Best Child Nutrition Books (for Parents): From a Pediatric Dietitian
Looking for trustworthy advice on the best books on child nutrition and healthy eating? I got you!
Here’s a solid list of child nutrition books that I rely on as both a parent as well as a pediatric registered dietitian (RD).
These books are rock-solid as far as offering trustworthy and easy-to-follow advice on everything from which nutrients kids need at different ages and stages as well as the best ways to approach feeding them.
That means you’ll find answers for all kinds of questions including which foods are most important as well as how you talk about food, offer food, and create rules and routines around meals and eating.
One tip: Since the challenges we face when it comes to feeding our kids change faster than the size of your kids’ shoes, bookmark 🔖 this page. You’ll have it as a handy reference as your questions and kids’ needs’ change.
First, you’ll find a list of book titles, then scroll to learn more about exactly what you’ll find in each book and why I love and own it myself! Read on to get the next best thing to having a dietitian on-call to help you solve our latest food and feeding concerns and questions…
Top Books on Child Nutrition and Healthy Eating: A Dietitian-Approved List
- Fearless Feeding: How to Raise Healthy Eaters From High Chair to High School by Jill Castle and Maryann Jacobsen
- Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family by Ellyn Satter
- How to Raise and Intuitive Eater by Sumner Brooks, Ammee Severson
- How to Nourish Your Child Through an Eating Disorder by Casey Crosbie, Wendy Sterling
- Diet-Proof Your Daughter: A Mother’s Guide to Raising Girls Who Have Positive Relationships with Food and Body by Amelia Sherry
- Fat Talk: Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture by Virginia Sole-Smith
- Food Refusal and Avoidant Eating in Children, including those with Autism Spectrum Conditions by Gillian Harris, Elizabeth Shea
- Eat, Laugh, Talk! by The Family Dinner Project
- Food Chaining: The Proven 6-Step Plan to Stop Pick Eating, Solve Feeding Problems, and Expands Your Child’s Diet by Cheryl Fraker
- Eat Like a Champion by Jill Castle
- Love Me, Feed Me: The Adoptive and Foster Parent’s Guide to Responsive Feeding by Katja Rowell
Best Child Nutrition Book for: Understanding Nutrition from Age to Age
Fearless Feeding: How to Raise Healthy Eaters From High Chair to High School
by Jill Castle, RD and Maryann Jacobsen, RD
This book is that it gets straight to the point, which is a godsend for busy, multi-tasking moms who don’t have the time or energy to cozy up on the couch learning the ins and outs of child nutrition. It ease-of-of use is why this book has been my go-to for years—ever since I became a mom, in fact!
The book is broken up into chapters by age, letting you dig into the ‘ish that you’re dealing with at any given moment. For example, for each age, there are easy-to-read reference charts that help identify which specific nutrients your child needs most during different stages of growth. It also gives examples of common foods that contain them.
For even more insight into the way your child’s behavior changes from age to age around food, the authors also include some insights into developmental stages. Yes! This is key information when it comes to understanding why your two-year-old suddenly stopped eating all those foods she used to love or why your beef-loving teen suddenly wants to try being a vegan. So helpful!
The authors all salt and pepper the pages with questions and answers to the problems that parents struggle with the most. Their advice is realistic and practical, so you know you’re going to walk away with an “I can do this” feeling when it comes to tackling an eating issue.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a favorite of mine if it didn’t also discuss the importance of modeling healthy eating behaviors, as well as the need to be flexible and open-minded when it comes to feeding children. The tone is open, empowering, and reassuring. Take their insight and advice and put it to work for you in the way you think is best!
This is my all-time favorite feeding reference book, one that I’ve kept on my shelf even years after graduating with a degree in nutrition. Even if you’re just trying to remind yourself which kid-friendly foods contain magnesium—and whether that’s really something you need to worry about, you’ll know you trust the answer here.
Bottom line: you’ll keep it for years, meaning it’s definitely worth the investment!
Best Child Nutrition Book for: Figuring Out How to Parent Around Food (And Understand Some of Your Own Eating Issues!)
Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family
by Ellyn Satter
If you’re like me, you’ve likely winced, shuttered, or possibly stood by in awe(!) at the array of amusing, bizarre, and sometimes surprisingly effective tactics people use to get the kids they love to eat.
From demanding a child “take one bite” or “finish their vegetables before dessert” to seeing four entirely different meals be served to a family of three (just in case!), we can get really confused about what is—and isn’t—a good idea when it comes to parenting around food.
Wondering what works, what doesn’t, and why? Let registered dietitian and family therapist Ellyn Satter, the godmother of feeding theory, explain! While Satter’s written many books on child nutrition, this one gives you the foundation of what being a “healthy” and normal, happy eater really means.
And by “healthy” eater, I not talking about a kid who feels good about eating, has the confidence to try new things, and the flexibility to find something to eat both when her favorites—and not so favorites—are on the table.
