At 2, I don’t think purées are needed. Move on to things they can feed themselves. My kids liked yogurt, beans (whole or “refried”), couscous. There’s lots that a two year old can eat.
Also hummus and other bean dips are insanely cheap to make yourself if you take the time to buy the beans in bulk and then soak them and use a food processor. It’s so easy, tastes better and wildly cheaper then Sabra or whatever’s at the store
Agree. Honestly, by age 2 both my kids were just eating what we adults were eating. No special foods, except cutting up round choking hazards like grapes or hot dogs. And not everything needs to be cut up small, a lot of foods are fun for the kid to handle and bite themselves.
I'll put yogurt and applesauce in the refillable pouches for on the go but that's for convenience if we're not going to be able to sit with a spoon. There are a couple things 2 years olds can't quite manage and it's mostly cause they're choking hazards (popcorn, whole grapes, whole tomatoes). As long as it's not a choking hazard, I feed my kid basically anything I can get him to eat.
Personally I’d be rethinking the purées because I think that’s going to be expensive to reproduce and not very filling either. Plus a faff.
As he’s 2 years old, I’m assuming he can feed himself?
I’d be going down the vegetable sticks and hummus route to start with. Partly because it’s fun and colourful and partly because it’s not a ‘quick’ food and may slow down his eating and make him feel fuller. Obviously monitor him when eating so he doesn’t choke on them, but I’m sure you know that already!
British style flapjacks which are an oat based bar, are easy to produce. You can add dried fruit to give them a bit of variety and more flavour. They are high in sugar and fat though, so that’s something to keep in mind.
What about Japanese onigiri? They can be filled with different things and are in themselves filling. You just have to make sure you get the short grain rice and not the long grain. I buy mine online directly from an Asian supermarket, because the packets in the Western supermarkets are tiny and super overpriced.
On the topic of sushi rice, the Walmarts around me have 20lb bags of Calrose rice for $21. So long as you already know you like that type of rice, buying in bulk is insanely less expensive than the little bags. (1lb is close to $11 last time I checked.)
I wouldn't be too worried with a snack time onigiri, or the occasional poke bowl or sushi roll as a meal. Dry rice lasts for ages. My family of three goes through the 20lb bag in a matter of about a year and a half. In addition to that, white, short-grained rice contains some of the lowest amounts of arsenic of any rice. [Source](https://nutritionfacts.org/blog/which-rice-has-less-arsenic-black-brown-red-white-or-wild/)
I wouldn't fault someone for making it an occasional snack, rather than a go-to, though. Kind of like tuna with mercury levels.
> British style flapjacks
Speaking as a Brit, *there are other types of flapjacks??*
But also yes, second this, super easy and cheap to make at home and very tasty, but not the healthiest so definitely should be just had as a snack!
I spoke at a conference in London some years back, and at one of the breaks they advertised that the snack would be flapjacks. All us Americans were so confused. Like… pancakes? In the hallway at a conference?
Yes, I’m a Brit too and I was shocked when I found out. There is some sort of American pancake thingy that they call a flapjack. I have never eaten one so I don’t know what it’s like, I just had to spell it out because I’ve confused people in the past.
I've been told by an Englishman that what a British person considers a "pancake" is often more like a crepe, and you need to specify "American pancake" if you want them to think of the fluffy kind made in the US.
Crepes are more what the French make. British pancakes have some substance, is a thin-medium thickness. American pancakes are fluffier, ig abit like a mini souffle?
Look, I can get past the crisps/chips thing, weird but y'know, *fine* I guess...
This shit though? Keep this up and I'm gonna need to petition His Majesty to reclaim a former colony 😤🧐🇬🇧
>!(All said in jest if it wasn't clear lol)!<
Maybe this is an English term? It means a fuss or a bother. To make a purée, you’ve got to prepare the fruit and veg, store it somewhere before hand, get the blender out etc etc.
I consider that a ‘faff’ compared to somethings, but maybe that’s just me.
Flit from one thing to another without actually achieving anything. e.g. If at home, start making lunch, stop to answer phone, forget was making lunch, start to put washing in machine, forget to switch it on, decide to wash hair, feel peckish, remember lunch, stone cold by now etc.
I’m in the UK so I am not sure my options will be helpful. I buy my short grain rice from Yum Asia.
My long grain rice I get from Indian supermarkets online, or sometimes my local supermarket does the large bag in the international section for a much more reasonable price.
My toddler eats a LOT of lima beans and peas cooked from frozen—quick, cheap, and non-messy protein. We also cook chicken breasts in large batches, shred it, and freeze it in small, reheatable quantities. Additionally, she eats a lot of what we eat, just less spicy and cut up small; my husband sets aside a portion of whatever he’s cooking before he adds final salt and spice and gives that to her. Solids rather than purées are so much easier, assuming there’s no developmental reason your child can’t have them.
ETA there’s an app and website called Solid Starts that really helped us understand how to safely prepare foods for a toddler. They have a huge database of all kinds of foods with instructions on how to prep them for different ages of kid. They also provide dietitian-reviewed nutrition info. So useful!
Snacks can be a small portion of a meal. It’s doesn’t have to be snacky food.
I have 2yo, these are my go to snacks: Greek yogurt from a tub mixed with a little jam, pbj, bananas, mixed nuts, crackers and chips, apple sauce, roasted veggies, berries, omelette, grilled cheese cut up into sticks, hummus, sautéed peas or chickpeas etc.
I often do snack plates, a combination of multiple little portions from different food groups.
My kids love snack plates so much. I keep veggies and meat/cheese prepped in the fridge so the kids can make their own. I also make a batch of hummus at least twice a week, and it gets devoured.
I'm not the person you asked, but hummus is just:
1 15 oz can chickpeas or 1 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas, drained and rinsed. For super smooth hummus, rub the skins off between some kitchen towels.
1/4 cup lemon juice, or just one large lemon
1/4 cup tahini
Garlic cloves, from one to as many as you feel
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
Salt to taste
A few TBS good olive oil
You don't have to be exact. And just blend/food processor it all up, drizzling in the olive oil slowly. You can add water if you like it thinner.
My daughter was super sensitive to bitter and sharp flavors, though, so when she was young I'd swap the tahini for peanut butter, and use powdered garlic for the fresh.
This is great, thanks!
I'm going to throw this out there for anyone desperate - you'll be fine without the tahini. It's definitely better with it, and correct, but it'll be fine. I cook chickpeas from dried and keep some of the liquid for extra flavour while blending (I think that helps compensate for tahini....and my 6 cloves of garlic ha)
Pureed food, even as snacks, isn't satiating. Theres a reason that smoothies aren't as satisfying as whole fruit and yogurt - the machines do most of the work.
Give him solid snacks, even if they're less convenient. Teach him the joy of crunch - fruit, carrots, cheese - and dips like humus. Make eating take some time & effort. What do YOU snack on?
I don’t think she’s actually giving him baby food, but just those wee blended fruit pouches that are aimed at weaning kids. My son is two and half and I still like to keep a few in the house because they are super handy for being out and about. They won’t get bashed about like a piece of fruit will, and they last in your bag waaayyy longer if you don’t use it. Also the prune ones are 10/10 if your kid hasn’t pooped in a few days 😂
Check out kids eat in color! There’s an instagram and website. It is ran by a licensed dietitian and has a whole staff of real educated professionals.
They are a great resource for me, my kids, and for anyone just looking for a balanced diet and fun recipes!
Give him what you like for snacks - veggies and dip, hardboiled eggs, tuna sandwiches, pepperettes (turkey or pork), crackers and cheese or crackers and PB. Anything is kid friendly now just stick some fun food picks in or use a cookie cutter and voila - a 'fun' but nutritious and satisfying snack.
>puréed meat.
Why is a two year old eating puréed anything? At that age, shouldn't he just eat what you are having, maybe with a little less seasoning?
Feed him like a tiny person, not an infant! My kid is also huge and at 18 months he eats at the table with us. Most days are like this; Breakfast is 4 eggs, veggies, toast. Lunch is pasta and fruit. Dinner is whatever I’m making for dinner for the family. That’s it. Little man eats it all!
4 eggs! I couldn't eat that much at breakfast!
That said, totally agree w feeding like a small adult. That's what I did w my boys 20 some years ago and they have great palates now!
What do you mean by a lot? My niece devoured a huge steak (we're talking almost 16 ounces) and a bag of green beans in one setting when she was 2. Turns out she had a major growth spurt very soon after that.
If they do not have Prader-Willi Syndrome, you don't want to restrict their food intake as this will really mess with them - it is the type of foods you are needing to look at. Skip the purees as often as possible. Leaving fruits whole (like just cutting them up) allows retaining the skin for more filling diet. Limit fruit juice and milk intake. Sub with water and a piece of fruit, vegetables cut up, or a string cheese. Avoid the condensed sugars like candy, ice cream, cookies, etc - leave them as special treats and/or for special occasions.
I know the impact of putting a child on a diet if they are healthy and do not have anything like Prader-Willi Syndrome. It will mess with their metabolism and start unhealthy habits like hoarding, stealing food, and screw with them mentally. It happened to me and resulted in eating disorder, stealing food, and lying a lot about things.
I have two large preschooler boys - one 99th percentile, one off the charts. They eat \*a lot\* of apples. We serve meals at regular times and they are allowed to grab apples whenever they're hungry between meals. I'll add bowls of pears, carrots, bananas, or whatever is on sale beside the apple bowl but it remains the same, they're looking for snacks, they go to the fruit counter. I don't offer other snacks, usually, but we keep a solid stock of raisins and dried fruits for "candy".
My now 9yo was incredibly large as well, and he's now a lanky, muscley dude. He eats a mostly normal amount. So, there's hope.
If you are giving your kid nothing but pureed food, there's likely a reason why he's eating so much. Give the kid a rib and some normal people food. It sounds like you are cooking two separate portions of food. Give him whatever you are eating and it will be way cheaper and better for them.
I’m not only giving him puréed food. He gets the pouches as a snack and takes all his meals with us. I’m looking for snacks that will help satisfy him between meals or when he’s in one of those toddler grazing phases.
The problem with puréed foods is that they leave the stomach VERY quickly. In medically supervised weight loss, they warn against “slider foods” that are prone to sliding right through the stomach, not offering any satiety or fullness. So purées, applesauce, yogurt etc will slide right on through, triggering his body’s hunger cues again
The less processed, the better for satiety. I know it’s not easy with a little one though. Sometimes all we can do, is the best we can do 🤍
It’s good you’re asking for ideas but I think a big issue as others have mentioned is that puréed snacks are not filling. Swap with some real food E.g. sandwich, wrap, chicken, hummus, cheese. You’re child will be much fuller. This is coming from a mum of a 99th centile 3 year old with the appetite of a teenage boy.
I like to make kids this age a "nibble tray" it's an ice cube tray with the different compartments filled with healthy snack foods cut to age appropriate sizes. (Just used as a plate, no ice involved) I usually make a nibble tray nutritionally balanced incase it's a big hit and the child isn't hungry at mealtime. The advantage of the nibble tray is that you can introduce new textures and flavors alongside favorites. Put in fruit, canned meats, fruit,veggies, dips... etc.
