By: Lisa Poisso Date Posted: 2/4/2008 Printer Friendly Version Email Story to a Friend

Weary of chicken nuggets, mac and cheese and fixing separate meals for your youngest diners? Don’t blame the kids – they most likely inherited their picky nature from you. Recent research published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition notes that children’s aversions to trying new foods are mostly inherited. The report found that 78 percent of childhood neophobia, or the fear of new food, is genetically linked.

Most kids put the brakes on their taste buds around age 2, in what scientists speculate is an instinctual response to preven

Fresh Ideas Gastrokid. Two foodie dads (one of whom is an editor at Bon Appetit) blog on what to feed the kids. Child of Mine: Feeding With Love and Good Sense by Ellyn Satter. A cult classic leading the way to good eating habits without strained parent-child relationships.

t them from gobbling everything they now can reach. The period usually lasts two to three years; but, as we all know, some children are harder to tempt back to the fold than others.

So how are you supposed to get good nutrition down the hatch? Jessica Seinfeld, wife of comedian Jerry Seinfeld and mother of three, addressed the challenge by writing Deceptively Delicious: Simple Secrets to Get Your Kids Eating Good Food, in which she counsels parents to slip pureed veggies into kids’ food. Seinfeld’s recipes hide such additions as pureed cauliflower in

Need More? For tips on getting your squeamish eaters to eat better, see our exclusive interview with Dr. Arthur Agatston, author of the South Beach Diet, and some recipes for success with bridge foods.

mashed potatoes or chicken salad.

Other experts advise patience — and lots of it. It can take up to 15 exposures for children to accept a new food, so don’t get discouraged too quickly. Keep offering new foods alongside healthy favorites, and don’t be afraid to let kids make an entire meal out of a healthy side dish, suggests Dallas dietitian Jessica Setnick. “Parents worry about variety and say things like ‘I’m not going to put out an orange every meal,’” she says. “My reply would be ‘Why not?’”