Super-Sizing Healthy Food Makes Kids Eat More of It

Children tend to eat more of a food if they see more of it on their plates.  This "super-sizing" has been seen as a bad thing.  Fast food restaurants have been blamed for providing huge portions, which cause people to eat more unhealthy food.

But what if we could turn "super-sizing" on its head?  What if we could help our children eat more of a healthy food by super-sizing it?

A recent study found that serving children double portions of fruits and vegetables made them eat 37% more vegetables and a whopping 70% more fruit!


Give Your Child Super-Sizes of Healthy Foods

If you are serving vegetables, fruit, or other healthy foods for dinner, try giving your child a big, adult-sized portion.  You may be surprised that she focuses on eating this big portion, rather than the other less healthy items on her plate.


This Technique Only Works If Your Child Already Likes the Food

If your child hates spinach, and sees a huge glob of it on her plate, she will not eat more.  If anything, she may be repelled by the large pile that takes up half her plate.

Start by teaching your child to like the food by using these techniques.  Once your child likes the food (or at least thinks it's ok), then give her larger portions of it.

Give Your Child Less of the Main Dish and More Fruits and Vegetables


Another study has found that giving children less of a main dish, like macaroni and cheese, made children eat more of the healthy fruits and vegetables that accompanied it.  Give your child a healthy main dish, but make sure it's a child-sized portion.  You don't want your child filling up on the main dish and leaving the extra healthy fruits and vegetables untouched.

Doesn't Serving Big Portions of Fruits and Vegetables Waste Food?

Frugal or environmentally conscious parents might object that giving your child big portions may waste food.  Although your child will eat more of the food if the portions are big, she may also leave more on her plate than she would if she were served a child-sized portion.

You can finish off your child's extra food yourself.  Your child will see you eating it and will be even more convinced that the food is tasty because Dad or Mom is eating it with gusto.

Related Articles
25 Ways to Get Your Child to Eat Vegetables
The One-Bite Suggestion: Help for Picky Eaters

See the Latest Article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter.

Just Say No to the Kid's Menu

It happens every time.  You sit down with your family at a restaurant and the server gives your child a children's menu -- full of games, puzzles, and...yes...junk food!

As unhealthy as many restaurants are, the least healthy food is reserved for the children.  Hamburgers, fries, hot dogs, soda, and loads of sweets.  Our growing children, who need a greater percentage of vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients to thrive, are served a lower concentration of these valuable chemicals than we, the parents, are!

Food on Children's Menus is High in Fat

The food on children's menus averages almost 50% fat.  Ironically, fast food children's menus have a slightly lower percentage of fat than sit down restaurants.  But both are loaded with fat.

Some fats are fine, and even healthy for children.  Olive oil, nuts, and seeds are healthy fats.  The fat in children's menus, however, comes mostly from saturated fats (meats, butterfat) or oil from deep frying (which can cause cancer by producing dangerous acrylamides and other oxidation products).

Food on Children's Menus is Repetitive

No matter how exotic and exciting a restaurant is, the children's menu has the same tired set of options.  Hamburgers, hot dogs, pizza, and macaroni & cheese.

If you wanted to teach your child the times tables, you wouldn't have her study the "two times" equations after she had already learned them.  If you want to teach your child to like a wide variety of healthy foods, you shouldn't keep teaching her the "hamburger" lesson over and over again.  She isn't learning a thing about the taste of new foods.  And giving your child the same foods over and over again can make her into a picky eater.

Food on Children's Menus is Overly Sweet

Children's menus usually come with soda or dessert.  What calories aren't taken up by fat are taken up by sugar!

Food on Children's Menus Have Very Little Fruits, Vegetables, or Other Healthy Foods

Your child can easily eat half her daily calories in one kid's meal without eating a single fruit, vegetable, or other healthy food.   Restaurant owners know that most children haven't learned to like fruits and vegetables, so they omit them from the kid's menu.

Alternatives to the Children's Menu

1. Tell your child that kid's menus are for babies.  Every child wants to be a big kid.  When the server hands your child a kid's menu, tell her that these menus are for babies and toddlers who haven't learned how to eat grown-up food yet.  She can enjoy the puzzles and the crayons, but can happily choose her food from the adult menu.


2. Split a meal with your child.  If the meals are too big, you and your child can decide on a meal that you both like and then split it.  Ask the server for a plate for your child.


3. Eat family style.  Order a few dishes and then allow everyone to take what they want from the dishes.  Your server can bring plates for all of you. 


4. Take food home.  Let your child order a meal off the grown-up menu, and then take the remainder home.  She can enjoy another serving a few days later, which will help her become even more familiar with the dish.

Related Articles

Children Like the Food They Grow Up With
Junk Food Diet May Cause Autism Through Insulin Resistance

See the Latest Article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter. 

5 Little-Known Ways to Help Your Overweight Child Lose Weight

Obesity in children has been increasing by leaps and bounds in the past few decades.  1/3 of American children are now overweight or obese. 1/4 of British children are overweight or obese. 

Policymakers tell parents to feed their children less and get them to exercise more.  This advice is accurate, but leaves many parents shaking their heads and saying "But how exactly do I get my child to eat less and exercise more?"

Some well-meaning parents put their overweight children on a diet.  But forcing an overweight child to go hungry will backfire.  Overweight children often have strong instincts protecting them from famine.  Triggering a "famine" by forcing them to diet can make them crave food -- especially high calorie food -- even more.  Their brains are now on alert because they have experienced the threat of starvation, and try to protect the children by making them put on more fat stores by eating lots of high calorie food.

The only permanent solution to obesity is to teach your overweight child to like foods that don't cause obesity.

Here are 5 little-known tips to help your child make the transition to liking healthy foods.

Tip 1: Stop All Junk Food Right Away

Children (and lab animals!) who are given junk food will inevitably choose the junk food over healthy food.  Overweight children are especially susceptible to this.  If junk food is removed, children (and animals) will actually go hungry for days before eating the healthy food.

Your child has little or no chance of learning to like healthy food if he is also eating junk food.  The healthy food simply won't taste good.

Stop buying sweets, chips, fast food, and processed food.  Your child will complain for a while, but in a month or two he will adjust to his new diet and like it just as well as he liked the junk food.

Tip 2: Give Your Child 5 Servings of Vegetables Per Day


Vegetables are the lowest in calorie density of all foods.  Make sure your child gets 5 servings of vegetables a day.  Give him vegetables for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks.  And make sure they taste good.  You can search for highly-rated recipes online.

Tip 3: Only Give Your Child Milk, Water, and Herb Teas to Drink

Your child's brain does something astounding when your child drinks.  It assumes that all liquid is water!  This means that your child's brain does not register calories in liquids! 