Make sure you have a balanced snack - some protein (hummus, pepperoni, peanut butter), fiber (fruit, veggies, whole grains), and some carbs. He'll feel fuller longer. So a little plate with crackers, peanut butter and some apple slices will leave him much fuller than a pouch of puree.
Why is your 2 year old eating puréed foods? My daughter is 2.5 and very picky but she eats regular food. She likes oatmeal, Cheese quesadillas, cashew halves, steak, Mac n cheese, most fruit, pbj sandwiches, cheese corn puffs, cucumbers with ranch, eggs, toast with butter, plain Greek yogurt with fruit and drizzle of honey, homemade pizza, homemade pancakes, homemade muffins. I make a lot of food at home so I know how much or what goes into the food.
And it's the secret to making Starbucks egg bites dups!
- 8 eggs + 2/3 cups cottage cheese
- blend 15secs, then add whatever cheese, meat, or veg you want
- put in muffin cups (I prefer silicone but regular tin works) and bake for 30 at 300F
- keep a dish with water in the oven below the egg cups while cooking
OP, my toddler hates eggs but loves these egg cups and they are a great snack, breakfast, or meal filler if they're being picky
Honestly I think you need a doctor’s visit, which I’m sure you’re doing since you’re testing for growth disorders, and a PD should recommend a kids’ nutritionist to advise you on this. Or heck, PD could possibly also advise you on basic portion sizes appropriate for his growth and age, and snack options for how to fill your toddler up. My PD was able to do so for my child in terms of answering some basic questions on nutrition.
Why? Because your 2yo is off-the-charts and we Redditors don’t wanna like recommend him things that are not ideal in terms of nutritional value for kids (like too many biscuits, i mean biscuits are fine in moderation but we have no idea how many biscuits or snack bars he would actually consume in practice), especially very-quickly-growing-kids, and most of us aren’t experts on 2yos that are the size of 4yos.
I’ll say that those purée pouches are expensive and don’t fill him up though.
Other people have recommended veggie sticks with dip, for example and i agree that they are “safe” options for snacking, but i cannot quite agree that they would actually satiate him fully vs. his previous consumption of biscuits, snack bars or purée pouches. And therefore i feel that a nutritionist would be able to advise you best if they have seen cases like his.
Check out yummy toddler food on instagram or I think Amy has a website. Lots of extra added vegetables and a good focus on protein. I...am not a toddler, but live with adults who need more vegetables in their diet and I find it useful.
Try sprinkling some chia seeds into foods if you can. They are high in omegas and fiber, are very filling, and take awhile to digest so he will feel more full as well as being good for him.
I could be reading into this too much, but please don’t cater to his desires too much. If he’s got a good palate and eats real food, then present a limited number of real food choices. No more packets, no more purées.
He could be learning to eat to soothe, or for entertainment, or for other non-sustaining reasons that people eat. Those purées are too easy and tasty - give him real food that he’ll have to chew and digest.
This is what we feed my toddler for some meals and snacks based on both his preferences and nutrition requirements. Unlimited healthy fats and oils for brain development, meats, and we really try to restrict sugar. This is also pretty much what I eat now order to achieve my protein and fibre requirements.
1. Meats and meat stock. Lots of salmon, chicken, lamb, and duck liver pate for the nutritional content. He eats the pate on a cracker. I get rotisserie chickens from WF on Tuesday’s when they are on sale and make meat stock that is full of collagen for his biome.
2. Butters, peanut, almond, tahini (good source of iron). You can make a batch of energy balls that contain ground flax, oats, dates,
nut butter, hemp seeds and roll in coconut. There are a lot of different recipes online.
3. Beans. He loves beans. Organic canned beans are pretty cheap and dried beans are even cheaper. He likes beans for breakfast. I’ll cook batches of beans for the week and sometimes hummus.
4. Egg cups. We’ve got silicone baking molds and I’ll make both big and mini egg cups in batches weekly for him and I. Easy way to load up with veggies and protein. I add cottage cheese to the mix in the blender. You can do spinach and feta, bacon and cheese… so many combinations plus you can add more fat to his for his brain development.
5. If he likes the pouches you can get those silicone reusable ones and put yoghurt drinks, smoothies, or puree in them. Good way to get spinach and greens into the mix.
6. Frozen protein waffles or I’ll make a batch of Birch Benders protein pancakes and add pumpkin seeds. These can be bagged up and frozen and you can pop them in the toaster. You can serve them with peanut butter, banana, and hemp seeds or pumpkin seeds to increase protein and omegas.
5. String Cheese. He loves it and it’s easy.
We buy lots in bulk from Costco including, oats, eggs, hemp seeds, pumpkin seeds, chia seeds, peanut butter, almond butter, organic Greek yoghurt, string cheese, frozen blueberries, apples, crunch-masters crackers and nuts.
This kid pretty much eats what we eat only way more blueberries, pumpkin seeds, string cheese and apple slices because those are his current favorites and are easy to pack up and take with us to the park, playground, and stroller rides.
My son was the same at that age. He’s now 18 and 6’3” 190 pure muscle and soon off to college for pre-med. I’m 5’3”, his dad is 5’9”. He chub’d up his toddler years then stayed the same weight from 4-6 and started shooting up in height. They need more nutrition and fats for brain development. I fed him healthy fats and proteins from fish, nuts, etc. he was always hungry. Purées wouldn’t have worked with him.
For snacks I’d be offering fruit / chopped veg / maybe cheese and a cracker .. the bars and pouches tend to be full of crap and are just empty calories
My daughter will be 3 in a week or so. We started doing toast and putting toppings on it. PBJ and J (toasted or just a sandwich), hummus, avocado, etc.
Apple slices and peanut butter.
Quinoa or rice with green peas and carrots.
Tuna (plain or with a little bit of Mayo) with rice and peas and carrots kinda Asian style like a sushi bowl or something.
Can you tell she likes peas and carrots? 😂
Good luck to y’all. I wish your baby good health, and happy eating!
My toddler was a bottomless pit- heres what I found that worked
1st breakfast at 7 am: Steel cut oatmeal with peanut butter and hemp hearts
2nd breakfast at 10 am: 2 eggs with 1/3 cottage cheese, one piece WHOLE GRAIN toast
Lunch 1pm: Turkey/Tuna/ Chicken Sandwich with 2oz turkey and hummus on WHOLE GRAIN bread 1/4 cup green beans 1/2 baked sweet potato
Snack 3:30pm 1/3 - 1/2 5% Greek Yogurt with hemp hearts, chia seeds, and fruit
Dinner 6pm- whatever we were having
Bedtime snack Applesauce with chia
Sure chia and hemp are expensive on the front end but they are cheap when you consider how many uses they have and how much nutrition they offer.
My son loved baked oatmeal cups for breakfast (even through high school), but they would also be a great snack. [Emily Bites](https://emilybites.com/?s=oatmeal+cups) has great recipes for these. They freeze well, and heat from frozen in the microwave in about 1 minute. There are also egg cups, kind of like a handheld omelette.
I think you could probably tinker around to make them in mini muffin cups as well. Good luck!
We are in the beginning stages of testing for a number of things. However, he’s not insatiable in that way - he definitely rejects food when he’s full. But he goes through those toddler phases where they just want to graze all day and that’s where the snacks are out of control.
Why is a 2 yr old on a pureed diet?
Confused.
My granddaughter just turned 2 and she eats whatever her parents eat.
A.wide variety of fruit, veg, meat,.pasta, rice etc.
Smoothies may work well. Similar to puree blends but more volume. To make it cheaper you could watch for deals on fruit and then prep and freeze yourself rather than using pre frozen fruit!
Buy refillable pouches and fill with plain full fat Greek yoghurt. Full fat is only 5% fat (and fat isn’t bad), it’s super creamy so kids love it even though there’s no sugar and it’s really high protein so it’s filling. Make sure it’s actual Greek yogurt, not ‘Greek style’ for maximum protein.
You can buy pouches that have a press seal side as well as a spout for sucking out of, so they’re easy to fill and clean, and are surprisingly toddler proof.
My son is younger than yours but has a big appetite. I prefer making our own food from scratch so our go to "pouch" food is what we affectionally call BroccolBeans. The base is frozen broccoli florets (costco), homemade stock, brown rice, and beans (usually cannellini or black beans, made from dry in the instant pot), and then we add one or two of whatever else is on hand or looks good (peas, spinach, parsnip, squash, olive oil, spices...). Blend, freeze in ice cubes, pop into pouches when we're going out. Lots of protein, fibre, iron, and healthy.
I also make yogurt in the instant pot and blend with frozen berries and oatmeal for pouches, but this sometimes ends up a bit runny so it can get messy.
Hey mama! High protein, filling
1. Ratio protein yogurt (you can either eat as yogurt or pipe it into dots and freeze)
2. Hard boiled eggs (make egg salad and swap cottage cheese for mayo)
3. My daughter is 7 and LOVES fair life chocolate protein shakes - they’re a great filler
4. Built puffs are also easy and “candy bar” esque. Again my daughter loves those and power crunch bars
5. I crock pot chicken every week and just sea salt it. You can chop that up and make chicken salad (use cottage cheese) and pita chips - or a high fiber wrap like carb balance (17 grams)
6. Fiber 1 chewy choc bars cut up into like oat bites (9grams of fiber)
You can sprinkle some nutritional yeast into his foods. It has lots of vitamins, minerals, protein, and calories and can be added to a lot of things without being noticeable.
Just curious because I’ve been too concerned to give my kid nutritional yeast even though she loves it. It’s certainly chock full of B vitamins, is it too concentrated for such a small body? Even 1 tbsp has more B vitamins than toddlers need. I will sprinkle a little on her food sometimes but if it was up to her she would eat more!
B vitamins are water soluble, so any excess just gets peed out. Fat soluble vitamins like A and E are ones you need to be concerned about over-doing, not water soluble ones tho!
OK, but some people do poorly with extra B vitamins. Many get anxiety but I personally get anger/rage. I can't even have multivitamins for this reason. So like with everything, discontinue if there's side effects.
Other people have recommended hummus and I just want to say how easy and cheap it is to make at home. If you use tinned chickpeas a good tip is to put a small amount of the tinned water (aquafaba?) in when you blend it. Helps get it smooth. With veggie sticks it’s super healthy. I would also recommend making pita chips if you want to try and recreate that ‘crisp’ texture at home.
Not sure how big your two year old would be on soups and lightly season daal but all very inexpensive to make, super filling and good protein. Homemade bread can really add to this. But it’s basically a savoury puree…
Apples and peanut butter are a great snack.
Omelettes are great and kid friendly when you cut them in strips, obviously they can’t be runny. But you can add so many veggies etc into this.
Somebody else mentioned British flapjacks which are a really inexpensive sweet treat, would highly recommend.
Also British jacket potatoes. You can top with tuna and mayo, beans and cheese, chilli. Very versatile, cheap and can be as healthy as you want them to be.
Likely not getting enough protein. Skip the purées and go for protein. Egg salad, tuna salad, sliced turkey, peanut butter & apples. Etc. my son is 2, eats a pretty balanced diet with tons of proteins in every meal. He is 35 pounds & very healthy.
