21 Month Old Only Wants to Eat Salad

I would try and add some shredded cheese, teeny tiny bits of cut up chicken and halved kidney beans. See how that goes. Good luck!

our 4 year old was like that. He loves lettuce. He would only want salads also so we gave him salads for every meal ( even breakfast.. that's all he wanted!)

In the salad's it would lettuce, shredded cheese, hard boiled egg, shaved carrots, tomatoes sometimes black olives ( most of the time he picked those out) and very very small diced meat. If he seen the meat he wouldn't eat it... when it was diced so little he didn't notice it in there he gobbled it up.

He likes fruit for his snacks so we were pretty lucky there. A few times when he would refuse those, I would dice up apples, grapes, peaches and pears really tiny and put those in with lettuce. He does like raisins and sunflower seeds in his salads.

We always gave him the salads with his plate of dinner. We would ask that he took atleast 3 bites of something else while he ate his dinner... sometimes he did sometimes he didn't its was all about picking the battles.

Can you put chickn in the salad? Or steak, tuna, etc?

Can you get her to eat the salad w/ some protein on it...cheese, chicken, etc?

Most parents would LOVE for their kids to want salad/vegetables. Hang in there.

I have a difficult eater too. She seems not to eat anything of substance! I used to offer her 4 things and if she rejected them all, oh well. But when her weight dropped I took a new approach. I'd offer her at least 6 things before giving up. Mine refuses cow's milk, hates meat (which I don't cook with much anyway), and sticks to fruit and some grains. so I grind nuts very fine and through it into her oatmeal. I also had to do a lot of experimenting and found she likes a lot of things i would not have thought to give a 20 month old: Quinoa, guacamole (but not avocado), peanuts (which are considered a choking hazard, but she needs some protein so i just supervise very close). If dinner is a bust, I try to get a few bites of something down her before bed. So experiment with unusual foods (after all it is unusual for a 20 mo. old to like salad), give her a little something before bed. Check up on her weight to determine how vigilant you need to be. If her growth and weight are good then just get her a bedtime snack so she'll sleep.
With my oldest, I had to refuse to give her any night time milk so she'd eat food in the day. It was a rough transition, but necessary. Too much milk and not enough food can permanently stunt height at this age.

I think you could try putting tender chicken shreds/cubes etc. in with the veggies.

Can you make her a bowl of rice with tiny vegetables all cut up and cooked with the rice...spinach and whatever. Put a pat of butter on top and give her a spoon? Mix in tiny bits of cheese or meat as well. I bet if she is eating well at lunch time you do not really need too worry about this. She will probably change how she eats again in a couple months!

I would talk to your pediatrician to see what you can give her to make sure her diet is balanced since she won't eat meat right now. Maybe in the mean time try the pediasure drink supplements since she drinks milk? Vegetarian adults raise vegetarian kids so there has to be a way, right? It may just be a phase but you never really do know how long a phase will last.

My daughter is a great eater too but she has gone through phases where she just won't eat her normal fare. Don't worry about it, try to add cheese or beans to the salad, and continue to offer up the normal dinner foods. Eating is one of the three things that LOs can actually control (the others are sleep and potty). Let her have a little control otherwise you'll set yourself up for a power struggle. This too will change, just go with the flow :)

Try adding some chicken or beans, there are other ways to get protein. Is she eating protein at other times during the day?

I know many vegetarians and they and their children are all healthy. I think getting protein from other sources is just fine.

It's something she will grow out of quickly. For a couple weeks my son would eat nothing but buttered noodles. It went away! For the hunger, can you let her snack on something she likes (dry Cheerios, animal crackers, pretzels, a banana) before bed? If you make it seem fun -- like taking it up to her room when you read books -- she may buy into it. At least this will fill her up and may help with the sleeping.

We are in food school and the best thing they have taught me is to always offer a protein, carb, and fruit or vegetable at every meal/snack. Children should also have the opportunity to sit down to the meal/snack every 2 1/2-3 hours. Then, you let the child decide which and how much of the protein, carb and fruit or vegetable he/she will have. They will self-regulate their intake through the day. I'd say make sure she's getting enough of a chance at other times of the day to get the bulk of her calories. We also started keeping a banana in the bedroom on days when we worried our son hadn't eaten much. It is an easy middle of the night snack he can get himself that is filling. Good luck.

You say she's "eating fairly well during the day at daycare" but don't specify what she is eating there, when you're not around, and the answer to that question is pretty important. If she is eating just the salad vegetables at dinner, but is eating a more varied and balanced set of healthy food at day care, there is much less to worry about. But if at daycare she also is only eating vegetables, then yes, you need to be adding beans, cheese, yogurt, fruit and whole grain starches both at daycare and at home.

Be sure of exactly what she's eating at daycare -- if she is getting snacks or food that THEY provide, is it possible she is getting things there you're unaware of, such as sweets or lots of starches, that are filling her up so that by dinner she only wants to pick at salad, then is hungry in the night? If the day care is feeding her any "treats" or loading her on starch during the day, you should stop them from doing so.

If your salad vegetables are largely lettuce and cucumber and tomato -- that's an issue. She needs spinach and kale for iron, broccoli for antioxidants and vitamins, citrus for vitamin C, beans and legumes, etc. etc. Most salads in the US are mostly lettuces and have little real nutritional value unless made with other vegetables. My main concerns would be not only lack of protein but also lack of iron and minerals. It's GREAT that she has a taste for veggies but be sure they are widely varied ones.