If your child drinks 200 calories per day in soda, it will not decrease his appetite.  He will eat as much as if he didn't drink the soda.

This means that he will be taking in 200 extra calories a day!!

Scientists have found that soda is one of the biggest predictors of childhood obesity.

Only give your child milk, water, or unsweetened no-calorie drinks like tea.  Your child's brain does recognize the calories in milk, perhaps because it is a substance that humans have always drunk.  Sugar-sweetened beverages are simply too new in our evolutionary history.


Tip 4: Don't Give Your Young Child Choices Around Food

Even a normal weight child will make poor food choices.  Overweight children, however, are victims of their brains, which are compelling them to eat large amounts of high calorie food. 

Don't let your child browse in the kitchen.  Feed him the same food that you feed the other members of the family. 

You may experience a month or so of rebellion because your child is used to demanding food at the grocery store or browsing through the refrigerator when he’s at home.  If you allow no exceptions, however, your child will accept the new rules within a month or two. 

Once your child is a teenager, you’ll need to teach him to make wise decisions around food.  At this point, give him the responsibility of making food decisions for himself and the family.  Allow him to choose the menu for the family dinner, as long as the foods are healthy.  Teach him to cook quick, healthy meals full of whole grains, fruits, and vegetables.

Tip 5: Feed your child a variety of foods over the long term, but limit variety each day.

Human beings eat more food if there are a variety of dishes spread before them.  You probably notice that you eat a lot of food at a buffet, where you can sample many tasty items.

You'll want to teach your child to like many different varieties of healthy foods, so you'll want to give him many different dishes in the long term.  But limit the number of foods he eats for meals to two or three.

Related Articles

Cure Your Junk Food Kid in 6 Weeks


See the Latest Article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter. 

Is My Child Too Thin? He May Just Look Thin Compared to Today's Kids

Children Are Getting Fatter

A recent study found that kindergarteners today are much heavier than they were in the 1970s and 1980s.

There are more obese children and fewer thin children.  The average-weight children are fatter than they used to be.

What Seems Normal Is Really Too Fat

One consequence of this is that parents who have a healthy weight child may think that their child is too thin.  We all have a natural tendency to think that what we see as average is good.  Since the average weight has gone up, a child who was average 10, 20, or 50 years ago may be seen as too thin today.   Adults around him may try to fatten him up by pressuring him to eat more.

Look at Children in Old Movies and TV Shows

A fun way to notice your own bias is to look at movies and TV shows from the 1940s or 1050s, when people were of a healthier weight.

Really look at the children in these shows.  These children look very thin!  But they aren't.  This is the healthy weight of a normal child.

Your Child is Probably Not Too Thin

With rare exceptions, if you have a thin child, he is probably not unhealthy.  If your child eats healthy food, he is probably getting enough nutrients.

If your child is extremely thin, has lost weight recently, or you think he may have a feeding or eating disorder, check with your doctor.

Don't Feed Thin Children Junk Food to Fatten Them Up

Thin children who eat junk food have a double whammy -- they aren't getting as many calories AND those calories don't contain enough vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients, and other healthy chemicals.  Stick to a healthy diet, filled with whole grains, vegetables, fruits, and other healthy foods.

Ignore Weight Charts for Your Thin Child

Weight charts are based on current statistics.  That means that as children get fatter, what is considered "underweight" will get higher and higher.  If your child is in the 10th percentile for today, he may have been average if he had been born 50 years ago.

Related Articles

The One-Bite Suggestion: Help for Picky Eaters
Feeding Your Child Healthy Food Now Can Help Him Years Later

See the Latest Article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter.

Does Banning Sugar and Junk Food Make Kids Want It More?

The most effective way to teach your child to love healthy food is also the simplest -- Give your child healthy food and don't give her junk food.  Children have an instinct to like food that they're used to.  They will learn to like healthy food because it's familiar.  And they won't like junk food as much because they aren't used to it.

Unfortunately, there is another instinct that children have that makes banning junk food difficult.  Children have a perverse desire to like things that are banned.  They become curious and want the forbidden fruit.

If you forbid junk food and sweets it may make your child want them even more. 

What can a parent do to get out of this dilemma?

Don't Keep Junk Food in the House

If you keep junk food in the house, but don't let your child have any, it will make her want it more.  She will see the package of Milky Ways in the top cupboard but she won't be able to get at them.  Her desire for the forbidden Milky Ways will grow and grow.  If she finally gets a chance to eat them, she will stuff herself until she is sick.

Scientists have found that showing children a food -- but not letting them have it -- makes them want it more.  They will work harder to get the food. 

It's Easier to Have No Junk Food in the House Than to Have It Occasionally

If your child knows that the top cupboard occasionally has cookies in it, every time she looks at the top cupboard she will think about cookies.  It's actually easier to make your house a no-junk-food zone than to cut down on the junk food.  Your child simply won't think about sweets and junk food when she's at home. 

Don't Eat Junk Food in Front of Your Child

If your child sees you eating doughnuts, but she can't have any, she will really want them.  It will kick off her instinct to like forbidden fruit and it will also kick off her instinct to eat what someone else is eating.

If you are determined to raise a child who likes healthy food, you'll need to eat the same healthy food yourself.  Change begins with the parent.  If you have a weakness for rocky road ice cream, hide it in the back of the freezer and eat it after your child goes to bed.

Have a Casual Attitude Towards Junk Food Outside the Home


We live in a junk food culture, and when your child goes to friends' houses, buffets, or parties, she will be inundated with junk food.

Let your child occasionally eat junk food when she is outside the home.  If you forbid your child to eat birthday cake at a party, you will make it into forbidden fruit.  She will also feel like an outsider.

Convey the attitude that junk food and sweets are simply not something that your family buys and brings into the house.  Give the impression that your family simply isn't interested in junk food.

Your No-Junk-Food Child Might DESIRE Junk Food More, But Not LIKE It More


If your child rarely gets sweets or junk food, she may seem to like them more because she gets excited when there are brownies or cupcakes at a party.  Her friends are more casual about it because they eat desserts every day.

Don't mistake this excitement for actually liking the dessert more.  Since she only has it rarely, even if she doesn't really like it, she will feel cheated if she doesn't grab it when it's there.


A Sneaky Trick You Can Use
You can take advantage of your child's instinct to be interested in things that are forbidden.  You can lure your child into trying turnips, for example, by eating them in front of her and saying "No, these are only for me.  You can't have any."  She will immediately beg for a turnip.  After protesting for a while, you can say "Well, ok." and give her some.