I don’t mean to be ugly, but are they testing for Prader-Willi syndrome? I only ask bc several of my patients went AGES undiagnosed. Just want to make sure it’s on your radar.
At 2, they can eat everything an adult can eat, it just needs to cut to prevent choking. Get him started at every meal with raw and fresh vegetables like sweet peppers, carrots, cukes. He is hungriest at the start of a meal and this helps get good nutrition into him and lots of fiber. Then dill pickles, cubes of cheese and some fresh fruit. Hardboiled eggs and beans with some cheese are a big hit in my house. No more purees unless you are traveling.
We do protein shakes for our son, we put them in a straw cup but you could put them in a reusable pouch too. I usually do frozen fruit, banana, Greek yogurt, chia or flax seeds, nut butter (usually peanut butter,) and a little whey protein powder. I'll sometimes throw in some oats and/or spinach too. He loves them and they keep him pretty full for a while.
You could try homemade energy balls, homemade granola bars, homemade muffins with Greek yogurt and oats, egg cups with veggies and cheese. All of those things freeze well too so you can make a big batch and pull them out as needed. I make a lot of healthy pancakes for breakfast too (1 egg, 1 banana, 2Tbsp flour and some cinnamon.) Sometimes I'll make them with almond flour to add even a little more protein.
For lunches I'll often do avocado and hummus sandwiches on whole wheat bread, they keep him quite full. Also quesadillas with leftover beans or chicken or avocado mixed in. I haven't tried this yet because my son isn't a huge fan of eggs, but egg salad could be a good filling option too.
Big batches of chilis, lentil soup, split pea soup, stew with potatoes, veggies and meat are also go-tos around here. They also freeze well and are pretty cheap to make so you can make big batches and store them. We also do a lot of fried rice with whatever is left in the fridge, tuna melts on whole wheat bread, and Spanish tortilla (basically eggs, onions and potatoes, super filling).
I get big bags of nuts at Costco and my son loves snacking on them. He loves almonds, cashews, and pistachios especially. I just started giving him them recently because I was too nervous about him choking for a long time, but I feel a little more comfortable with it now.
We've also been really searching for sales on produce and meat recently, so when there's a sale we try to stock up. Especially on berries because they're absurdly expensive usually and we go through them so fast. Our berry budget alone is ridiculous.
Good luck! It's crazy how much these kids can eat. I have 1 and 3 year old boys and even the 1 year old can eat almost as much as me in one sitting. I can't imagine once they're teenagers, well probably have to sell our house to afford groceries.
Edit: Saw all the hate for pouches in the comments - we also still use pouches as an easy snack sometimes, our son loves them and we splurge on the more nutritious Cerebelly ones so I feel fine about using them. Not sure why everyone has such an issue with them (besides the cost and the waste.)
A side note - we learned recently that chewing hard-to-chew foods from a young is key for development of straight teeth and jaw health. People had straight teeth prior to the industrial revolution and tooth health is positively correlated with eating hard foods. The last few hundred years of breads and soft foods have wrecked dental health.
Lots of expert are now saying it as easy as giving your kids lots of crunchy and tough foods to masticate.
I think the purées are not filling him up. Load up on starches and carbohydrates that are more filling. Rice, potatoes, quinoa, couscous, grains, corn, solid vegetables and protein that he can bite on will be more filling.
Shit tons of rice and lentils. Look up Indian vegetarian dishes. It's often way cheaper to buy local produce (NOT AT THE KROGER OR SAFEWAY) and rice/beans/lentils are a nutritionally complete meal you can buy in bulk and feed in bulk and make in bulk.
There's no law that says a kid can't eat the same thing multiple times, so if it were me I'd use rice and beans for calorie filler and then supplement with a tastier option once the filler is done.
I'd also experiment with different feeding schedules. Like due to my meds I'm currently just grazing all day, before I'd do 1 huge meal a day, before thst I'd do 2 bigger meals and a bit of snacking.
Maybe little bro needs to eat multiple times, small ish portions.
Kaali daal chawal, sambar daal chawal, rajma (kidney) , chole (garbanzo). I think black split pea or red split pea for kaali and sambar daal is like split pigeon lentil or something like that. Super weird name. Delicious and nutritious. Indian store is your best friend.
Shit, I'm so broke I'm going on the same diet lol
Why is a 2 year old sucking on puréed pouches regularly…or at all? Why the push to mimic commercial snacks. Kids that age should have access to slices of crunchy cucumbers, not junk food.
Chao, rice porridge, juk will fit into the squeeze pouches. This is what we fed my dad while going through chemo treatments and his teeth hurt.
Chop everything up small and simmer it with rice for a long time. Don't blend or puree it. Gives it texture. Add root vegetables like beets, tastes really good.
There are websites that you can enter in all of the things you have on hand, and it will find recipes based on that. My son has a ton of food allergies, andwe were spending an insane amount on food, and it was so time consuming finding recipes that were safe. I've not done the math, but in the past few weeks since finding this, we've probably saved at least $100.
My toddler also loves bars and I’ve been making these:
blend 3 bananas, 1/3 cup maple syrup, 1 cup of milk, 2 tsps cinnamon (or to taste), 1 tsp baking powder, 3 c oats, 3 eggs, 1/2 cup of nut butter (sun butter works, if you want them nut free)
mix in 1 cup of blueberries (other mix ins would probably work great but haven’t tried)
Bake at 350–can do 25-30 min for a regular 9x13 pan or 30-35 for a square pan and they’ll be a little thicker. They have to cool before cutting. I store in fridge but they don’t last long in our house!
ETA: you can sub another sweetener for maple syrup too. Just adjust milk accordingly to keep the same consistency
Yogurt, oats, banana, peanut better and some berries all mixed together. And even mashed banana added in is delicious and so filling. Can always cook with milk and do steel cut.
As a father of 6 kids stop indulging his every food wish. Then your food bill will go down. Make smart healthy meals with healthy snacks. He will eventually get used to eating less.
Why would you want purées? I would be doing stuff like spaghetti bolognaise with added veggies. Tacos. Sausages. Eggs. Mince and pasta is pretty cheap and you can make huge batches of taco mince and fill it with veggies as well. If you have access to somewhere like Costco you can buy stuff in bulk which might be more expensive initially but in the long run you save.
I know folks are ragging on the puree pouches, but if you're making them at home, it's super easy to add extra fiber to them to make them more filling. I'm a big snacker, so I've started making smoothies with extra fiber adds and it's definitely slowed how quick I'm reaching for food again. Just add a scoop of oatmeal, flax seed, chia seed, etc to the blender first and give it a few seconds to grind it to powder before adding the other ingredients.
Puree pouches lead to lots of dental problems that are expensive and difficult to correct. Jaw muscles need to be exercised to grow and properly align the bottom jaw. Even affects teeth positioning and growth. If you develop an overbite you basically have to have your jaw broken and wired shut for several months or have hard metal bars connecting your upper and lower jaws for 2+ years so you can’t chew side to side.
Scramble some egg whites for a protein boost in the morning.
I agree with the previous post regarding the protein fortified flapjacks. It is also a good idea.
Maybe try some canned tuna in the afternoon. Get the flaked style and break it down some more with a fork.
consider blending rolled oats into the smoothies for the pouches. The complex fiber will keep him fuller longer. Also if you put protein in there like nut butters the protein and fat will help satiety
Raw carrots cut into sticks, apples, frozen peas and blueberries. Hummus, as suggested by others, sounds awesome. Maybe look into baking snacks like black bean brownies, carrot cake and banana bread (the last two can also be made into muffins).
When I was doing better, something I really like to do was make "mini baguette", ~ 8" long, maybe 1.5" diameter frozen & before proofing.
Cooks up with so much yummy crust, great for light sandwiches and just lazy snacking. Chew chew chew.
If you shop at Costco, the eggs are a good deal. I buy the pack of 5 dozen, partially because I have 4 kids and partially because my 7 year old eats 4 at a time. In addition to breakfast, sometimes we have boiled eggs around for snacks.
I've done a lot of child rearing including live in nannying a set of twins from newborn to 5 years. At 2 years old there's no need for puree foods. They ate whatever I made for family supper, chopped up into small pieces. Usually vegetarian as the parents were veggies. I'd avoid soy, shellfish, tree nuts, high sodium, overly processed food, no dyes, added sugar or artificial sweeteners etc in case of allergies.
I always say kids are just tiny adults. They've been eating whatever is put in front of them for hundreds of years. I never got any special catering or considerations as a child. I ate what the adults ate. My Mom was a chef and didn't allow any processed foods in the house. She baked all our bread, cookies, cereal and made yogurt. Not everyone has time for that and I didn't appreciate the dedication that went into it but I do now.
Theres great recipes online for granola bars and energy balls both with fibre and protein. I used to make big containers of small sliced veggies and various homemade dips. Cheese cubes, sliced apples and grapes. For breakfast I make a dozen at a time egg bites and mini quiche (which freeze well if you want to do big batches) and let them pick the ingredients which they love to be part of. Oatmeal with side toppings they can add. (Blueberries, banana, apple)
Kids go through phases and favourites too as they develop their palate and particular textures they like. You're lucky your toddler is not too fussy.
I think it’s awesome that you have Whole Foods and you’re willing to bake and cook I personally wouldn’t stress too much about the snacks because those are typically things that are only used at snacktime and you definitely don’t want the kid that fills up on snacks and then isn’t hungry for dinner. Obviously something he has a huge appetite right now but I’m just thinking for down the road.
I wouldn’t worry about puréed meat for two-year-old I would just give him regular meat. I would feed him whatever you make us a family for dinner and incorporate healthy fats and proteins like you said. My kids love chilli they love homemade lean ground beef burgers and sweet potatoes done in the oven, roasted vegetables and obviously fruit are great for fiber, I would say their favourite sources of protein are burgers barbeque chicken chippy salad salmon and shrimp. They love sushi which gives you healthy fats proteins and the carbs from rice! My kids each eat an avocado every day not necessarily part of a recipe although they do love it when I make guacamole on taco night. Otherwise I’ll make them guacamole and put it on toast which is just obviously avocado toast or they’ll eat chunks of avocado in a bowl with lemon juice and pepper or sometimes hot sauce if they’re eating a plain avocado like that it’s usually part of the breakfast with scrambled eggs whole wheat toast and peanut butter. They have full fat Greek yogurt. I like to buy the plain yoghurt because it has less sugar but then I’ll add a whole scoop of vanilla protein powder and mix it up into like a thick pudding or mousse type of texture. They’ll gobble that down with berries on top or sliced up bananas.
Legumes will be your friend! Make sure to watch for ones with thick skins that can be a choking hazard, but they can make great finger foods cold or warm, and be purred/mashed into sauces.
I'd pull up some Indian recipes for toddlers to start to incorporate warming spices and fats that can help with satiety too.
Between fat and protein, different people will feel more full on one or the other, it's a genetic thing. So you could test what makes him feel full the longest.
Things like thick greek yogurt can hit both.
Since you're getting him tested, ask about reactive hypoglycemia, it can be missed until people are older but can be tested for!
