a tale of two eaters

I have a picky eater. This is most irritating to me. My first child is a fabulous eater...always has been. She loves veggies, she tries new foods willingly...she digs up weird looking stuff in the produce section and asks if she can try it. She whines for me to buy fresh aspargus and artichokes. She loves fresh spinach salads and turnip greens. I *love* that she is such a good eater. My two much-younger brothers were terrible eaters well into their teens. I have irritating memories of them pouting and refusing to eat at any restaurant that didn't have chicken nuggests on the menu. I swore that would never be my child, and I held Maria up as evidence that kids *can* love a variety of foods, and of course I chalked this up to my superb parenting. And then I had Jack. Jack, to my knowledge, has never actually eaten a vegetable...unless you count french fries as a vegetable. A few have crossed his lips when I've managed to sneak them in, but he promptly spews them back out. If you put a vegetable on his high chair tray, he will grab your hand and place it back on your palm. I can list the foods he will eat.

cheese
yogurt
ice cream
milk
mac and cheese
scrambled eggs
peanut butter sandwiches
cookies
crackers (of the saltine, tortilla chip, and goldfish variety)
cake
grapes
pears
toast
bananas
pizza
doughnuts

I really think that's it. Oh, and french fries of course. I am at a loss. He seems to be getting more picky instead of less! He used to eat spaghetti, chicken, apples,,,he won't now. No vegetables, ever. I think he ate pureed sweet potatoes a couple of times as a baby, but that's it. He seems to have an especially deep affinity for junk food too. He sniffs at and usually turns down almost anything you offer him, but if the food up for grabs happens to be a cookie or cracker of any kind he will barely glance at it before shoving it in his mouth. It always baffled me when he was a younger toddler that he would regard almost any food I pushed at him as suspicious and usually refuse to eat it, but later that same afternoon while at the park I'd be fishing cigarette butts and bugs out of his mouth. No accounting for taste....