It's quite common for autistic or hyperlexic kids to be picky eaters. Especially if they have intense sensory preferences or sensory processing issues.
Some may have really restricted diets and need help from a trained feeding therapist. And others may just be particular about certain foods or textures, but still eat a fairly decent assortment of foods. In other words, they may be somewhat picky, not extremely picky.
Regardless of how picky your child is, it's important to know your child's food preferences. And that's where this free printable picky eating tracking sheet comes in. You can use it to identify what foods your child likes, dislikes, and sometimes eats.
How to Use this Picky Eating Tracking Sheet
There are three columns on this picky eating tracking printable for you to fill in. You'll simply write down the foods that apply to each column.
In the first column, you will list your child's preferred and favorite foods. The ones they'll almost always eat, no matter what. This column will also include their samefoods, those safe and predictable foods that they could eat day in and day out. Basically, this column is all about listing the foods that your child calls "actually good" (direct quote from my youngest).
For the second column, you'll list foods that they'll sometimes eat. You know, like when the stars align just right. So some days they might eat it and other days they won't touch it at all. Instead, they'll push it around the plate in disgust.
Then finally, in column three, you'll list the foods that they most definitely won't eat for whatever reason. The foods they dislike or hate. The "junk" (again, another quote from my youngest).
Once you've filled in the tracking sheet, it's time to look for patterns in each column. Is there something that ties all the dislikes together or all the preferred foods together? Like are they all green veggies? Do the foods all use ground beef? Are they spicy foods? Foods covered in cheese? Sweet foods? Plain foods? etc. Be sure to use this process and analysis for all three columns.
After you identify the patterns, you might be able to come up with other foods that meet or fit that pattern or adapt meals to better fit those preferences. For instance, let's say that all of their preferred foods seem to be plain food or food with simple flavors. Maybe that means you need to serve food without sauces, stick to simpler flavors over spicy, or deconstruct their meals (e.g., serve all the taco parts separately instead of as an assembled taco).
You can also use the information from this tracking sheet when meal planning. Simply try to incorporate some food from the first two columns into your meals. You could also try different ways of serving foods from the dislike or sometimes eats columns to see if they still dislike those foods or not.
Another idea is to fill in this picky eating printable and share it with your child's occupational therapist or feeding therapist. It will be helpful information for them as they support you and your child with picky eating.
Finally, you can share the information from this tracking sheet with relevant caregivers or family members so they have ideas of what foods your child might enjoy or eat. This information can be especially useful during the holidays!
Download the Free Picky Eating Tracker