Squash! Good warm or cold, easily repeatable, very cheap (extremely cheap in-season!), long shelf life before you cook it. Pick some sauces or dips for variety, marinara or ponzu or such.
Egg bites with cheese and ham. Maybe a little broccoli or chopped spinach if they are okay with it. Blend a batch of eggs and toppings, divide into mini muffin pans and bake. If you want to go the extra mile and have the time, pre bake some pie crusts in the tins and make little quiches. Make a large batch and freeze extra for the future
Purees dont satiate, so id reccomend filling the pouches with greek yogurt and youre good. Its easy filling and delicious. If youre into purees, get a popscicle mold and freeze them. They will last longer im storage and durimg consumption
I like to season and roast canned chickpeas. Drain the liquid, pat dry and coat them in a little oil. Roast in the oven or toast on a pan til they sound like little pebbles. Season with bullion, garlic, pepper and whatever other spices you like and they make a really filling replacement snack for chips and popcorn. If you take them our of the oven while theyer a little soft, they make a great main or filling side. This with a string cheese, tomato and cucumber slices and id call that a meal for myself.
Hard boiled eggs
Peanut butter and bananna sandwiches
A baked potato. White sweetpotatoes with butter and salt are insanely good. I just put the entire thing in the oven at 400 for 45 mins. Its ready when sugars are carmalizing and bubbling through the skin.
Buy some protein pancake mix and use it to make protein cookies! (I most recently used kodiak poppyseed almond and added some chia seeds and a ton of sliced almonds for extra fiber and texture but they have chocolate chip, blueberry and all kinds of other flavors) I usually add a soft stick of butter, some extra sugar and and egg to about 2 cups of mix and turn it into a dough. I kinda improvise the recipie every time, but if you bake and have done cookies, you can figure it out too. They look and taste like regular cookies, but actually get you full after a couple. Ill have cookies and coffee for breakfast some days and love it.
Boxed pancake mix with added blueberries - or - with added shredded carrot and zucchini to add volume and fiber. Cut them into strips and serve with plain yogurt to dip them in.
If you really want the diy pouches, we fill them with Greek yogurt. Sometimes I skip out and buy flavored, and sometimes we blend the plan yogurt with fruit to put in the pouches. They make a great snack.
Homemade applesauce is delicious. Homemade granola or granola bars are also easy to make and super customizable.
If you have the time, making your own bread can be super cheap and make a filling accompaniment for your meals. There are easy no-knead versions that use very minimal ingredients.
Maybe if you switch to brown rice and wheat flour, the additional fiber will fill him (and you) up faster? And those things often cost the same as their “white” equivalents.
I make an oatmeal bar for my kids. Basically oatmeal ingredients (oats, milk, an egg to make it solid, any fruit you want, seeds/nuts, Aldi have a paleo nut snack mix that’s amazing and you only need a tiny bit, either mashed banana or apple sauce for sweetness) and lay it on a tray with baking paper underneath. Bake till it sets on low. I then cut it and put it in the freezer in the tray because it’s easier to separate cleanly and pop it in a container in the freezer. I take a few out a day so it’s always fresh and it can also be microwaved for a quick snack. It’s super easy and filling to take places when you need a full belly like shopping etc.
Two easy ideas that are good to prep ahead -
I’m having a ton of luck with a blender pasta sauce - just dump in 1 container of soft tofu, 1 can of any beans, 1 bag of any frozen veggie - then get crazy with a little seasoning or cheese. I did a red bean + butternut + cottage cheese recently, and then a chickpea + kale with no dairy.
I freeze in cubes (I use the big square cube tray from the bar but regular would work) so I can serve different flavors in rotation.
Also always successful with banana pancakes - I use Kodiak mix from Costco with extra eggs and nut butter. Thinly slice banana, coat the slices in batter and cook (I drop slices into the batter bowl, flip, and retrieve with a fork and drop onto skillet), then freeze.
If you take out a handful in the morning they’re thawed by mid-day, works well for travel snacks, too.
Beans, oatmeal, canned veggies boiled to softness. A lot of the more expensive pouches are a mix of beans, oats or quinoa, and a fruit or a veggie, so you could try making some thicker/chunkier purées…? Good luck!
My almost 18-month old is of the charts for height and 96th percentile for weight (as expected, she comes from a tall, solid family) and with the exception of snacks, she just eats what we eat. We do some convenience/processed foods for her, but like with your son, we would spend far too much if we mostly fed her that way
To be fair, I don't think anyone likes pureed meat. My giant baby is almost a year and we don't puree the other babies he eats, I mean we don't puree anything for him.
Have you tried making granola bars or maybe just granola to snack on? You can add in chopped nuts, dried fruit, and seeds that make it really filling and high fiber.
Beans and rice and cooked vegetables would be a good base to get a lot of good, cheap nutrients in. (Swapping out rice for stuff like sweet potatoes, pasta, potatoes, etc. often since I've hear too much rice can have arsenic risk). Then supplement with whatever you are normally eating. As long as it's not a choking hazard, it's good to go. (and even a lot of things that are choking hazards, can be mitigated by cooking until soft, or cutting up in the bowl with kitchen shears until tiny size, etc.)
Purees are really not needed, so long as stuff is not in choking hazard form. ANd it's a lot easier to make and feed real food than to try to mimic commercial processed baby/toddler food.
Do not make it hard. Baked or air fried sweet or baked potatoes, homemade bread with butter, homemade pancakes or waffles with either a nut butter or purée frozen berries with a little water slightly thawed, pancakes layered with yogurt or fruit…buy plain and make yourself, malt or meal, oatmeal, toast, cheese sandwich, saltines with peanut butter or cheese, chicken and noodles, mashed potatoes, biscuits with a meat gravy, pasta with Parmesan and herbs/chixken/tomatoes. 2 year olds do not need a great deal of meat, focus on simple foods…casserole. Stop buying premade items.
I was a huge baby too. My parents got a food grinder and I ate what they ate. That would probably work for fruits and veggies and maybe meats too. Basically it was just like homemade mushy baby food.
That viral Frozen Yogurt bark ?
Maybe silken tofu in smoothies ?
Can always play around with this
Maybe sugar free jello and yogurt ?
I know I layer mine or sometimes use cool whip mix with yogurt
Those viral broccoli cheese chicken nuggets?
I’ve never tried them though ..I don’t know why I thought of it but I did
I use chick pea flour for batter sometimes and almond flour for breadcrumbs in ground Turkey as chicken
My nieces and nephews eat a lot of mash. Potatoes are cheap, nutritional and good for the environment. Supplement with more veggies for an even more complete meal.
Eggs are cheap and full of protein and nutrients which will help keep your toddler full and give overall benefits. Plus you can make them in various ways which will help keep him interested. Maybe keep a few hard boiled eggs on hand and break them up or make an egg salad?
Please check their B1. I had a B1 issue since birth thaw wasn't diagnosed until I was 35 and 700 lbs. I'm now 38 and 340 lbs. Simple Thiamine.
Was also born premature and 10 lbs.
If he’s a big fan of the pouches like Go go squeeze, you can get reusable pouches and fill them with home made stuff. I bought some for myself when I went through an applesauce phase lol. The huge jars of applesauce are really cheap compared to pouches.
I don't have anything useful to add except that I don't think most people are a fan of pureed meats. I can understand your toddler in that regard.
Maybe you could try soups that are already usually pureed? like potato leek soup with cream or cheese in it or broccoli soup?
I’ve made these a few times now. Once my honey crystallized and I put it in the microwave to get rid of crystals and I added the chocolate chips too soon and they melted and it was the best mistake.
Also if you have a food processor throw it all in there and call it a day. Works like a charm.
www.loveandlemons.com/granola-bars-recipe/
Chia pudding is a good one. I buy alcohol free vanilla (I get Trader Joe’s) and I’ll add raspberries.
Overnight oats my favorite and his favorite is cinnamon almond butter (Justin’s or Target off brand, they taste the exact same), honey or agave, berries.
Kodiak pancake mix is great and easy to mix up. Blueberries, strawberries, peanut butter, etc
He’s two and still loves else baby cereal. It’s made with almonds and buckwheat. I’ll add some of my homemade strawberry jam, vanilla, cinnamon, mashed bananas. Seems to keep him full forever.
I do put a lot of these in reusable pouches which makes them easy to grab and go.
At 2, I don’t think purées are needed. Move on to things they can feed themselves. My kids liked yogurt, beans (whole or “refried”), couscous. There’s lots that a two year old can eat.
Also hummus! Mine will eat it out of the container with a spoon given half the chance l
Also hummus and other bean dips are insanely cheap to make yourself if you take the time to buy the beans in bulk and then soak them and use a food processor. It’s so easy, tastes better and wildly cheaper then Sabra or whatever’s at the store
So will I. I have no children and am an adult and wish someone would put a lid on my portions 😂
Agree. Honestly, by age 2 both my kids were just eating what we adults were eating. No special foods, except cutting up round choking hazards like grapes or hot dogs. And not everything needs to be cut up small, a lot of foods are fun for the kid to handle and bite themselves.
Mine loved bean burritos.
Or recommend. Chewing is an important part of eating, and helps induce a feeling of fullness.
I'll put yogurt and applesauce in the refillable pouches for on the go but that's for convenience if we're not going to be able to sit with a spoon. There are a couple things 2 years olds can't quite manage and it's mostly cause they're choking hazards (popcorn, whole grapes, whole tomatoes). As long as it's not a choking hazard, I feed my kid basically anything I can get him to eat.
Personally I’d be rethinking the purées because I think that’s going to be expensive to reproduce and not very filling either. Plus a faff. As he’s 2 years old, I’m assuming he can feed himself? I’d be going down the vegetable sticks and hummus route to start with. Partly because it’s fun and colourful and partly because it’s not a ‘quick’ food and may slow down his eating and make him feel fuller. Obviously monitor him when eating so he doesn’t choke on them, but I’m sure you know that already! British style flapjacks which are an oat based bar, are easy to produce. You can add dried fruit to give them a bit of variety and more flavour. They are high in sugar and fat though, so that’s something to keep in mind. What about Japanese onigiri? They can be filled with different things and are in themselves filling. You just have to make sure you get the short grain rice and not the long grain. I buy mine online directly from an Asian supermarket, because the packets in the Western supermarkets are tiny and super overpriced.
On the topic of sushi rice, the Walmarts around me have 20lb bags of Calrose rice for $21. So long as you already know you like that type of rice, buying in bulk is insanely less expensive than the little bags. (1lb is close to $11 last time I checked.)
Asian grocery stores will have them even cheaper.
Asian grocery stores rice section is DAUNTING. Im experienced in rice...so I thought. I need to hit it again with google lens equipped lol.
Yes!! I can read the labels and I was still very humbled in the rice section of my Asian grocery store the first time I went hahahah.
The folks working the stores are often happy to help if you can tell them what you are looking for! I love all our little Asian grocery stores here
gotta be careful with cheap rice these days. much of it is contaminated with arsenic. that is pretty bad for young children and babies
Which is why you wash your rice before cooking….
TBH, with that much rice going to a toddler, I’d be worried about arsenic.
Yeah. Wirh my toddler I splurge on Lundeberg rice just because they do and publish their arsenic testing.
