor. Coleslaw is just hard for a baby to eat, and grilled green beans weren’t soft enough. On this night, he ate something different. Pre-made (by us) broccoli and egg bake, a quick quesadilla with refried beans that we’d made earlier in the week and shredded cheese between corn tortillas, leftover rice and then 1/2 of a pear for dessert. But 95% of the time he eats at least one thing that we are also eating, if not more. 
 
Food is a huge part of people’s lives but nutrition often isn’t and the reasons why not are extensive. Palate training has helped us ensure that our baby will know and accept nutrient-dense foods. Does he love fruit, breads, rice cakes, sweets, etc.? Of course. And we will never be able to keep from candy, fruit juices, and other treats from him but for us it’s about balance and moderation. When I put cheese, fruit and broccoli on my son’s plate and watch him start with the cheese, then the fruit but still accept and eat the broccoli, I know palate training has worked and been worth the effort.