Related Articles


Why Children Like Processed Food and What Your Can Do About It
Children Like the Food They Grow Up With

See the Latest Article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter.

Use Tasty or Yucky Facial Expressions to Get Your Child to Like Healthy Foods

Yummy Face

Yucky Face

Children learn which kinds of food to eat by observing their parents.  This is an ancient instinct.  In prehistoric times, there were many wild plants that were poisonous. If a child simply ate whatever he found growing on the ground, he would die of poisoning.  Children look to adults to find out if a food is edible and tasty or yucky and poisonous.

You may have discovered this already.  If Uncle Jim comes to dinner and refuses to eat his asparagus, this attitude can spread like a cold virus throughout your family.  Soon all your children are leaving piles of uneaten asparagus on their plates. 

Children Look at Yucky and Yummy Facial Expressions

One way children tell whether an adult likes a food or not is to look at his facial expression.  If the adult is relishing his food with a blissful expression, it is probably tasty.  If the adult has his upper lip and nose curled up in an expression of disgust, it is probably repulsive.

A recent study found that young children liked a food better if it was being eaten by someone who had an "mmm...good" smile, and disliked a food if it was being eaten by someone who had a "yucky" disgusted expression. 


A Trick to Getting Your Child to Like Healthy Foods

When your child is eating a healthy food, eat the same food yourself and make a "yummy" expression.  Children can see through fake expressions, so really try to enjoy the food yourself and let a natural "yum" expression come to your face.  You can say something like "Mmm...this asparagus is really good." to emphasize it and to get your child to look at your face.

Remember, if your child catches on, this technique will backfire.  If he thinks he's being manipulated into eating a healthy food, he will think that it's not tasty enough to eat for its own merits.  So use this technique sparingly, and try to be genuine in your own appreciation.

A Trick to Getting Your Child NOT to Like Unhealthy Foods

If your child is eating a food that isn't healthy, you can express your opinion by putting on a yucky expression while he's eating it.

Try to be genuine here as well.  It may not be difficult, given the disgusting junk that food manufacturers make for children!  When my son poured his Halloween candy out on the counter, there were chewy eyeballs and "fruit" flavored chalky candies that made me cringe with disgust just looking at them!  I made a few comments about how disgusting they were and he never ate them.

Of course you'll want to respect your child while you're doing this.  Sitting in front of a poor kid who's eating an ice cream cone and flashing disgusted faces isn't polite or kind!  But occasionally, if there is an unhealthy food that really is pretty disgusting, feel free to let your opinion express itself on your face!

Related Articles

Children Like the Food They Grow Up With
The One-Bite Suggestion: Help For Picky Eaters


See The Latest Article...

Why Children Like Processed Food and What You Can Do About It

If you're like many parents, you may try to cook tasty, healthy meals for your child.  But you may feel like your own home-cooked meals can't compete with processed junk food -- food made in a factory or a fast food restaurant. Your child picks at the lasagna, salad, and whole wheat garlic bread that you make, and then eats her weight in McDonald's french fries or Doritos.

Processed food is the scourge of the modern world.  It can cause obesity, diabetes, heart disease, Alzheimer's, autism, and even permanently lower the intelligence of your child.  Why do children like it so much?

Processed Food Comes in Pretty, Fun Packages

Part of the reason children like processed food is the packaging.  Manufacturers will try to win your child's trust and interest by putting your child's favorite cartoon character on the package.  They spend millions on commercials that make their food seem exciting and fun.

One of their goals is to get your child to have brand loyalty.  Researchers found that children liked food better if it had McDonald's branding on it, especially if the children watched a lot of TV and saw commercials for McDonald's.


What To Do  Don't let your child watch TV commercials.  Manufacturers don't care about your child -- they are only interested in making money.  Commercials are the reason why TV causes obesity.  There are plenty of alternatives to commercial TV -- PBS, Netflix, pay-per-view, or DVDs rented from the library.

You can also try to make your homemade food look pretty and fun.  Make faces, animals, or trees with your vegetables and fruit.  There are many great books that can give you ideas for food art.

Give healthy foods cute names.  A recent study found that calling healthy foods names like Emerald Dragon Bites made children like them more.

Processed Food Tastes the Same -- There Are No Surprises

One package of Doritos Cool Ranch chips tastes exactly like another.  Compare this to carrots.  Each carrot tastes slightly different -- one may be sweet, one might be bitter, one might be crisp, one might be soft.

Children feel safer if their food tastes exactly the same.  Our primitive ancestors used their sense of taste to determine whether food was rotten or spoiled.  If a mushroom tasted different from usual, your primitive ancestor quickly spat it out.

Processed food has such a uniform flavor that it teaches children to be afraid of food that has variability.  Your child expresses this fear by being picky, and refusing real foods with real variations in taste and texture.


What To Do  The less experience your child has with processed food, the more she will like the taste of real foods, and the more accepting of the natural variations that occur in real food.  Keep on making those home-cooked meals! 


Processed Food is High in Fat, Sugar, and Salt

It will come as no surprise to you that processed food tends to be high in fat, sugar, and salt.  Children will immediately like fatty, sweet, and salty food.  They have to learn to like the taste of real foods over time.

Manufacturers rely on fatty, sweet, and salty tastes partly because it is difficult to make processed food have tasty flavors.  The complex, natural flavor of an apple, cantaloupe, or peach will deteriorate if it is exposed to oxygen and light.  Most processed foods don't really taste that good -- we think that they do because they have addictive tastes of fat, sweet, and salt.  Close your eyes the next time you eat something out of a package, and think about the flavor -- not whether it's salty, sweet, or crunchy, but the flavor.  It is often bland, insipid, or unpleasant.  A twinkie really doesn't taste good -- it just has a lot of fat and sugar.

What To Do You can capitalize on the fact that manufacturers can't mimic tasty flavors.  If you continue to feed your child homemade food, and avoid processed food, then years later your child will think processed, manufactured tastes are yucky.  The imitation apple flavor of a lollipop won't compare with a real apple. 

Related Articles

Cure Your Junk Food Child in 6 Weeks
10 Ways Food Manufacturers Hijack Your Child's Brain
Let Your Child Smell Flavorful Foods
25 Ways to Get Your Child to Eat Vegetables

Find me on Facebook or Twitter.
See the Latest Article...

Hunger Makes Food Tasty

Hunger makes the pleasure of eating much stronger.  Food tastes wonderful!

When your child is hungry, foods that she normally dislikes will taste good.  Foods that she is normal neutral about will taste great!  If your child didn't eat anything all day, biting into a normally disliked tomato would be a blissful experience.