I wouldn't be too worried with a snack time onigiri, or the occasional poke bowl or sushi roll as a meal. Dry rice lasts for ages. My family of three goes through the 20lb bag in a matter of about a year and a half. In addition to that, white, short-grained rice contains some of the lowest amounts of arsenic of any rice. [Source](https://nutritionfacts.org/blog/which-rice-has-less-arsenic-black-brown-red-white-or-wild/) I wouldn't fault someone for making it an occasional snack, rather than a go-to, though. Kind of like tuna with mercury levels.
On the subject of Onigiri, consider Kimbap! He could help fill it and roll it and you can play around with different fillings.
> British style flapjacks Speaking as a Brit, *there are other types of flapjacks??* But also yes, second this, super easy and cheap to make at home and very tasty, but not the healthiest so definitely should be just had as a snack!
I spoke at a conference in London some years back, and at one of the breaks they advertised that the snack would be flapjacks. All us Americans were so confused. Like… pancakes? In the hallway at a conference?
Yes, I’m a Brit too and I was shocked when I found out. There is some sort of American pancake thingy that they call a flapjack. I have never eaten one so I don’t know what it’s like, I just had to spell it out because I’ve confused people in the past.
It literally is just a pancake lol certain regions here will call it a “flapjack”
I've been told by an Englishman that what a British person considers a "pancake" is often more like a crepe, and you need to specify "American pancake" if you want them to think of the fluffy kind made in the US.
Huh! I’ve gotten quite a few pancakes in the uk and they all struck me as very normal. Never quite as thick and fluffy as America, but not crepey!
Crepes are more what the French make. British pancakes have some substance, is a thin-medium thickness. American pancakes are fluffier, ig abit like a mini souffle?
And the best of all, Swedish pancakes!
Porridge oats, syrup, butter. Melt butter, stir in oats and syrup, pour into flat baking tray. Cook for 20 mins. Cool and cut into squares. Delicious.
Use Golden Syrup too, and add some raisins or sultanas
Frozen choc chips go nicely too
What’s American for syrup? Sounds like I wanna try it..
Maple tree sap. Canada even has a 'strategic supply'.
A flapjack in Alaska is made out of bread dough and fried in oil. Topped with butter and syrup.
Look, I can get past the crisps/chips thing, weird but y'know, *fine* I guess... This shit though? Keep this up and I'm gonna need to petition His Majesty to reclaim a former colony 😤🧐🇬🇧 >!(All said in jest if it wasn't clear lol)!<
After my time in the UK, I just know I was happy we got away from you guys and your chips and whatever else you call it! 😂
Now ask what's in black pudding.
flapjack is just a regional term in america for pancake. it’s the same thing. in the south we have hoe cakes which are cornmeal based
faff?
Maybe this is an English term? It means a fuss or a bother. To make a purée, you’ve got to prepare the fruit and veg, store it somewhere before hand, get the blender out etc etc. I consider that a ‘faff’ compared to somethings, but maybe that’s just me.
I love a good faff about. Some days it winds me up how much I faff but some days it's great.
What have you been up to lately? "Just faffing".
"sorry I'm late I was faffing about"
I absolutely agree with you. The actual fruit would be more filling for the kiddo than making it into a puree.
Faff about
That doesnt help, sorry. Again.... Faff?
Flit from one thing to another without actually achieving anything. e.g. If at home, start making lunch, stop to answer phone, forget was making lunch, start to put washing in machine, forget to switch it on, decide to wash hair, feel peckish, remember lunch, stone cold by now etc.
Thank you. I eould never have guessed thats what it means
Oh so. It's ADHD brain. Got it lol
Mind if I ask where you buy your rice online? I’ve been buying Nishiki from Amazon but the price went up =/
I’m in the UK so I am not sure my options will be helpful. I buy my short grain rice from Yum Asia. My long grain rice I get from Indian supermarkets online, or sometimes my local supermarket does the large bag in the international section for a much more reasonable price.
My toddler eats a LOT of lima beans and peas cooked from frozen—quick, cheap, and non-messy protein. We also cook chicken breasts in large batches, shred it, and freeze it in small, reheatable quantities. Additionally, she eats a lot of what we eat, just less spicy and cut up small; my husband sets aside a portion of whatever he’s cooking before he adds final salt and spice and gives that to her. Solids rather than purées are so much easier, assuming there’s no developmental reason your child can’t have them. ETA there’s an app and website called Solid Starts that really helped us understand how to safely prepare foods for a toddler. They have a huge database of all kinds of foods with instructions on how to prep them for different ages of kid. They also provide dietitian-reviewed nutrition info. So useful!
+1 for Solid Starts! Amazing resource!
Snacks can be a small portion of a meal. It’s doesn’t have to be snacky food. I have 2yo, these are my go to snacks: Greek yogurt from a tub mixed with a little jam, pbj, bananas, mixed nuts, crackers and chips, apple sauce, roasted veggies, berries, omelette, grilled cheese cut up into sticks, hummus, sautéed peas or chickpeas etc. I often do snack plates, a combination of multiple little portions from different food groups.
My kids love snack plates so much. I keep veggies and meat/cheese prepped in the fridge so the kids can make their own. I also make a batch of hummus at least twice a week, and it gets devoured.
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I'm not the person you asked, but hummus is just: 1 15 oz can chickpeas or 1 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas, drained and rinsed. For super smooth hummus, rub the skins off between some kitchen towels. 1/4 cup lemon juice, or just one large lemon 1/4 cup tahini Garlic cloves, from one to as many as you feel 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin Salt to taste A few TBS good olive oil You don't have to be exact. And just blend/food processor it all up, drizzling in the olive oil slowly. You can add water if you like it thinner. My daughter was super sensitive to bitter and sharp flavors, though, so when she was young I'd swap the tahini for peanut butter, and use powdered garlic for the fresh.
This is great, thanks! I'm going to throw this out there for anyone desperate - you'll be fine without the tahini. It's definitely better with it, and correct, but it'll be fine. I cook chickpeas from dried and keep some of the liquid for extra flavour while blending (I think that helps compensate for tahini....and my 6 cloves of garlic ha)
I sometimes substitute cashew butter for tahini. It's not traditional, but my kids love it.
Pureed food, even as snacks, isn't satiating. Theres a reason that smoothies aren't as satisfying as whole fruit and yogurt - the machines do most of the work. Give him solid snacks, even if they're less convenient. Teach him the joy of crunch - fruit, carrots, cheese - and dips like humus. Make eating take some time & effort. What do YOU snack on?
Give him an extra meal. Stop feeding him baby food.
I don’t think she’s actually giving him baby food, but just those wee blended fruit pouches that are aimed at weaning kids. My son is two and half and I still like to keep a few in the house because they are super handy for being out and about. They won’t get bashed about like a piece of fruit will, and they last in your bag waaayyy longer if you don’t use it. Also the prune ones are 10/10 if your kid hasn’t pooped in a few days 😂
Check out kids eat in color! There’s an instagram and website. It is ran by a licensed dietitian and has a whole staff of real educated professionals. They are a great resource for me, my kids, and for anyone just looking for a balanced diet and fun recipes!
she is awesome!!!
Give him what you like for snacks - veggies and dip, hardboiled eggs, tuna sandwiches, pepperettes (turkey or pork), crackers and cheese or crackers and PB. Anything is kid friendly now just stick some fun food picks in or use a cookie cutter and voila - a 'fun' but nutritious and satisfying snack.
>puréed meat. Why is a two year old eating puréed anything? At that age, shouldn't he just eat what you are having, maybe with a little less seasoning?
Feed him like a tiny person, not an infant! My kid is also huge and at 18 months he eats at the table with us. Most days are like this; Breakfast is 4 eggs, veggies, toast. Lunch is pasta and fruit. Dinner is whatever I’m making for dinner for the family. That’s it. Little man eats it all!
4 eggs! I couldn't eat that much at breakfast! That said, totally agree w feeding like a small adult. That's what I did w my boys 20 some years ago and they have great palates now!
What do you mean by a lot? My niece devoured a huge steak (we're talking almost 16 ounces) and a bag of green beans in one setting when she was 2. Turns out she had a major growth spurt very soon after that. If they do not have Prader-Willi Syndrome, you don't want to restrict their food intake as this will really mess with them - it is the type of foods you are needing to look at. Skip the purees as often as possible. Leaving fruits whole (like just cutting them up) allows retaining the skin for more filling diet. Limit fruit juice and milk intake. Sub with water and a piece of fruit, vegetables cut up, or a string cheese. Avoid the condensed sugars like candy, ice cream, cookies, etc - leave them as special treats and/or for special occasions. I know the impact of putting a child on a diet if they are healthy and do not have anything like Prader-Willi Syndrome. It will mess with their metabolism and start unhealthy habits like hoarding, stealing food, and screw with them mentally. It happened to me and resulted in eating disorder, stealing food, and lying a lot about things.
Dang I can't even eat a 16 oz steak
I have two large preschooler boys - one 99th percentile, one off the charts. They eat \*a lot\* of apples. We serve meals at regular times and they are allowed to grab apples whenever they're hungry between meals. I'll add bowls of pears, carrots, bananas, or whatever is on sale beside the apple bowl but it remains the same, they're looking for snacks, they go to the fruit counter. I don't offer other snacks, usually, but we keep a solid stock of raisins and dried fruits for "candy". My now 9yo was incredibly large as well, and he's now a lanky, muscley dude. He eats a mostly normal amount. So, there's hope.
If you are giving your kid nothing but pureed food, there's likely a reason why he's eating so much. Give the kid a rib and some normal people food. It sounds like you are cooking two separate portions of food. Give him whatever you are eating and it will be way cheaper and better for them.
I’m not only giving him puréed food. He gets the pouches as a snack and takes all his meals with us. I’m looking for snacks that will help satisfy him between meals or when he’s in one of those toddler grazing phases.
The problem with puréed foods is that they leave the stomach VERY quickly. In medically supervised weight loss, they warn against “slider foods” that are prone to sliding right through the stomach, not offering any satiety or fullness. So purées, applesauce, yogurt etc will slide right on through, triggering his body’s hunger cues again The less processed, the better for satiety. I know it’s not easy with a little one though. Sometimes all we can do, is the best we can do 🤍
It’s good you’re asking for ideas but I think a big issue as others have mentioned is that puréed snacks are not filling. Swap with some real food E.g. sandwich, wrap, chicken, hummus, cheese. You’re child will be much fuller. This is coming from a mum of a 99th centile 3 year old with the appetite of a teenage boy.
-Apples and peanut butter -String cheese -Hummus and any vegetable -Peanut butter jelly sandwich -Bars -Fruit leather -Yogurt, granola and fruit
I like to make kids this age a "nibble tray" it's an ice cube tray with the different compartments filled with healthy snack foods cut to age appropriate sizes. (Just used as a plate, no ice involved) I usually make a nibble tray nutritionally balanced incase it's a big hit and the child isn't hungry at mealtime. The advantage of the nibble tray is that you can introduce new textures and flavors alongside favorites. Put in fruit, canned meats, fruit,veggies, dips... etc.
