18 July 2026
Having a picky toddler at home is probably the hardest part of a motherhood. I may not be a mom, but I feel like one being one of the guardians of my niece.
That's her. Our little pasaway, picky with food.
She just turned four and should be eating properly at her age. But no, she only chooses what she wants to eat. The concerning part is that most of her favorites are processed foods. It's been a struggle for us ever since. We know it's unhealthy, so we had to do something about it.
Some of the foods she likes are sausages, meatloaf, noodles, eggs, and, of course, sweets and junk food. We find it difficult to convince her to eat fruits and vegetables. She even finds it disgusting to drink soup or touch other wet foods. That's stressful, isn't it?
This kid has a broken family, but her parents are co-parenting. She's with us on weekdays, and stays with her father on weekends. Having two families raise her is even more difficult because there are two different ways of raising a child.
Back when she was a baby, her grandfather on her father's side didn't allow her to eat solid baby food. Her father obeyed him, of course, and my sister couldn't do anything about it. That should have been the right time to train her to eat healthy foods, but because of her grandfather, she never got proper training.
Only when her parents separated two years ago did she start living with us, and we began teaching her to eat different foods. Unfortunately, it was already difficult because she wasn't used to them. She had become very picky.
And you know what? You can't give her just anything. She sniffs it like a dog and touches it before tasting. That's how picky she is.
At least we've managed to get her to eat eggs and some other solid foods, but it's still not enough to make her healthy. She may be a big girl, but she still doesn't have a healthy diet.
So I decided to buy this sausage maker set. It came with a pump, funnels, sausage case, and strings. But I added the red case since she only eats the typical red sausages.
Making sausages is just easy. All you have to do is combine all ingredients, and grind them together. I added some carrots, potatoes, and a few chops of onions, and garlics to the meat. I just hoped she wouldn't notice the carrots, though.
I added an egg, flour, and seasonings, then mixed well everything. It's better if you use a blender. It'll make the meat mixture finer.
Just stuff the meat into the tube, and slowly pump into the sausage case.
Then I used the strings to divide the sausages into small sizes.
You can either steam or boil the sausages. This step cooks the sausages evenly.
Then simply fry before eating.
As simple as that, you can make your home made sausages for your little ones at home.
They may not be as tasty as the processed ones we buy from the supermarket, but at least I was able to make my niece eat homemade sausages.
If you're a mother dealing with the same problem, what do you do to encourage your toddlers to eat healthier foods?
I appreciate your responses.
Thanks for your time.
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Jane is a Filipina wanderer in a foreign land who finds comfort in nature and freedom in writing. She loves watching raw picturesque landscapes, listening to the symphony of nature, breathing in drops of sunshine, walking through scenic trails and cityscapes, tasting new culinary flavors, capturing pretty little things, venturing into hidden gems, and dancing with the flow of life.
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