Children Learn to Like Foods That They Eat When They're Hungry

Your child will grow to like foods that she eats when she is hungry, because the food tastes especially good.

If your child always eats chocolate bars when she is hungry, she will grow to love chocolate bars.  If your child eats carrot sticks when she is hungry, she will grow to love carrot stocks.

Give Your Child Healthy Foods When She is Hungry

When your child is hungry, give her foods that you want her to learn to like.  Follow up with foods that she is already familiar with, or foods that are less nutritious.

Snacks Should Be Healthy

Think about what many parents feed their children for snacks, when they are hungry between meals.  Cookies, chips, and granola bars!  Food companies even market this food as "snack food."

When parents feed their children sugary, high fat treats when they are hungry at snack time, it trains their brains to love these treats.  A hundred years ago, children also occasionally ate treats, like fresh pies, but they were almost always given at the end of the meal as desserts.

Snack time is perfect for teaching your child to like healthy foods like vegetables and fruits, or foods that are new to your child.

Tips

1. Set out an appetizer tray with vegetables and dip while you finish preparing dinner.
2. Serve dessert last when your child is no longer hungry.
3. If you're trying to teach your child to like a food, like broccoli, give it to her when she's hungry.
4. If your child is a picky eater and you're trying to get her to like more foods, feed her new, unfamiliar foods first.

Related Articles

Cure Your Junk Food Kid in 6 Weeks
How to Introduce a New Food So Your Kid Loves It

See the Latest Article...

Why Children Don't Like Vegetables -- And What You Can Do About It

It seems like Nature has played a nasty trick on parents.  Vegetables are some of the healthiest foods, but they are also the hardest foods to get children to like. 

Why is this?  Why do children dislike vegetables so much?  Can parents do anything about it?

Human beings developed their innate taste preferences hundreds of thousands of years ago.  In prehistoric times people were in danger of starving.  Overly sweet, high-fat food was an extremely rare find.  Humans developed instincts to shun the plentiful vegetables and crave the rare treats of honey, high-fat grubs, or bone marrow fat which would keep them alive during famines.
  
Children can still learn to like vegetables, but they are an acquired taste.

Here are some reasons why children don't like vegetables, and what you can do to counter them.

Vegetables are Low in Calories

Most vegetables are extremely low in calories.  A cup of cauliflower has 25 calories.  A cup of M&Ms has 1023 calories.

All humans have an instinct to overeat sugary, fatty calorie dense food.  Children, however, have an especially strong instinct to eat them because children are growing and have a greater need for calories.  Scientists have found that children who were growing liked the taste of extremely sweet foods more than children who weren't.  It's no wonder that children like foods that are so sickeningly sweet that most adults would find them disgusting.

Vegetables are on the other end of the spectrum.  They are extremely low in calories.  A prehistoric child who filled up on vegetables would not get enough calories to survive and grow. 

What You Can Do  Add fats to vegetables.  Nut butters, olive oil, cheese, and butter are all fats that you can use. If you're worried about your child getting too much fat, remember that children have a higher fat requirement than adults.  Your child should be getting a medium-fat (not low-fat) diet.  You can balance out the high-fat dishes with lower calorie foods elsewhere and still give your child a medium-fat diet.  Concentrate on healthy fats like nuts or olive oil.

Vegetables are Bitter

Human beings have an instinct to avoid bitter tasting foods.  Scientists think that our bitter receptors evolved to detect poisons in foods, many of which are bitter alkaloids.

Children like bland, sweet, and salty foods the first time they taste them. Bitter foods are acquired tastes.

The first time you ever tasted black coffee or beer, you probably thought they were disgustingly bitter.  After drinking them a few times, however, you came to love the taste.  Your brain "learned" that coffee and beer were not poisonous, even though they had a bitter taste.

What You Can Do  Your child needs to "acquire" the taste of vegetables.  He needs to eat them often.  Feed your child vegetables at least three times a day.  Over the course of a year, he will get 1000 "lessons" in acquiring the taste of vegetables.  The poor kid next door, who only gets vegetables a few times a week, will only get 100 lessons, and may never learn to like the bitter taste of vegetables.

Vegetables Have Strong Tastes

Imagine taking a bite of white bread.  It has an extremely mild taste.  It's almost hard to discern a taste at all, except "starchy."

Now imagine taking a bite of raw broccoli.  Broccoli has a very strong taste.

Foods with strong tastes have more chemicals in them.  Your child's brain distrusts these chemicals because they could be poisonous.  Of course we know that domesticated plants are not poisonous, and many plant chemicals are extremely healthy antioxidants and beneficial phytochemicals.  But your child's brain is still in the Stone Age, when many plants were poisonous.

What You Can Do Your child's brain has a technique for testing foods for poisonous chemicals.  Your child eats a tiny amount and then waits a few days to see if it's poisonous.  If, after a few days, your child does not feel sick, he may eat a little more and see if the bigger portion is poisonous.

Feed your child a new vegetable every few days for 12 to 15 times.  At this point, he should like it.  If he doesn't, wait six months or so and try again.

Vegetables Are Fibrous

Processed food has easy-to-eat textures that most kids like immediately.  Crunchy, creamy, bready are all textures that are easy to eat.

Vegetables can be fibrous.  Celery has strings that are hard to break apart.  Raw cauliflower is very hard, and chewing breaks it apart into many small hard pieces.

Children have an instinct to avoid textures that are unfamiliar and hard to eat, because these foods may cause choking. If your child is not used to vegetables, he may unconsciously be afraid that the fibrous textures may choke him.

What You Can Do  The more vegetables your child eats, the easier it will be for him to chew and swallow them.  Give your child lots of vegetables, both raw and cooked.  After a while he will be an expert vegetable-chewer!

Vegetables Are Mushy

Some vegetables, like tomatoes, okra, or cucumbers, have a mushy, slimy texture.  Human beings have an instinct to avoid mushy, slimy textures because rotten foods have this texture.

What You Can Do Your child will learn to ignore the mushy, slimy textures if he is given many vegetables with this consistency.  Give your child tomatoes, okra, cucumbers, and other slimy vegetables often.  Make sure they are in tasty recipes. See more on slimy and mushy tastes.

Related Articles
 
25 Ways to Get Your Child to Eat Vegetables
How to Introduce a New Food So Your Kid Loves It
Vegetables and Dips: Tasty and Fun For Kids

See the latest article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter.

Eating Your Children's Food Will Make Them Like It More!

This article is about a strange technique for getting your young child to like a food.  To make your child like her food, you should eat it yourself!

I'm not talking about eating the same KIND of food.  I'm talking about eating the actual food off their plates!

There are two versions of this technique. 

