Kids have minds of their own and they aren’t always easily persuaded. Meal times can either be a pleasure or a nightmare. If you’re conscious of giving your children healthy options at meal times, you may be discouraged when they turn them all down. If your child constantly refuses to eat vegetables, it can be disheartening. Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to encourage your children to eat healthy meals. Here are a few.
Shape Cutters
Have you noticed that your child won’t eat a carrot but will happily devour a cookie in the shape of a dinosaur? Shape cutters can be life savers when you want your child to choose the healthy option. Cutting vegetables into small shapes or characters they love can make mealtime more fun.
If you haven’t got shape cutters to hand, try and turn the plate of food into a smiley face instead. Who can eat the smile first?
Soup
For children, it’s often less about the taste and more about the texture of food. Perhaps your child hates the sliminess of onions or the roughness of broccoli. Making your own soup is a fantastic way to choose healthy ingredients and control what you eat according to your family’s likes and dislikes.
Butternut squash soup with coconut milk is a firm favorite with young children, especially around Halloween when pumpkins and butternut squash are at their best.
Get Them Involved
It can help children to know where their food came from and how it was made. Letting your children pick the vegetables and cook with you is an excellent way to give them some control over their meal times when so much is dictated to them. It’s also one of the best ways to work up an appetite.
Let your children make some of the decisions. For example, ‘should we have carrots or peas tonight?’ allows them some control while still having to eat their vegetables.
Offer a Variety
When there are a variety of healthy foods on the plate, your child is more than likely to eat at least one of them. One of the best ways to do this is to offer a favorite food, two healthy things they like, and two healthy things they’ve never tried. Offer lots of praise if your child eats something new.
If your child refuses to eat certain types of vegetables, keep putting a taste on their plates. More often than not, most children will eat what’s available to them with a little persistence.
Set a Good Example
You can’t be disappointed with your child for not eating vegetables if you do the same thing. Set a good example by eating a variety of healthy foods at the dinner table, in front of your children. Seeing you eat healthy meals will encourage them to do the same.
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