Picture this: you’ve spent hours preparing child friendly mini-meatballs in a naturally colourful home-made tomato sauce. You’ve served it imaginatively on the plate surrounded by a few green peas, beautifully carved carrot sticks, an artistic sprinkle of cheese. You place it on the table before your darling toddler. Her face screws up in disgust. “Yuk! I don’t want it. I’m not hungry”.

There are so many options for a response here: “Look, I’ve spent hours making this” (don’t expect sympathy from a three-year-old); “Well, what would you like instead?” (you’re not a restaurant) to bribery: “If you eat this, you can have some ice cream” (Bingo! This is how to get the sweet stuff!).

Toddlers soon learn if refusing a meal will get them what they really want. It really is a battle of control and we, the parents, need to win.

Put the meal in the fridge and re-heat it when your child gets hungry or at the next meal-time. If it means going to bed with no dinner one night, try to suppress those feelings of sympathy and guilt, and think about the long-term goal. No child ever faded away from missing a meal.