The Tricky "I Want Your Food" Technique

Imagine that you've served your toddler a healthy meal of vegetable frittata and grapes.  Your toddler eats the frittata, but leaves the grapes.  You're not surprised -- you know that your little sweetums is not a grape lover.

"Oh, YES!" you say, using your best acting skills.  "I'm so glad you didn't eat your grapes because I LOVE grapes!"

Grab her plate and wolf down the grapes, making suitable relishing noises.

If your child is like most children, this will tell her 2 things:

1. Grapes are tasty because Mom (or Dad) is loving them.
2. Someone has taken my grapes away and is enjoying them.  I WANT THEM BACK!

Children have a paradoxical desire to like things that other people take from them, even if they hated them a second ago.  Heaven help the parent who, within the sight of their child, throws away a cheap toy that their child no longer plays with.  Immediately it becomes the favorite toy!

Use this technique sparingly, and only for young children who aren't sophisticated enough to catch on that you're only pretending.

The Loving "We're Sharing This Food" Technique

Children have a natural instinct to eat the same foods as their parents.  You can see this same instinct in many mammals.  A young fawn will push its mother's nose aside and eat the same plants that its mothers was eating.

You can (and should) encourage this instinct by eating the same foods as your child.

However, to really take advantage of this instinct, eat from the same plate as your baby or toddler.  Share a plate of food with your child.  You can sit your child in your lap so she can see the food. Your child's brain will definitely get the message that you and she are eating the same food!

Sharing a plate is a cozy, comfy, and fun thing to do.  Your child will associate the taste of grapes with the warmth of your lap, and will like them more as a result.

Our Primitive Ancestors Shared Their Food

People a long time ago (and today in some cultures) ate from the same plates.  It is a time-honored way of teaching children to eat the same food as the rest of the tribe or family.  It added motivation to eat in the form of mild competition (if I don't eat this then brother will get it) and role modeling.

What About Germs?

You may be concerned that sharing plates will spread germs.  This is a valid concern.  Young children can catch dangerous germs from their parents, including those that cause cavities.

With a little care, you can share a plate and still avoid spreading germs.  Avoid touching your mouth if you're eating finger food.  If you're eating spoon food, use a different spoon for you and for baby, and spoon from different parts of the plate.

What About Table Manners?

You may be concerned that your child will learn bad table manners. You don't want your child grabbing food off Grandma's plate at Thanksgiving!

This technique is for babies and toddlers.  You have plenty of time to stop before your child gets old enough to be expected to have table manners.  Don't worry about manners, mess, or mayhem this early in your child's life.  The important thing is to have fun and teach the taste of healthy foods!

Related Articles

Give Your Newborn Baby TASTES of Real Food
Feeding Babies Lumpy Foods Before 9 Months Prevents Picky Eating
Vegetables and Dip: Tasty and Fun for Kids

See the Latest Article...

Feeding Babies Lumpy Foods Before 9 Months Prevents Picky Eating

Your baby has made the transition to "solid" food.  She opens her mouth like a little baby bird whenever she sees a spoonful of jarred baby food.

But now you're wondering "When do I start feeding her lumpy food?  When do I put the purees behind and feed her food with some texture?"  Is your baby ready for the next step?  How will you know when she is?

Babies Gag When They Encounter a New Texture

You decide to experiment.  You mash a banana, leaving almost imperceptible lumps.  Your baby opens her mouth, takes the banana, and then...gag...choke...!  As a new parent, you're terrified!  You try frantically to remember the baby Heimlich maneuver.

Your baby spits out the banana.  "Well," you think, "That's an obvious sign.  She just isn't ready."

Babies Need to Learn New Textures

What you may not realize is that many babies gag when they experience a new texture.  They need to learn to swallow new textures, and this learning takes time.

The banana encounter was a first lesson for your baby.  Even though it seemed to end badly, your baby did experience the feeling of slightly lumpy food.  She may spit out lumpy food dozens of times, but each time is a new lesson.  Over time she will feel more comfortable.

If Your Baby Does Not Learn to Eat Lumpy Textures Before 9 Months, She May Be a Picky Eater for Years

Why not avoid all the drama and wait until a baby is developed enough so that she doesn't have to go through dozens of texture lessons?

There is a very good reason not to wait.

Studies like this one have found that parents who wait until their babies are 9 months old before introducing lumpy textures have children who, at seven years old, eat many fewer foods, including fruits and vegetables!  In other words, these children have been made into picky eaters!

It's amazing that just a few months difference in timing can create fussy eaters six years later!

How Our Ancestors' Babies Learned to Eat Solid Food

The original solid food came, not from a jar, but from the mother chewing up food in her mouth and giving it to her baby.  This food was "naturally" textured.

I'm not advocating chewing food for your baby.  But it's nice to know that for hundreds of thousands of years, babies' first solid food was lumpy, and they did just fine.

Start at 6 Months

You can start serving lumpy food to your baby at 6 months.  Start with tiny, soft lumps and slowly work your way up. 

Your baby may accept lumpy food better if it is mixed in a puree that she loves.  So if she's a carrot fan, mix small lumps into her carrot baby food.

If you have been trying for weeks to give your baby lumpy food and she still gags and chokes, check with your physician.  She may have an oral motor issue that can be helped by a visit to a speech pathologist.

Related Links

Give Your Newborn Baby Tastes of Real Food
Feeding Your Baby Salt Can Make Her Like It For the Rest of Her Life
Children Like the Food They Grow Up With

See the Latest Article...


Find me on Facebook or Twitter.

What To Do With All That Halloween Candy?

Halloween is over and your child probably has a huge bag of candy that he's slogging through.  My son Sean got 68 pieces of candy from his trick-or-treating (yes, he counted them!).

At 2 pieces a day, that would mean candy for over two months!  That's a lot of "lessons" in learning to like the taste of candy.

Get Your Child to Happily Give Up His Candy

If you can find a way to get your child to happily give up his candy, you are training him to think that candy isn't that important.  Psychologically, the candy will seem to have less value because it's being traded for something else.

Plus, he won't be getting daily taste lessons in liking the taste of candy.  If a child is exposed to tastes when he is young, he will be more likely to like those tastes later on.

Buy Your Child's Candy

Some kids are very motivated by money.  My son Sean is one of these kids.

On Halloween night, I told Sean that I would buy his small candies for 15 cents each and his big candy bars for 25 cents each.  He got over $10, which was very exciting for him.

Trade It For Toys

Some kids don't value money, but they do value toys.  Buy a bunch of small toys and offer to trade the toys for the candy. 

Give It Away to a Hungry Child

Some kids are motivated by helping other people.  Food banks will take extra Halloween candy.  If your child has a big heart, tell him about the poor hungry children who would love his candy.

