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“You can’t force them to eat what they don’t want.”—You sure can. You don’t give them what they want, and eventually they will eat whatever you give them.
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Exactly. I never understood weak willed, and weak minded parents that didn’t know how to get their 5 year olds to eat vegetables. I mean, I understand that they ARE weak minded and willed, but I could not fathom living with a 5 year old telling me what they will and will not eat. Ludicrous! My parents took this approach (which I have improved upon): There was always fruit out on the table, banas, apples, oranges (occasionally peaches and pears, only in season), which I could eat at any time. When breakfast or dinner was made, the choice was, “You can eat what I made, or a bologna sandwich, that you make yourself.” I have always hated bologna, and never took up the offer (we just had it because dad liked it). The biggest part was that my dad would sit with us (mom was bedridden) and eat and talk about our day. He’d teach me about things and draw diagrams and talk about work, and I’d never give anything in exchange for that. Heck I ate a lot of things I didn’t like, but we didn’t have a lot of money and I was grateful to have anything. Before my mom married my dad (adopted), be barely survived off of help from family and our church during holidays (United Methodist). I remember fighting over beans as a kid, and since I was smallest, if I didn’t eat fast my siblings would take my food. Life got better though, and we made it. And I’m grateful that God helped us out by sending my dad to take care of us, and help mom out.

With reference to:

“When I was in gradeschool, lunch was like prison. We got a tray with various dents in it and each dent got a scoop of something. Desert was either jello or pudding except on fridays, then it was either a small square of yellow cake or a scoop of cobbler of some kind.”
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I am from Las Vegas (in Clark County, the largest school district in the country), and when I was a kid, everything came to the school pre-packages (like a TV dinner), in some industrial plant somewhere else in the city. The lunch people just warmed up the food (or set out the cold food, there were always two options, a cold ham and cheese/turkey and cheese, and a hot rotating meal). Man that food was terrible. I remember that once or twice a month there was food I wanted to eat, other than that I drank the milk and ate the fruit and brought my own food or bought snacks (equally bad, but tasted good, and were free when we did good in class, as we got vouchers for the snack shop for good grades). Since my parents actually paid for my lunch (I was not on a free lunch program), the lunch people tried really hard to get me to eat their food. If I had known better, I’d have packed my lunch. Now I try and grow as much of my own food, because I’m tried of the processed garbage. A little is ok, but when it’s the bulk of your diet, wow its hard on the body.