Satter pioneered the Division of Responsibility (sDOR), an evidence-based feeding theory that’s the bomb diggity when it comes to giving parents a specific set of guidelines for feeding that work from infancy to adolescence.
Parents that practice the sDOR typically raise kids that maintain their natural, healthy-for-them body weight, have higher intakes of fruits and vegetables, and have more confidence when it comes to foods and eating.
Truth be told, this book transformed the way I feed my own girls, feed myself, and even the way I practice nutrition as a professional. Yes, it’s THAT good. And, the best part, you really only need to read the first four chapters to get the most important advice.
In fact, those early chapters outline the principles of eating competence, which is the foundation of normal eating that keeps kids well-nourished and well-protected from disordered eating. If you want to develop eating competence—which is really for many of us when it comes to healing our relationship with food, you can get more hands-on help by reaching out for a Nutrition Therapy Consult with me.
Best Child Nutrition Book for: Helping Kids Learn to Be Intuitive Eaters
How to Raise an Intuitive Eater: Raising the Next Generation with Food and Body Confidence
by Sumner Brooks, MPH, RDN, and Amme Severson, MPP-D, RDN
If you’re an intuitive eating (IE) devotee, you’ll appreciate that this is only the book endorsed by IE patroness and pioneer expert Elyse Resch, MS, RDN. The authors take IE into the world of parenting and offers extensive (extensive!) information on how to apply it to many important aspects of feeding kids.
The book is dense, yet helpfully broken up into smaller sections so it’s easy to scan and drift into the areas that really speak to what you’re struggling with at any particular moment.
It’s much less about actual nutrition and much more about supporting your child’s feelings about food and their body’s ability to eat well, so keep this in mind. Again, if you’ve just discovered IE yourself you’ll especially appreciate what the advice, tips, and perspective that these incredible dietitians offer.
Best Book for Creating a Game-Plan for Overcome an Eating Disorder
How to Nourish Your Child Through an Eating Disorder
by Casey Crosbie, RD, CSSD and Wendy Sterling MS, RD, CSSD
Eating disorders are hard, so hard, ugly, life-stealing, joy-strangling bastards and I pray as a parent you never have to deal with one. In fact, helping us all be more mindful about avoiding triggering an ED in any child is literally the reason that this site, NourishHer, exists. But I digress…
Crosbie and Sterling’s book is a bible for any parent trying to tackle the biggest, most malicious feeding obstacle they’ll ever face.
Practically speaking, the authors work within the context of Family Based Therapy (FBT) which is currently considered the gold standard treatment for adolescent eating disorders.
This book is required reading for any parent who enters my practice with a child struggling to recover as it provide parents with the skills they need to support their child through within their own home.
It’s a brilliant approach that brings everyone on board during meals and snacks, which is a crucial aspect of long-term success.
Even if you’re child doesn’t have a full-blown eating disorder but is teetering with some disordered eating behaviors this book can be a solid asset for steering your family back on course to having a healthy relationship with food.
If you like any of these books, please talk about them with a fellow parent, colleague, teacher, or friend! Spreading the word about positive feeding practices is an awesome way to start changing the culture our kids face when it comes to eating and food.
Best Child Nutrition Book for Mothers Raising Girls (And Recovering From Diet Culture Themselves!)
Diet-Proof Your Daughter: A Mother’s Guide to Raising Girls Who Have Happy, Healthy Relationships With Food & Body
Can I fairly say that this is the very best book for any mom who’s ever considered how her own relationship with food might impact her daughters’? Why, yes, I can! And that’s simply because, as far as I know, it’s the only book that does such a thing.
If you’ve battled back from your own issues with food and want to make sure your daughter or daughters (or nieces, students, teammates, etc) never have to do it themselves, then this book is for you.
In it, you’ll find personal stories from me about food-related issues I’ve struggled with parenting my own girls, as well as those that have come up with parents in my professional nutrition therapy practice. All of them will make you feel more at ease about all those weird and tough-to-solve situations that come up when you’re trying to set a good example for your kids with food.
I also give specific actions you can take to help your daughter feel good about her body and weight, eat well, and for the both of you to have a positive relationship.
Also important: If you check out the reviews, you’ll see many dietitians and mothers who are raising boys say the information was just as useful for them, which makes sense because all of the “best practices” around helping kids be happy, healthy eaters work regardless of gender!
Best Child Nutrition Book for Parents Who Worry About Weight
Fat Talk: Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture
Okay, so this book it’s exactly about child nutrition. It’s about how notions of fatness, worry about weight, and many aspect of culture converge to make feeding our kids and feeling good about our bodies feel overwhelming and sometimes impossible.
I can almost guarantee it’ll be eye-opening and pressure-relieving for any parent who’’s ever felt inspired to rally back against diet culture.
If you’re a mom of a child in a larger body and you’re interested in all the systems that make the fact feel challenging, overwhelming, triggering, and downright painful, then this book may be your saving grace.