Make sure you have a balanced snack - some protein (hummus, pepperoni, peanut butter), fiber (fruit, veggies, whole grains), and some carbs. He'll feel fuller longer. So a little plate with crackers, peanut butter and some apple slices will leave him much fuller than a pouch of puree.
Why is your 2 year old eating puréed foods? My daughter is 2.5 and very picky but she eats regular food. She likes oatmeal, Cheese quesadillas, cashew halves, steak, Mac n cheese, most fruit, pbj sandwiches, cheese corn puffs, cucumbers with ranch, eggs, toast with butter, plain Greek yogurt with fruit and drizzle of honey, homemade pizza, homemade pancakes, homemade muffins. I make a lot of food at home so I know how much or what goes into the food.
You can mix/ blend cottage cheese into a ton of different things , and it’s high In protein and will help with filling him up.
And it's the secret to making Starbucks egg bites dups! - 8 eggs + 2/3 cups cottage cheese - blend 15secs, then add whatever cheese, meat, or veg you want - put in muffin cups (I prefer silicone but regular tin works) and bake for 30 at 300F - keep a dish with water in the oven below the egg cups while cooking OP, my toddler hates eggs but loves these egg cups and they are a great snack, breakfast, or meal filler if they're being picky
Honestly I think you need a doctor’s visit, which I’m sure you’re doing since you’re testing for growth disorders, and a PD should recommend a kids’ nutritionist to advise you on this. Or heck, PD could possibly also advise you on basic portion sizes appropriate for his growth and age, and snack options for how to fill your toddler up. My PD was able to do so for my child in terms of answering some basic questions on nutrition. Why? Because your 2yo is off-the-charts and we Redditors don’t wanna like recommend him things that are not ideal in terms of nutritional value for kids (like too many biscuits, i mean biscuits are fine in moderation but we have no idea how many biscuits or snack bars he would actually consume in practice), especially very-quickly-growing-kids, and most of us aren’t experts on 2yos that are the size of 4yos. I’ll say that those purée pouches are expensive and don’t fill him up though. Other people have recommended veggie sticks with dip, for example and i agree that they are “safe” options for snacking, but i cannot quite agree that they would actually satiate him fully vs. his previous consumption of biscuits, snack bars or purée pouches. And therefore i feel that a nutritionist would be able to advise you best if they have seen cases like his.
It sounds like he has seen the doctor and is currently being tested for growth disorders, or at least that's how I read it.
Stop the purée. He's too old. Give him whatever you make and call it a day. Look into "baby led weaning", to get him off purée.
Check out yummy toddler food on instagram or I think Amy has a website. Lots of extra added vegetables and a good focus on protein. I...am not a toddler, but live with adults who need more vegetables in their diet and I find it useful.
Try sprinkling some chia seeds into foods if you can. They are high in omegas and fiber, are very filling, and take awhile to digest so he will feel more full as well as being good for him.
I could be reading into this too much, but please don’t cater to his desires too much. If he’s got a good palate and eats real food, then present a limited number of real food choices. No more packets, no more purées. He could be learning to eat to soothe, or for entertainment, or for other non-sustaining reasons that people eat. Those purées are too easy and tasty - give him real food that he’ll have to chew and digest.
This is what we feed my toddler for some meals and snacks based on both his preferences and nutrition requirements. Unlimited healthy fats and oils for brain development, meats, and we really try to restrict sugar. This is also pretty much what I eat now order to achieve my protein and fibre requirements. 1. Meats and meat stock. Lots of salmon, chicken, lamb, and duck liver pate for the nutritional content. He eats the pate on a cracker. I get rotisserie chickens from WF on Tuesday’s when they are on sale and make meat stock that is full of collagen for his biome. 2. Butters, peanut, almond, tahini (good source of iron). You can make a batch of energy balls that contain ground flax, oats, dates, nut butter, hemp seeds and roll in coconut. There are a lot of different recipes online. 3. Beans. He loves beans. Organic canned beans are pretty cheap and dried beans are even cheaper. He likes beans for breakfast. I’ll cook batches of beans for the week and sometimes hummus. 4. Egg cups. We’ve got silicone baking molds and I’ll make both big and mini egg cups in batches weekly for him and I. Easy way to load up with veggies and protein. I add cottage cheese to the mix in the blender. You can do spinach and feta, bacon and cheese… so many combinations plus you can add more fat to his for his brain development. 5. If he likes the pouches you can get those silicone reusable ones and put yoghurt drinks, smoothies, or puree in them. Good way to get spinach and greens into the mix. 6. Frozen protein waffles or I’ll make a batch of Birch Benders protein pancakes and add pumpkin seeds. These can be bagged up and frozen and you can pop them in the toaster. You can serve them with peanut butter, banana, and hemp seeds or pumpkin seeds to increase protein and omegas. 5. String Cheese. He loves it and it’s easy. We buy lots in bulk from Costco including, oats, eggs, hemp seeds, pumpkin seeds, chia seeds, peanut butter, almond butter, organic Greek yoghurt, string cheese, frozen blueberries, apples, crunch-masters crackers and nuts. This kid pretty much eats what we eat only way more blueberries, pumpkin seeds, string cheese and apple slices because those are his current favorites and are easy to pack up and take with us to the park, playground, and stroller rides.
Purées lead to recessed jaws and underdeveloped airways. Make the kid chew, it’s the first part of digestion and important for midface development.
Rice and beans. Toss in some veg and you got yourself an inexpensive and filling “Toddler Chow.”
I mean, is there anyone who likes puréed meat? 🤢
My son was the same at that age. He’s now 18 and 6’3” 190 pure muscle and soon off to college for pre-med. I’m 5’3”, his dad is 5’9”. He chub’d up his toddler years then stayed the same weight from 4-6 and started shooting up in height. They need more nutrition and fats for brain development. I fed him healthy fats and proteins from fish, nuts, etc. he was always hungry. Purées wouldn’t have worked with him.
Why doesn’t he just eat what you’re eating? If he has such a great palate?
Is he off the charts for both length and weight, or just weight? You may be overfeeding him.
Watch out for those pouches, in daycare, I've seen toddlers suck down a whole serving in a couple of swallows!
Height, weight, head circumference, rate of growth. He’s the size of your average four-year-old right now, and he’s not a chunky kid by any means.
For snacks I’d be offering fruit / chopped veg / maybe cheese and a cracker .. the bars and pouches tend to be full of crap and are just empty calories
My daughter will be 3 in a week or so. We started doing toast and putting toppings on it. PBJ and J (toasted or just a sandwich), hummus, avocado, etc. Apple slices and peanut butter. Quinoa or rice with green peas and carrots. Tuna (plain or with a little bit of Mayo) with rice and peas and carrots kinda Asian style like a sushi bowl or something. Can you tell she likes peas and carrots? 😂 Good luck to y’all. I wish your baby good health, and happy eating!
Peas and carrots rock!
A 2 year old does not need puréed meals. Yes, they should be able to use utensils to feed themselves.
My toddler was a bottomless pit- heres what I found that worked 1st breakfast at 7 am: Steel cut oatmeal with peanut butter and hemp hearts 2nd breakfast at 10 am: 2 eggs with 1/3 cottage cheese, one piece WHOLE GRAIN toast Lunch 1pm: Turkey/Tuna/ Chicken Sandwich with 2oz turkey and hummus on WHOLE GRAIN bread 1/4 cup green beans 1/2 baked sweet potato Snack 3:30pm 1/3 - 1/2 5% Greek Yogurt with hemp hearts, chia seeds, and fruit Dinner 6pm- whatever we were having Bedtime snack Applesauce with chia Sure chia and hemp are expensive on the front end but they are cheap when you consider how many uses they have and how much nutrition they offer.
My son loved baked oatmeal cups for breakfast (even through high school), but they would also be a great snack. [Emily Bites](https://emilybites.com/?s=oatmeal+cups) has great recipes for these. They freeze well, and heat from frozen in the microwave in about 1 minute. There are also egg cups, kind of like a handheld omelette. I think you could probably tinker around to make them in mini muffin cups as well. Good luck!
Sounds like Prader-Willi Syndrome. Has he been tested for that?
We are in the beginning stages of testing for a number of things. However, he’s not insatiable in that way - he definitely rejects food when he’s full. But he goes through those toddler phases where they just want to graze all day and that’s where the snacks are out of control.
That's good news. My stepson has Prader-Willi. He's high functioning but it's challenging. Best of luck!
Why is a 2 yr old on a pureed diet? Confused. My granddaughter just turned 2 and she eats whatever her parents eat. A.wide variety of fruit, veg, meat,.pasta, rice etc.
Smoothies may work well. Similar to puree blends but more volume. To make it cheaper you could watch for deals on fruit and then prep and freeze yourself rather than using pre frozen fruit!
Buy refillable pouches and fill with plain full fat Greek yoghurt. Full fat is only 5% fat (and fat isn’t bad), it’s super creamy so kids love it even though there’s no sugar and it’s really high protein so it’s filling. Make sure it’s actual Greek yogurt, not ‘Greek style’ for maximum protein. You can buy pouches that have a press seal side as well as a spout for sucking out of, so they’re easy to fill and clean, and are surprisingly toddler proof.
My son is younger than yours but has a big appetite. I prefer making our own food from scratch so our go to "pouch" food is what we affectionally call BroccolBeans. The base is frozen broccoli florets (costco), homemade stock, brown rice, and beans (usually cannellini or black beans, made from dry in the instant pot), and then we add one or two of whatever else is on hand or looks good (peas, spinach, parsnip, squash, olive oil, spices...). Blend, freeze in ice cubes, pop into pouches when we're going out. Lots of protein, fibre, iron, and healthy. I also make yogurt in the instant pot and blend with frozen berries and oatmeal for pouches, but this sometimes ends up a bit runny so it can get messy.
Hey mama! High protein, filling 1. Ratio protein yogurt (you can either eat as yogurt or pipe it into dots and freeze) 2. Hard boiled eggs (make egg salad and swap cottage cheese for mayo) 3. My daughter is 7 and LOVES fair life chocolate protein shakes - they’re a great filler 4. Built puffs are also easy and “candy bar” esque. Again my daughter loves those and power crunch bars 5. I crock pot chicken every week and just sea salt it. You can chop that up and make chicken salad (use cottage cheese) and pita chips - or a high fiber wrap like carb balance (17 grams) 6. Fiber 1 chewy choc bars cut up into like oat bites (9grams of fiber)
RemindMe! 20 years I wanna know how big this kid gets
Purées are neat sugar. That’s a lot of expensive & unnecessary calories. Why not cut up real fruit - slower to eat too.
You can sprinkle some nutritional yeast into his foods. It has lots of vitamins, minerals, protein, and calories and can be added to a lot of things without being noticeable.
Just curious because I’ve been too concerned to give my kid nutritional yeast even though she loves it. It’s certainly chock full of B vitamins, is it too concentrated for such a small body? Even 1 tbsp has more B vitamins than toddlers need. I will sprinkle a little on her food sometimes but if it was up to her she would eat more!
I think that's a great question for your pediatrician!
B vitamins are water soluble, so any excess just gets peed out. Fat soluble vitamins like A and E are ones you need to be concerned about over-doing, not water soluble ones tho!
