This month, our Yahoo! Motherboard topic is “Getting Your Kids to Eat Healthy Foods”, which is a coincidence since I’m also working on ClubMum.net, which is all about getting kids to want to do things that are good for them.
In general, my family eats pretty well. We try hard not to purchase food that’s bad for us and avoid most foods with high-fructose corn syrup. But there are things my kids love, and I do allow them treats. For us, fruit is a dessert, and frequently my kids are happy with an apple, berries, banana, or my daughter’s personal favorite – frozen mangoes.
For school lunches, we purchase a wide variety of healthy snacks, and then let our kids choose from a few different choices. We generally have wheat crackers, fruit, cheese sticks, and yogurt available for them.
The biggest issue we have is getting my kids to eat vegetables. It’s nearly impossible – with the exception of cucumbers and carrots, they pretty much refuse anything with veggies in it. I’m at a total loss… any help or advice with that?
Photo credit: Jen DeCesari
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As for “sneaking” veggies in, I want to teach my kids the importance of veggies, so I don’t try to hide them. I dress them up. I chop up veggies into really small pieces and include them in our spaghetti sauce once a week (carrots, mushrooms, peppers, onions, broccoli, zucchini…if you saute them for a long time, the texture changes which is what a lot of kids don’t like about veggies). I also make a cold pasta salad (using fun shaped pasta) and chop up tomatoes, peppers, cucumber, you name it. Throw some champagne salad dressing on and even a little rotisserie chicken. Dipping also makes veggies more appealing to my kids, even if they’re cooked. You can dip in salsa which is healthier, but ranch is a favorite around our house (and since my kids are underweight, we go for it). I’ve also heard there are now yogurts with veggies in them.
I look forward to hearing other people’s ideas!