Virginia isn’t a dietitian or therapist yet her writing and social activism champions mothers facing a very complicated world full of pressures that weigh on everything, from what’s packed in their child’s lunch to the size of their thighs and love of baked goods. She’s an incredible voice, a world class journalist, and as a New York Times Best-Selling author, she’s been able to the complicated issue of weight and anti-fat bias to the next level when it comes to understanding and insight.
If you’re interested in social issues and larger cultural systems as well as how they impact the way we parent around food, then you will love this book! (If that’s feeling a little heavy and you’re just hoping to figure out whether your daughter needs more iron or calcium or an extra snack after school, then you will want to skip this one—at least for now.)
If you’re not a book lover but would like to get to know Virginia and her mission better (including how to to dress of a larger body, and what’s she’s got going on in her garden), then consider checking out her newsletter Burnt Toast.
Best Child Nutrition Book for Neurodivergent Kids
Food Refusal and Avoidant Eating in Children including those with Autism Spectrum Conditions
by Gillian Harris and Elizabeth Shea
Most of the parents I work with use a strikingly similar conversation starter, which is the frustrating complaint: “She is SO picky! She doesn’t like anything!” After that, a longer conversation reveals that, aside from an assortment of vegetables, exotic-sounding sauces, and fish, the child truly has few food limits. This book is NOT for them.
This book is for caregivers of children dealing children with an extremely extreme form of ‘picky,’ one that can lead to nutritional deficiencies, social isolation, major mealtime stress, and (not surprisingly!) put a major ding in family dynamics.
Extremely picky eaters often reject foods for reasons only they may understand. They’ve often whittled down the list of things they’ll accept to 10, five, or even just three foods or less. (Yes, I once had a patient who are white rice, the liquid from canned beans, and Pepsi. That’s an extreme example of extreme but wanted to give you a glimpse into what some parents are struggling with.)
Usually, extreme forms of food rejection relate to sensory issues, anxiety, or a previous negative incident with food (such as choking or food poisoning, which is one of the issues at play with my rice eater). Note this kind of extreme pickiness is NOT due to concerns about body shape or size.
I find that parents are a mixture of relieved and terrified when I tell them their child’s extreme pickiness has a clinical name, ARFID (avoid restrictive food intake disorder) and can quantify as a eating disorder. That said, you don’t need to have an ARFID diagnosis to benefit from the insights in this book!
And, if you’re raising a child with autism or working with kids on the spectrum on-the-regular then the tips and advice these authors provide will be a godsend to both you and them.
Best Child Nutrition Book for: Making Dinner Less Stress and More Fun!
Eat, Laugh, Talk! The Family Dinner Playbook
This favorite is one I keep in my kitchen with my recipes not on my nightstand or in my counseling office. It’s packed with easy-to -make meals and, more importantly, fun activities (games, questions, and conversation starters) that make feeling more connected to each other at the table a priority.
Personally, if you’re going to work on any aspect of your eating I think you’ll get the most bang for your buck by prioritizing improving the family atmosphere more than anything else!
When kids feel supported, seen, and understood they’re more likely to better in multiple aspects of life, including with their eating!
Kid who feel stressed or anxious at meals tend to want to avoid them, which can take a toll on the quality of their eating. Kids who feel supported and accepted, as well as less judged and pressured, will continue showing up at the table—which means they benefit from your connection, which can support them long after that particular meal is over.
If you’ve read my book, Diet-Proof Your Daughter, you’ll know this is one of the core reasons I recommend prioritizing have a positive, relaxed attitude towards your daughter’s eating as opposed to approaching it with worry about what she is and isn’t or how much or little she’s putting in her mouth.
For more general ideas and inspiration, start by visiting The Family Dinner Project Resources or scrolling to the bottom of the page and connecting with them on your favorite social media channel.
Best Child Nutrition Book for Picky Eating
Food Chaining: The Proven 6-Step Plan to Stop Picky Eating, Solve Eating Problems, and Expand Your Child’s Diet
by Cheryl Fraker, RD, Mark Fishbein, MD, Sibyl Cox, RD, + Laura Walbert, CCC-SLP
First off, this book is loaded with info and tips to help solve a variety of feeding problems, from everyday nuisances (like getting a toddler to sit through a meal) to less common problems (like swallowing issues in the special needs child).
However, the part I think parents will appreciate most is Chapter 6: How Do I Get My Child to Try New Foods? The info here answers the one question nutritionists get on the regular.
Food chaining is a pretty simple process that most people pick up on quickly and the explanation and instructions in this chapter provide the tools you need to do it. It’s also a great primer for any pediatric practitioner who wants to get familiar with the concept so they confidently pass on some ‘picky eating’ tips of their own.
Disclosure: This page contains affiliate links for books I own and use as a parent and/or nutrition provider. If you decide to purchase one after clicking a link, I may earn a small commission, which helps me continue to run this site.
Want something to read to help you up your raise-a-healthy-eater game right now? Check out 👉 Unlock the Secrets to Healthy Eating for Your Daughter: Ultimate Guide for Moms,” which can help you get some support and quick wins when it comes to improving your overall approach to eating right now.