Don't Make It Sound Like Candy is Bad

If your child sees candy as a forbidden delicacy, he will only want it more.  Be casual about your motives for buying or giving away the candy.  My son assumed that I was buying the candy for myself and my office.  I didn't confirm or deny it!

Related Articles

When Sugar Becomes Love
Carbonated, Sweetened Soda Linked to Violence


See the Latest Article...

10 Ways to Get Your Child to Eat Whole Grains

Studies show that eating whole grains instead of refined grains lowers the risk of many chronic diseases. While benefits are most pronounced for those consuming at least 3 servings daily, some studies show reduced risks from as little as one serving daily. The message: every whole grain in your diet helps!

The benefits of whole grains most documented by repeated studies include:

• stroke risk reduced 30-36%
• type 2 diabetes risk reduced 21-30%
• heart disease risk reduced 25-28%
• better weight maintenance

Other benefits indicated by recent studies include:

• reduced risk of asthma
• healthier carotid arteries
• reduction of inflammatory disease risk
• lower risk of colorectal cancer
• healthier blood pressure levels
• less gum disease and tooth loss

 (The above was a quote from the Whole Grains Council website)

Switching to whole grains is one of the easiest steps parents can take to teach their children to love healthy food.  Follow these tips to easily switch your kids from processed white to healthy brown!

1. Just do it!  If you completely stop giving your child refined grains and start giving them whole grains, they may not even notice!  Researchers gave children either whole wheat or white flour pancakes at a school cafeteria.  There was no difference in the number of pancakes the children ate!  Expect the switch to be easy!  It very well might be.
2. It's ok if it takes time.  Some children may immediately like the taste of whole grains.  Others may take time.  It takes up to 15 times for a child to like a new food.  It may take much longer for the child to prefer a new kind of food to an old established one.  Just keep serving whole grains.  Eventually your child will think refined are grains boring and tasteless.
3. Pair whole grains with tasty food. Children like a new food better if it's paired with food your child already loves.  If your child loves hamburgers, serve hamburgers with whole wheat buns.  If your child is a PBJ sandwich lover, use whole wheat bread for the sandwich.  You can find pizza with whole wheat crust and whole wheat macaroni and cheese for the pasta lover in your family.
4. Bake with whole grains.   It's hard to say no to a fresh baked muffin. 
5. Find whole grain on-the-go food.  Parents sometimes resort to unhealthy food when they are taking snacks along to zoos and parks.  Whole grains are a better choice.  Bring Triscuits, 100% whole wheat Wheat Thins, popcorn, or corn nuts.
6. Convert the neighbors. Children like foods better if they see their friends eating them.  Gently bring up the topic of whole grains when you're talking to your kid's parents.  You may start a local trend!  If your child sees most of the kids in school eating whole wheat bread sandwiches, he will feel left out if he doesn't have one too.
7. Check the labels. Many foods labeled "whole grain" aren't made with 100% whole wheat.  Always check the ingredients label.  The first ingredient should be whole wheat and there should be no "flour", "wheat flour" or "refined flour". 
8. Eat it yourself.  Children look to their parents as food role models.  Make the switch to whole grains yourself, and your children will follow.  If you don't like whole grains, eat them anyway.  After a few months you'll find your tastes changing.
9. Think about the future of the world.   Cultural changes starts with a few individuals, and spreads to a tipping point where almost everyone has changed.  Fifty years ago a few brave parents sent their children to school with whole wheat sandwiches and now it's not considered unusual.  By joining the parents who are using whole grains you are changing the world in your own small way. 
10. Go to the Whole Grains Council Website.  This website has recipes, tips, and ways to help the world become whole grain eaters.  Join the movement!

Related Articles

Teaching Kids to Like Whole Grains is Easy
25 Ways to Get Your Child to Eat Vegetables
How to Introduce a New Food So Your Kid Loves It

See the Latest Article...

Children Don't Like Mushy, Slimy Textured Foods -- Until They Get Used to Them

Most children love tomato sauce.  Pizza tops the list of favorite foods for most children, and spaghetti is usually not far behind.

Strangely enough, though, fresh tomatoes are one of the least liked foods for children.

How is this possible?  How can children love tomatoes when they are cooked into a tomato sauce, and hate them just as vehemently when they are fresh?

Tomatoes are Slimy

Although there are some subtle taste differences, the main difference between tomato sauce and fresh tomatoes is their texture.  The inside of fresh tomatoes is slimy.  Children don't like this slimy texture.

The Human Brain Thinks that Slimy = Rotten

Most plants become slimy when they start to rot.  Rotten food is less nutritious and may be contaminated with harmful bacteria.

Human beings have a strong instinct to avoid slimy or mushy food.  You may have had the experience of accidentally eating or drinking something that has gone bad and has become slimy.  It probably felt extremely repulsive and you spat it out.  

Another Reason Why Kids Don't Eat Their Vegetables -- The Texture!

Some vegetables and fruits naturally have a slimy texture.  The infamous tomato is one.  Cantaloupe, okra, mushrooms, onions, cucumbers, and grapes are others.

However, most fruits and vegetables are at least a little mushy or slimy.  This is one of the reasons why children often don't like fruits and vegetables.

Children Need More Repetitions to Learn to Eat Slimy Food

Nature gave us the dislike of slimy, mushy textures as a warning.  But our primitive ancestors would have starved to death if they disliked perfectly nutritious, healthy food that just happened to have a slightly slimy or mushy texture.

Your child's mind can learn to love tomatoes, grapes, and other mushy, slimy food.  But she has to learn to like them over time.  Nature made her apprehensive, but provided the means to "test" these foods for rottenness by eating small portions, and then waiting to see whether there were any symptoms of poisoning.

You can teach your child to like tomatoes, cantaloupe, grapes, and all other fruits and vegetables, by giving them to her often.  Her dislike of the slimy textures will dissipate over time.

Processed Food Makes Real Food Textures Seem Strange and Dangerous

Processed food has textures that are the very opposite of slimy.  Processed food is usually crunchy, chewy, or creamy.

Manufacturers strive for these textures because their foods don't have to go through a "trial period" where people's minds wonder whether they are poisonous or not. Processed food manufacturers want their customers to like a food immediately because they may not buy the food again if they don't like it the first time they taste it.

However, if your child eats mostly processed foods, the threshold for a food tasting too slimy or mushy will lower.  Your child's mind will only find processed food textures "safe".  Natural, real food textures will seem disgusting or unappealing.

By giving your child processed foods, you are teaching her to dislike the texture of real foods.

