What is served on the plate of lunch must "disappear" in the tummy before anything else is served. IF you finish your meal (meat, veggie, grain) then you may have another plate of food if you are hungry - dessert which is applesauce or yogurt and there is usually a cookie/cracker/wafer type of thing on the plate too.

My philosophy is to in a sense goad the picky ones into eating or at least attempting and if they make a good stab at it they get dessert with me gradually insisting on more and more to be eaten before I will remove the plate. But at the same time a child that eats it all is likely still hungry - hence the additional food. And if a child isn't hungry enough for the first plate of food it would be very rude of me to offer them even more food.

Those who don't want to eat sit at the table till the others are done. There is absolutely no getting down from the table since it is lunch time not playtime. If they start making messes with the food it is removed to the counter and they sit with nothing. Food is not a toy either.