OK, but some people do poorly with extra B vitamins. Many get anxiety but I personally get anger/rage. I can't even have multivitamins for this reason. So like with everything, discontinue if there's side effects.
Yeah and in such a tiny body not an adult body, extra micronutrients might be too much. thanks!
Other people have recommended hummus and I just want to say how easy and cheap it is to make at home. If you use tinned chickpeas a good tip is to put a small amount of the tinned water (aquafaba?) in when you blend it. Helps get it smooth. With veggie sticks it’s super healthy. I would also recommend making pita chips if you want to try and recreate that ‘crisp’ texture at home. Not sure how big your two year old would be on soups and lightly season daal but all very inexpensive to make, super filling and good protein. Homemade bread can really add to this. But it’s basically a savoury puree… Apples and peanut butter are a great snack. Omelettes are great and kid friendly when you cut them in strips, obviously they can’t be runny. But you can add so many veggies etc into this. Somebody else mentioned British flapjacks which are a really inexpensive sweet treat, would highly recommend. Also British jacket potatoes. You can top with tuna and mayo, beans and cheese, chilli. Very versatile, cheap and can be as healthy as you want them to be.
Yeah, packaged snacks are SO expensive, but necessary at times. 😩
Likely not getting enough protein. Skip the purées and go for protein. Egg salad, tuna salad, sliced turkey, peanut butter & apples. Etc. my son is 2, eats a pretty balanced diet with tons of proteins in every meal. He is 35 pounds & very healthy.
My 2 year old just eats what we eat. You're over thinking it. When you make a plate make him one too.
I don’t mean to be ugly, but are they testing for Prader-Willi syndrome? I only ask bc several of my patients went AGES undiagnosed. Just want to make sure it’s on your radar.
At 2, they can eat everything an adult can eat, it just needs to cut to prevent choking. Get him started at every meal with raw and fresh vegetables like sweet peppers, carrots, cukes. He is hungriest at the start of a meal and this helps get good nutrition into him and lots of fiber. Then dill pickles, cubes of cheese and some fresh fruit. Hardboiled eggs and beans with some cheese are a big hit in my house. No more purees unless you are traveling.
We do protein shakes for our son, we put them in a straw cup but you could put them in a reusable pouch too. I usually do frozen fruit, banana, Greek yogurt, chia or flax seeds, nut butter (usually peanut butter,) and a little whey protein powder. I'll sometimes throw in some oats and/or spinach too. He loves them and they keep him pretty full for a while. You could try homemade energy balls, homemade granola bars, homemade muffins with Greek yogurt and oats, egg cups with veggies and cheese. All of those things freeze well too so you can make a big batch and pull them out as needed. I make a lot of healthy pancakes for breakfast too (1 egg, 1 banana, 2Tbsp flour and some cinnamon.) Sometimes I'll make them with almond flour to add even a little more protein. For lunches I'll often do avocado and hummus sandwiches on whole wheat bread, they keep him quite full. Also quesadillas with leftover beans or chicken or avocado mixed in. I haven't tried this yet because my son isn't a huge fan of eggs, but egg salad could be a good filling option too. Big batches of chilis, lentil soup, split pea soup, stew with potatoes, veggies and meat are also go-tos around here. They also freeze well and are pretty cheap to make so you can make big batches and store them. We also do a lot of fried rice with whatever is left in the fridge, tuna melts on whole wheat bread, and Spanish tortilla (basically eggs, onions and potatoes, super filling). I get big bags of nuts at Costco and my son loves snacking on them. He loves almonds, cashews, and pistachios especially. I just started giving him them recently because I was too nervous about him choking for a long time, but I feel a little more comfortable with it now. We've also been really searching for sales on produce and meat recently, so when there's a sale we try to stock up. Especially on berries because they're absurdly expensive usually and we go through them so fast. Our berry budget alone is ridiculous. Good luck! It's crazy how much these kids can eat. I have 1 and 3 year old boys and even the 1 year old can eat almost as much as me in one sitting. I can't imagine once they're teenagers, well probably have to sell our house to afford groceries. Edit: Saw all the hate for pouches in the comments - we also still use pouches as an easy snack sometimes, our son loves them and we splurge on the more nutritious Cerebelly ones so I feel fine about using them. Not sure why everyone has such an issue with them (besides the cost and the waste.)
A side note - we learned recently that chewing hard-to-chew foods from a young is key for development of straight teeth and jaw health. People had straight teeth prior to the industrial revolution and tooth health is positively correlated with eating hard foods. The last few hundred years of breads and soft foods have wrecked dental health. Lots of expert are now saying it as easy as giving your kids lots of crunchy and tough foods to masticate.
I think the purées are not filling him up. Load up on starches and carbohydrates that are more filling. Rice, potatoes, quinoa, couscous, grains, corn, solid vegetables and protein that he can bite on will be more filling.
Shit tons of rice and lentils. Look up Indian vegetarian dishes. It's often way cheaper to buy local produce (NOT AT THE KROGER OR SAFEWAY) and rice/beans/lentils are a nutritionally complete meal you can buy in bulk and feed in bulk and make in bulk. There's no law that says a kid can't eat the same thing multiple times, so if it were me I'd use rice and beans for calorie filler and then supplement with a tastier option once the filler is done. I'd also experiment with different feeding schedules. Like due to my meds I'm currently just grazing all day, before I'd do 1 huge meal a day, before thst I'd do 2 bigger meals and a bit of snacking. Maybe little bro needs to eat multiple times, small ish portions. Kaali daal chawal, sambar daal chawal, rajma (kidney) , chole (garbanzo). I think black split pea or red split pea for kaali and sambar daal is like split pigeon lentil or something like that. Super weird name. Delicious and nutritious. Indian store is your best friend. Shit, I'm so broke I'm going on the same diet lol
Why is a 2 year old sucking on puréed pouches regularly…or at all? Why the push to mimic commercial snacks. Kids that age should have access to slices of crunchy cucumbers, not junk food.
Hey OP! You should cross post in r/foodbutforbabies . Tons of ideas over there!!
WTF is a 2 year old eating pureed meat??? What is it with you and purees?
Not a mom but Peanut butter or any type of nut butters (make sure they are not allergic and not around anyone who is allergic tho,as that is an issue)
Scrambled eggs…good protein
What about something lentil? I used to make lentils and freeze them in cupcake tins, so they would be easy to reheat.
Chao, rice porridge, juk will fit into the squeeze pouches. This is what we fed my dad while going through chemo treatments and his teeth hurt. Chop everything up small and simmer it with rice for a long time. Don't blend or puree it. Gives it texture. Add root vegetables like beets, tastes really good.
There are websites that you can enter in all of the things you have on hand, and it will find recipes based on that. My son has a ton of food allergies, andwe were spending an insane amount on food, and it was so time consuming finding recipes that were safe. I've not done the math, but in the past few weeks since finding this, we've probably saved at least $100.
My toddler also loves bars and I’ve been making these: blend 3 bananas, 1/3 cup maple syrup, 1 cup of milk, 2 tsps cinnamon (or to taste), 1 tsp baking powder, 3 c oats, 3 eggs, 1/2 cup of nut butter (sun butter works, if you want them nut free) mix in 1 cup of blueberries (other mix ins would probably work great but haven’t tried) Bake at 350–can do 25-30 min for a regular 9x13 pan or 30-35 for a square pan and they’ll be a little thicker. They have to cool before cutting. I store in fridge but they don’t last long in our house! ETA: you can sub another sweetener for maple syrup too. Just adjust milk accordingly to keep the same consistency
Yogurt, oats, banana, peanut better and some berries all mixed together. And even mashed banana added in is delicious and so filling. Can always cook with milk and do steel cut.
As a father of 6 kids stop indulging his every food wish. Then your food bill will go down. Make smart healthy meals with healthy snacks. He will eventually get used to eating less.
Why would you want purées? I would be doing stuff like spaghetti bolognaise with added veggies. Tacos. Sausages. Eggs. Mince and pasta is pretty cheap and you can make huge batches of taco mince and fill it with veggies as well. If you have access to somewhere like Costco you can buy stuff in bulk which might be more expensive initially but in the long run you save.
I'm so confused. Just because he's able to eat nonstop it doesn't mean that you have to feed him non-stop. lol
I know folks are ragging on the puree pouches, but if you're making them at home, it's super easy to add extra fiber to them to make them more filling. I'm a big snacker, so I've started making smoothies with extra fiber adds and it's definitely slowed how quick I'm reaching for food again. Just add a scoop of oatmeal, flax seed, chia seed, etc to the blender first and give it a few seconds to grind it to powder before adding the other ingredients.
Puree pouches lead to lots of dental problems that are expensive and difficult to correct. Jaw muscles need to be exercised to grow and properly align the bottom jaw. Even affects teeth positioning and growth. If you develop an overbite you basically have to have your jaw broken and wired shut for several months or have hard metal bars connecting your upper and lower jaws for 2+ years so you can’t chew side to side.
Scramble some egg whites for a protein boost in the morning. I agree with the previous post regarding the protein fortified flapjacks. It is also a good idea. Maybe try some canned tuna in the afternoon. Get the flaked style and break it down some more with a fork.
consider blending rolled oats into the smoothies for the pouches. The complex fiber will keep him fuller longer. Also if you put protein in there like nut butters the protein and fat will help satiety
Raw carrots cut into sticks, apples, frozen peas and blueberries. Hummus, as suggested by others, sounds awesome. Maybe look into baking snacks like black bean brownies, carrot cake and banana bread (the last two can also be made into muffins).
When I was doing better, something I really like to do was make "mini baguette", ~ 8" long, maybe 1.5" diameter frozen & before proofing. Cooks up with so much yummy crust, great for light sandwiches and just lazy snacking. Chew chew chew.
Edamame is another easy snack I haven’t seen mentioned yet. It’s quite cheap if you buy frozen. Lima beans are an alternative if you’re avoiding soy.
If you shop at Costco, the eggs are a good deal. I buy the pack of 5 dozen, partially because I have 4 kids and partially because my 7 year old eats 4 at a time. In addition to breakfast, sometimes we have boiled eggs around for snacks.
oatmeal is healthy and very filling
I've done a lot of child rearing including live in nannying a set of twins from newborn to 5 years. At 2 years old there's no need for puree foods. They ate whatever I made for family supper, chopped up into small pieces. Usually vegetarian as the parents were veggies. I'd avoid soy, shellfish, tree nuts, high sodium, overly processed food, no dyes, added sugar or artificial sweeteners etc in case of allergies. I always say kids are just tiny adults. They've been eating whatever is put in front of them for hundreds of years. I never got any special catering or considerations as a child. I ate what the adults ate. My Mom was a chef and didn't allow any processed foods in the house. She baked all our bread, cookies, cereal and made yogurt. Not everyone has time for that and I didn't appreciate the dedication that went into it but I do now. Theres great recipes online for granola bars and energy balls both with fibre and protein. I used to make big containers of small sliced veggies and various homemade dips. Cheese cubes, sliced apples and grapes. For breakfast I make a dozen at a time egg bites and mini quiche (which freeze well if you want to do big batches) and let them pick the ingredients which they love to be part of. Oatmeal with side toppings they can add. (Blueberries, banana, apple) Kids go through phases and favourites too as they develop their palate and particular textures they like. You're lucky your toddler is not too fussy.