A child who is used to the taste of fruits and vegetables won't notice their slightly slimy textures.  A child who is used to food that is dry, crunchy, chewy, or creamy will notice even the subtlest of slimy textures and push her plate of vegetables away.

If you give your child fresh fruits and vegetables, she will learn to be tolerant of the many textures that fruits and vegetables have.

Very Fresh Vegetables are Less Slimy

Produce usually takes a week or more to get to the supermarket.  In this time, the rotting process begins.  Supermarket fruits and vegetables are more slimy and mushy than fresh picked fruits and vegetables.

If you want to convert your tomato-hater into a tomato lover, try to find extremely fresh tomatoes.  They are very firm and much less mushy inside.

Grow your own plants, or find a farmer's market or community supported agriculture farm. 

Related Articles

25 Ways to Get Your Child to Eat Vegetables

Vegetables and Dip: Tasty and Fun for Kids

See the Latest Article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter.

Children Like the Food They Grow Up With

My husband likes healthy "foodie" foods.  Some of his favorite foods are samosas, hummus and whole wheat crackers, and broccoli.

But when we visit his parents, a strange thing happens.

A bowl full of an unnaturally bright green, jiggly substance makes his eyes light up with happiness.  It's "Perfection Salad"-- lime jello with chopped cabbage and carrots.

I have to tease him about liking a food that is so out of line with his other tastes.  But it makes me think.  Why does he like it?  Not because it inherently tastes good.  He likes it because he ate it when he was a child.

Children Learn Food Preferences Early

Researchers have found that food that children eat before age 3 sets their preferences for the rest of their lives.  Children who eat vegetables in their first 3 years like them as adults.  Children who eat french fries and pop tarts in their first 3 years like them as adults.

Each time you give your baby or toddler a meal, you are teaching him a lesson.  You are teaching him foods that he will habitually reach for 30 years later.

This is a frightening concept because the foods many parents give their children are foods that could kill them 50 years later.  Diet is now the #1 preventable cause of early death.

The Good News: Young Children Are Programmed to Learn New Foods

Babies and toddlers are programmed to learn to like the taste of new foods.  Young babies will accept anything.  Toddlers are pickier (probably Nature's way to ensure that they don't swallow the potentially poisonous things that they cram in their mouths).  However, even toddlers will learn to like foods as long as eat them often enough.

Early childhood can be an exciting time for parents who are determined to give their children a lifelong love of healthy foods.  What you feed your children now can have a huge impact later.  You can teach your children to have good eating habits for the rest of their lives just by giving them the right kind of food.

More Good News: You Control Their Environment

When your children go to school, they can trade food with other kids. When they are teenagers, they can buy their own food.  But when they are babies or toddlers, you can decide exactly what they eat.

Young childhood is a very easy time to teach children to love healthy food.  Just avoid sweets, bland refined grains, and other junk food.  Focus on vegetables, fruits, whole grains, dairy, and healthy unprocessed meats.

What If My Children Are Older Than 3?

What if you've already passed that crucial age?  Is it too late to teach a 6 year old, a 10 year old, or a teenager to like healthy food?

People of all ages can learn to like healthy food if they repeatedly eat the food, and don't eat the junk foods that make real food taste bad.

Even adults can change their taste preferences.  A vegetarian who decides to avoid meat for ethical reasons finds that after several months he doesn't like the taste of meat anymore.  A heart attack victim who switches to a diet full of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains finds that after a while he doesn't miss the hamburger and french fry lunches that he used to love.

If you start when your child is older than 3 it may take longer and not be as complete.  But you can definitely make a huge difference.

What About Teenagers?

Teenagers reach another period where they are open to new tastes.  Their brains are growing and changing rapidly, which makes teenagers receptive to new experiences.

The good news is that teenagers are less picky than younger children.  The bad news is that teenagers usually have the freedom to eat whatever they (or their friends) want.

It's important to have regular family meals with your teenager.  Try to aim for a family breakfast and a family supper.  Your teen will experience at least one or two meals a day of healthy food.

Teach your teen about nutrition (without being preachy).  Related it to something she is interested, like improving her basketball game or reducing acne.  Avoid talking about weight control because it might trigger an eating disorder.

Related Articles

Let Your Child Smell Flavorful Foods
Teach Your Child the Taste of Fresh Food
Family Meals Help Children Like Healthy Foods: Part 1 

See the Latest Article...

When Sugar Becomes Love

Every parent knows that sugar isn't good for kids.  And yet many parents give their children desserts, candy, and soda.  Why do they do this?

One reason is obvious to any adult who has ever given an ice cream cone to a kid.  Sugary treats make kids happy.  A sad or angry kid is immediately turned into a calm, euphoric child, focused only on the taste of the ice cream.  Even a kid who is already in a good mood acquires a look of bliss when she eats a candy bar.

Because sweets make kids so happy, parents may feel mean if they don't give their children sweets.  Why deprive your child of something that makes them happy, just because it isn't healthy?  Why not let them have some fun?  Don't you LOVE your kid?

The Euphoria That Children Get From Sugar is Creepy!

Because sweets are so prevalent in modern cultures, people rarely stop and think about the euphoria that comes from eating sugar.  Isn't it strange that a substance can so suddenly stop your child's bad mood in its tracks? Isn't that look of bliss a little unnatural?  What's really going on?

The reason children love sugar so much is that it acts like a drug.  Like illegal drugs, sugar stimulates both the dopamine system (also triggered by drugs like cocaine) and the opiate system (also triggered by drugs like heroin).

Children who eat sweets repeatedly may actually change the neural workings of their brains.  Scientists aren't sure what the consequences of this are, but it may lead to increased susceptibility to drug addiction, or less of an ability to experience pleasure from other things.

A hundred years ago, parents used to put a splash of whiskey in their babies' bottles.  We shudder at the ignorance of these parents.  And yet, many parents are doing something very similar every day!

Sugar May Make Your Child Unhappy in the Long Term

There is a common pattern with mood-altering drugs.  In the short term, they cause pleasure or happiness.  But the sudden, unnatural surge of neurochemicals causes the brain to react by lessening the ability for those neurochemicals to affect the brain.  In some cases, neurons die from overstimulation (excitotoxic death).  In others, receptors change their sensitivity to the neurochemical (downregulate or upregulate).

What this means is that if your child eats desserts (or takes drugs) she may be less able to feel pleasure or joy with everyday experiences.

So you are trading that one moment when you see your child in bliss for a much longer time when she doesn't enjoy herself -- when play seems boring, regular food seems tasteless, and your hugs don't feel cuddly.

Can I NEVER Give My Child Sweets?

