Author’s practical guidance
Refuses to even look at a new food on the plate
Source named in the book: food neophobia and repeated exposure (Wardle & Cooke)
Wariness of new food is not about taste in the first moment — refusing to even look is the earliest stage of neophobia, before a bite is on the table.
Say this now
“It's just sitting there. You don't have to look at it yet.”
Removes the requirement, keeps the food present.
“You can smell it if you want, that counts too.”
Lowers the bar for what counts as trying.
Do this
- Put a small amount on the plate without comment, most meals.
- Let a single glance, touch or smell count as progress — tasting is the last step, not the first.
- Serve the same new food many times before deciding they dislike it.
- Keep portions tiny for anything new.
- Eat the same food yourself, visibly, without narrating it.
Avoid this
- "Just look at it, that's all I'm asking." — turns looking into the first round of a fight neither of you needs.
- Hiding the new food inside a familiar one — teaches that new foods need to be disguised to be safe, the opposite lesson.
- Removing the food the moment they turn away — ends the exposure before it can do anything.
If it repeats
If a food has been offered calmly many times over several weeks with zero movement, it is fair to set it aside for now and try again in a month, rather than serving it forever without change.
Why the book suggests this
Wariness of new food is not about taste in the first moment — refusing to even look is the earliest stage of neophobia, before a bite is on the table. Cooke and Wardle's research found it peaks in this age range: a child who has just learned to walk away from a caregiver needs a way to screen what goes in their mouth.
Looking away is doing its job as intended — protective caution, not a verdict on the food or the cook. The mistake most parents make is treating a first glance as a final answer, when for a genuinely new food it usually is not.
From this collection
Same Words: At the Table
45 prepared situations in this family area.