Sunday, February 22, 2009

Taking my small victories where I can get them

I try not to worry too much about Scooter's eating habits. He is extremely picky and eats from a limited repertoire, but at least he does get some fruit and will take the multi-vitamins we have for him.

Nevertheless, I have moments when I despair of Scooter ever expanding what he is even willing to have on a plate near him.

Yesterday, I cooked up a crockpot full of black beans, knowing I will need some for a dinner later in the week. After letting them cool and dividing them into 2-cup portions, I had another 1/2 cup or so left.

A bit later I was struck with inspiration. There was a point when Scooter would eat cheese quesadillas. And his favorite preschool lunch had always been black-bean burritos (which I have never recreated to his satisfaction). We have both white corn tortillas and Mexican cheese on-hand, so I tried to approach the topic nonchalantly.

Mouse (shuffling around the kitchen): Hey, Scooter. Would you like to have a quesadilla?

Scooter (playing on the computer at the kitchen bar): Um, I don't like quesadillas.
...pause...
What's a quesadilla?

Mouse: It's sort of like a burrito...

Trillian (from the living room): but flat.

Scooter: OK.

So I made the quesadilla, mashing up some black beans away from where he could see them and sprinkling them generously with cheese.

He took the first bite with me holding a quarter of it. And pronounced it "very good." Usually that means he won't eat anymore, but there was more enthusiasm than usual in his voice, so I held out hope. He ended up eating a bit more than half of the quesadilla, unprompted after that first bite.

Hooray!

2 comments:

Bea said...

So funny. "Very good" is one of Bub's favourite expressions as well - as in, "I want some yellow peppers, baloney, and very good crackers!"

Aliki2006 said...

Hooray is right! Excellent...