Listen up, parents: the reality is that you cannot stop your child from being a fussy eater. No amount of bribery, tellings-off, cajoling, commanding or nagging is going to change anything and indeed the more pressure you put on them to consume something they don’t want to, the more resistant they will become.

The best tactic is to simply present your children with a wide array of foods and meals and then say absolutely nothing. This is certainly an approach that will require a bit of willpower and tongue-biting, but it can work wonders to gradually undo fussy eating. You actually have a considerably higher chance of kids eating a much hated food – like broccoli for instance- if you do not push the issue, and this applies in the long term too. A study of university students found that once they had left home, they quickly chose to not consume foods that they were forced by their parents to eat when they were children.