Even Chrissy Teigen’s Kids Go Through Picky Eating Phases — Here’s Her Fix
Chrissy Teigen has built a career around loving food, from bestselling cookbooks to a full baking line. Her own kids didn’t get the memo, and she’s been refreshingly honest about it.
Even a Cookbook Author’s Kids Go Through It
Across her four children, Teigen’s household covers nearly the entire spectrum of kid eating habits. One son has famously never eaten a vegetable, while her youngest will eat almost anything put in front of him.
That range hasn’t embarrassed her into pretending otherwise. She’s talked about it publicly, more than once, with a kind of good-humored resignation.
She Built an Actual Restaurant Menu for Her Toddler
When her daughter Luna went through a picky phase as a toddler, Teigen created a laminated restaurant-style menu, complete with fake money for Luna to “pay” with. The menu leaned into foods Luna already liked rather than fighting her preferences head-on.
Options included grilled cheese with berries and chicken tenders with fries and a pile of broccoli on the side. Nothing on it was designed to trick her, just to make dinner feel like a choice she was making herself.
The Trick Wasn’t the Food, It Was the Excitement
Teigen has been direct about the actual goal behind the menu. “I wanted Luna to get excited to eat,” she said, describing the moment things had shifted from an easy eater to a resistant one seemingly overnight.
That framing matters. The menu wasn’t really a nutrition strategy, it was a way to hand back a sense of control during a phase where food had become a battle.
Years Later, the Picky One Became the Adventurous One
That early intervention didn’t just get Luna through a rough patch. Years later, she’s become the family’s most adventurous eater, working her way through salads, vegetables, sushi, and edamame at school.
Her brother Miles, meanwhile, has taken a very different path, still resistant to vegetables well past toddlerhood. Teigen has learned that whatever worked for one kid doesn’t necessarily translate to the next.
She Refuses to Hide Vegetables in Anything
Despite the ongoing struggle with Miles, Teigen has said she deliberately avoids sneaking vegetables into other food to trick him into eating them. She’d rather let her kids see the actual ingredients and build trust over time.
That approach trades a quicker fix for something slower but more durable. A kid who eventually chooses a vegetable on their own is a different outcome than one who was tricked into eating it without knowing.
Cooking Together Does What Lecturing Never Could
Even with picky eaters at the table, Teigen and her husband John Legend have found that cooking together gets further than any argument about nutrition. Luna and Miles will happily help make a batch of Chex Party Mix, even if they won’t touch a casserole.
“I think it’s the act of creating it together,” Legend has said, pointing to involvement itself as the actual motivator. It’s not about the specific recipe, it’s about feeling like part of making it.
RELATED ARTICLE: Vegetable Recipes for Kids & Picky Eaters
