This paper identifies trends in children's cookbooks for nutrition messages, cultural content, and food themes according to food guidance of the time. Except for those developed in government-sponsored nutrition programs since the 1970s, children's cookbooks seemingly have a preponderance of high-calorie dessert and party/fun recipes and limited vegetable recipes. In the past 150 years, the science of nutrition has grown from a focus on nitrogen to one on multiple nutrients and their interrelationships. Foods in the market have diversified in number and form, and a children's nutrition specialty has been introduced and expanded in many dimensions-including in the publishing of children's books. Because children's early food choices influence both their growth and health, factors impacting food choices need to receive more attention.