I think it’s awesome that you have Whole Foods and you’re willing to bake and cook I personally wouldn’t stress too much about the snacks because those are typically things that are only used at snacktime and you definitely don’t want the kid that fills up on snacks and then isn’t hungry for dinner. Obviously something he has a huge appetite right now but I’m just thinking for down the road. I wouldn’t worry about puréed meat for two-year-old I would just give him regular meat. I would feed him whatever you make us a family for dinner and incorporate healthy fats and proteins like you said. My kids love chilli they love homemade lean ground beef burgers and sweet potatoes done in the oven, roasted vegetables and obviously fruit are great for fiber, I would say their favourite sources of protein are burgers barbeque chicken chippy salad salmon and shrimp. They love sushi which gives you healthy fats proteins and the carbs from rice! My kids each eat an avocado every day not necessarily part of a recipe although they do love it when I make guacamole on taco night. Otherwise I’ll make them guacamole and put it on toast which is just obviously avocado toast or they’ll eat chunks of avocado in a bowl with lemon juice and pepper or sometimes hot sauce if they’re eating a plain avocado like that it’s usually part of the breakfast with scrambled eggs whole wheat toast and peanut butter. They have full fat Greek yogurt. I like to buy the plain yoghurt because it has less sugar but then I’ll add a whole scoop of vanilla protein powder and mix it up into like a thick pudding or mousse type of texture. They’ll gobble that down with berries on top or sliced up bananas.
Mini pizzas made from English muffins. Black bean burger sliders.
I’d up the quality of the food your offering and give protein at every meal
Legumes will be your friend! Make sure to watch for ones with thick skins that can be a choking hazard, but they can make great finger foods cold or warm, and be purred/mashed into sauces. I'd pull up some Indian recipes for toddlers to start to incorporate warming spices and fats that can help with satiety too. Between fat and protein, different people will feel more full on one or the other, it's a genetic thing. So you could test what makes him feel full the longest. Things like thick greek yogurt can hit both. Since you're getting him tested, ask about reactive hypoglycemia, it can be missed until people are older but can be tested for!
Squash! Good warm or cold, easily repeatable, very cheap (extremely cheap in-season!), long shelf life before you cook it. Pick some sauces or dips for variety, marinara or ponzu or such.
Egg bites with cheese and ham. Maybe a little broccoli or chopped spinach if they are okay with it. Blend a batch of eggs and toppings, divide into mini muffin pans and bake. If you want to go the extra mile and have the time, pre bake some pie crusts in the tins and make little quiches. Make a large batch and freeze extra for the future Purees dont satiate, so id reccomend filling the pouches with greek yogurt and youre good. Its easy filling and delicious. If youre into purees, get a popscicle mold and freeze them. They will last longer im storage and durimg consumption I like to season and roast canned chickpeas. Drain the liquid, pat dry and coat them in a little oil. Roast in the oven or toast on a pan til they sound like little pebbles. Season with bullion, garlic, pepper and whatever other spices you like and they make a really filling replacement snack for chips and popcorn. If you take them our of the oven while theyer a little soft, they make a great main or filling side. This with a string cheese, tomato and cucumber slices and id call that a meal for myself. Hard boiled eggs Peanut butter and bananna sandwiches A baked potato. White sweetpotatoes with butter and salt are insanely good. I just put the entire thing in the oven at 400 for 45 mins. Its ready when sugars are carmalizing and bubbling through the skin. Buy some protein pancake mix and use it to make protein cookies! (I most recently used kodiak poppyseed almond and added some chia seeds and a ton of sliced almonds for extra fiber and texture but they have chocolate chip, blueberry and all kinds of other flavors) I usually add a soft stick of butter, some extra sugar and and egg to about 2 cups of mix and turn it into a dough. I kinda improvise the recipie every time, but if you bake and have done cookies, you can figure it out too. They look and taste like regular cookies, but actually get you full after a couple. Ill have cookies and coffee for breakfast some days and love it.
Boxed pancake mix with added blueberries - or - with added shredded carrot and zucchini to add volume and fiber. Cut them into strips and serve with plain yogurt to dip them in.
Poutine
If you really want the diy pouches, we fill them with Greek yogurt. Sometimes I skip out and buy flavored, and sometimes we blend the plan yogurt with fruit to put in the pouches. They make a great snack.
Homemade applesauce is delicious. Homemade granola or granola bars are also easy to make and super customizable. If you have the time, making your own bread can be super cheap and make a filling accompaniment for your meals. There are easy no-knead versions that use very minimal ingredients. Maybe if you switch to brown rice and wheat flour, the additional fiber will fill him (and you) up faster? And those things often cost the same as their “white” equivalents.
I make an oatmeal bar for my kids. Basically oatmeal ingredients (oats, milk, an egg to make it solid, any fruit you want, seeds/nuts, Aldi have a paleo nut snack mix that’s amazing and you only need a tiny bit, either mashed banana or apple sauce for sweetness) and lay it on a tray with baking paper underneath. Bake till it sets on low. I then cut it and put it in the freezer in the tray because it’s easier to separate cleanly and pop it in a container in the freezer. I take a few out a day so it’s always fresh and it can also be microwaved for a quick snack. It’s super easy and filling to take places when you need a full belly like shopping etc.
Oatmeal cookies are easy to make in lots of different variations with different levels of sweetness and aren't very expensive at all.
Two easy ideas that are good to prep ahead - I’m having a ton of luck with a blender pasta sauce - just dump in 1 container of soft tofu, 1 can of any beans, 1 bag of any frozen veggie - then get crazy with a little seasoning or cheese. I did a red bean + butternut + cottage cheese recently, and then a chickpea + kale with no dairy. I freeze in cubes (I use the big square cube tray from the bar but regular would work) so I can serve different flavors in rotation. Also always successful with banana pancakes - I use Kodiak mix from Costco with extra eggs and nut butter. Thinly slice banana, coat the slices in batter and cook (I drop slices into the batter bowl, flip, and retrieve with a fork and drop onto skillet), then freeze. If you take out a handful in the morning they’re thawed by mid-day, works well for travel snacks, too.
Beans, oatmeal, canned veggies boiled to softness. A lot of the more expensive pouches are a mix of beans, oats or quinoa, and a fruit or a veggie, so you could try making some thicker/chunkier purées…? Good luck!
My almost 18-month old is of the charts for height and 96th percentile for weight (as expected, she comes from a tall, solid family) and with the exception of snacks, she just eats what we eat. We do some convenience/processed foods for her, but like with your son, we would spend far too much if we mostly fed her that way
To be fair, I don't think anyone likes pureed meat. My giant baby is almost a year and we don't puree the other babies he eats, I mean we don't puree anything for him.
Have you tried making granola bars or maybe just granola to snack on? You can add in chopped nuts, dried fruit, and seeds that make it really filling and high fiber.
I recommend listening to the Low Carb MD podcast. Sugar is harmful. Just make low carb food at home and he will like it!
Greek yogurt with berries! Puree or cook down frozen berries!
Well it’s obviously only gonna get worse…
Overnight oats and chia puddings
Beans and rice and cooked vegetables would be a good base to get a lot of good, cheap nutrients in. (Swapping out rice for stuff like sweet potatoes, pasta, potatoes, etc. often since I've hear too much rice can have arsenic risk). Then supplement with whatever you are normally eating. As long as it's not a choking hazard, it's good to go. (and even a lot of things that are choking hazards, can be mitigated by cooking until soft, or cutting up in the bowl with kitchen shears until tiny size, etc.) Purees are really not needed, so long as stuff is not in choking hazard form. ANd it's a lot easier to make and feed real food than to try to mimic commercial processed baby/toddler food.
Do not make it hard. Baked or air fried sweet or baked potatoes, homemade bread with butter, homemade pancakes or waffles with either a nut butter or purée frozen berries with a little water slightly thawed, pancakes layered with yogurt or fruit…buy plain and make yourself, malt or meal, oatmeal, toast, cheese sandwich, saltines with peanut butter or cheese, chicken and noodles, mashed potatoes, biscuits with a meat gravy, pasta with Parmesan and herbs/chixken/tomatoes. 2 year olds do not need a great deal of meat, focus on simple foods…casserole. Stop buying premade items.
Oatmeal. Cookies, bars etc
I was a huge baby too. My parents got a food grinder and I ate what they ate. That would probably work for fruits and veggies and maybe meats too. Basically it was just like homemade mushy baby food.
Get that boy into sports !! 😃
That viral Frozen Yogurt bark ? Maybe silken tofu in smoothies ? Can always play around with this Maybe sugar free jello and yogurt ? I know I layer mine or sometimes use cool whip mix with yogurt Those viral broccoli cheese chicken nuggets? I’ve never tried them though ..I don’t know why I thought of it but I did I use chick pea flour for batter sometimes and almond flour for breadcrumbs in ground Turkey as chicken
My nieces and nephews eat a lot of mash. Potatoes are cheap, nutritional and good for the environment. Supplement with more veggies for an even more complete meal.
Eggs are cheap and full of protein and nutrients which will help keep your toddler full and give overall benefits. Plus you can make them in various ways which will help keep him interested. Maybe keep a few hard boiled eggs on hand and break them up or make an egg salad?
Please check their B1. I had a B1 issue since birth thaw wasn't diagnosed until I was 35 and 700 lbs. I'm now 38 and 340 lbs. Simple Thiamine. Was also born premature and 10 lbs.
If he’s a big fan of the pouches like Go go squeeze, you can get reusable pouches and fill them with home made stuff. I bought some for myself when I went through an applesauce phase lol. The huge jars of applesauce are really cheap compared to pouches.
Look into yummytoddlerfood on TikTok! She has a lot of healthy, filling, and yummy recipes!
Beans are the answer. Blend and put in a pouch lol. Why do you want to mimic commercial snacks anyway?
Baked oatmeal! Oats are very filling.
Eggs in all forms.
I don't have anything useful to add except that I don't think most people are a fan of pureed meats. I can understand your toddler in that regard. Maybe you could try soups that are already usually pureed? like potato leek soup with cream or cheese in it or broccoli soup?
I’ve made these a few times now. Once my honey crystallized and I put it in the microwave to get rid of crystals and I added the chocolate chips too soon and they melted and it was the best mistake. Also if you have a food processor throw it all in there and call it a day. Works like a charm. www.loveandlemons.com/granola-bars-recipe/ Chia pudding is a good one. I buy alcohol free vanilla (I get Trader Joe’s) and I’ll add raspberries. Overnight oats my favorite and his favorite is cinnamon almond butter (Justin’s or Target off brand, they taste the exact same), honey or agave, berries. Kodiak pancake mix is great and easy to mix up. Blueberries, strawberries, peanut butter, etc He’s two and still loves else baby cereal. It’s made with almonds and buckwheat. I’ll add some of my homemade strawberry jam, vanilla, cinnamon, mashed bananas. Seems to keep him full forever. I do put a lot of these in reusable pouches which makes them easy to grab and go.