It's not realistic, in today's culture, to never give your child sweets.  Restricting sweets completely may even make your child want them more.

But don't give sweets to your child on a regular basis.  It's probably easiest if you let your child eat the occasional cookie at Grandma's house, or free sample of cake at the supermarket, but avoid sweets at your home.  That way your child won't be thinking about sweets when she's at home.

Related Links

Junk Food Diet May Cause Autism Through Insulin Resistance
Don't Give Your Child Chocolate Milk
When Sugar Becomes Love 

See the Latest Article...

Carbonated, Sweetened Soda Linked to Violence

A recent study found a link between the amount of soda that teenagers drink and how violent these teenagers were.

Teenagers who drank soda almost every day were more likely to carry a weapon and to have been violent towards family or peers.

In studies like these, there is always a question of what caused what.  Does drinking soda cause teenagers to be more violent?  Or do violent teenagers drink more soda?  Or is there some other factor that is causing both soda drinking and violence?

Some possible explanations are:

• Parents who are less responsible will buy their children soda and will be more likely to have violent children
• Depressed teenagers will try to self-medicate with caffeine and sugar.  Sugar causes a temporary lift in mood (although in the long term it may cause mood problems).
• Teenagers who don't care about consequences will eat foods that are unhealthy and will use violence.

The list could go on and on.

However...

One Possible Reason for These Results is that Sugar May Cause Violence

Scientists wait for all the studies to come in before coming to conclusions.

Parents shouldn't wait!!

The excessively sweet food that we eat today has a strong effect on brain neurochemicals.  It is possible that soda may, due to its sugar and/or caffeine content, make children more violent.

There are Many Reasons Not to Buy Your Child Soda

Soda pop drinks are a completely empty source of calories.  They don't teach children to satisfy their thirst with healthy drinks like water, herb teas, or milk.  Giving your child soda in his formative years may make him a lifelong soda drinker.

What To Do

It's easy to stop your child from drinking soda.  Simply don't buy it at the supermarket.  Your child may complain for a while, but his thirst will lead him to healthier drinks.  Eventually he will forget about the taste of soda.  If you or your spouse drink soft drinks, now is a perfect time for you to kick the habit as well.

Related Articles
Don't Give Your Child Chocolate Milk
Feeding Your Child Healthy Food Now Can Help Him Years Later
When Sugar Becomes Love

25 Ways to Get Your Child to Eat Vegetables

Of all the foods, vegetables are the hardest for most kids to learn to like.  This is not surprising.  Vegetables have qualities that make them hard to learn to like.

• They're bitter.  Human beings have a natural aversion to bitter tastes because bitterness is an indication of alkaloids, some of which are poisonous.
• They're low calorie.  Human beings have an instinct to like foods that are high in caloric density.  Our primitive ancestors had to guard against starvation.

This does not mean that your child cannot learn to like vegetables!  It only means that your child has to learn to like vegetables.  It doesn't happen automatically.

These tips will help you to teach your child to overcome his natural aversion to vegetables and learn to love them!

Tips for Babies (and Fetuses!)

1. Eat vegetables in the last third of your pregnancy.  During the last trimester, your fetus is getting a head start on learning the foods that it will be eating for the rest of its life.  Researchers have found that if pregnant women eat carrots, when their babies are starting solid food, they already like the taste of carrots because they learned it in the womb.  
2. Avoid sweets in the last third of your pregnancy.  Babies who are exposed to sweet tastes in pregnancy may have more of a sweet tooth later on.  Kids who like and expect foods to taste excessively sweet won't like the subtle sweetness of carrots or cauliflower.
3. Breastfeed your baby, and eat vegetables during this time.  The food you eat flavors your breast milk.  Nature is teaching your baby the taste of the foods of his future.  Eat a wide variety of vegetables during this time.
4. If you feed your baby formula, use protein hydrosylate formula.  Protein hydrosylate formulas have the milk proteins broken down by enzymes.  This creates a bitter taste.  Babies who drink this formula are more accepting of vegetables later on because they have learned to like bitter tastes.
5. Feed your newborn baby tiny tastes of vegetables.  You can give your newborn baby TINY tastes of vegetables, even before he eats solid food.  You can do this by adding a teaspoon or two of vegetable cooking water or vegetable juice to his milk or formula.  Remember, you don't want to add enough to dilute his milk or to add calories.  You are just adding a smidgen of flavor.
6. Start solid foods early.  Start feeding your baby solid foods at 4 months.  There is no advantage to waiting.  Doctors used to recommend waiting because they thought that early feeding would cause allergies.  Now some researchers are finding that waiting actually encourages allergies.
7. Give vegetables as an early solid food.  Early foods may have a special influence on your child's later eating habits.  There is no reason to start with bland-tasting cereals like rice or wheat.  They aren't teaching your baby anything about tastes.  Start with vegetables, and work your way quickly to strong, bitter-tasting vegetables like spinach or broccoli.
8. Feed your baby a new vegetable twice a week for 6 weeks.  It can take time for your baby to learn to like a vegetable.  Give your baby a new vegetable twice a week for 6 weeks.  If he still doesn't like it, wait 3 or 4 months and try again.
9. Be patient and positive.  Healthy foods like vegetables can take weeks to learn to like.  Junk food takes no time at all.  Even as your baby spits out the spoonful of cauliflower, he is learning to like it.

Tips for Young Kids

1. Stop the junk food, especially sweets.  Human beings have an instinct to eat high calorie food if it is available.  Our primitive ancestors had to gorge on the high calorie food that they found.  If they filled up on vegetables, they wouldn't have the stomach space available for the high calorie food.  Eating junk food makes vegetables taste bad.
2. Serve vegetables for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  The more taste lessons your child gets, the faster he will learn to like vegetables.  Feed him vegetables at least three times a day, preferably more.
3. Feed your child a new vegetable twice a week for 6 weeks. It takes children of all ages up to 12 tries to learn to like a new healthy food.  Wait for a few days between servings.
4. At the beginning, add fat or a tiny amount of healthy sweetener to the vegetable.  Children have a natural liking for sweet and fatty tastes.  You can add butter, sauces, or fruit juices to help your child like the vegetable.
5. Find good recipes.  Plain vegetables aren't usually very tasty.  Scout around the internet for highly rated recipes.
6. Serve a vegetable to your child when he's hungry.  Hunger makes everything taste good!  Start dinner each night with a vegetable appetizer.
7. Eat the vegetable yourself.  Children, like most mammals, look to their parents to learn what is edible and tasty.  Eat the same vegetable yourself, and comment on how good it is.
8. Play with your food.  Make the vegetable friendlier by playing games with it.  You can cut vegetables into fun shapes, or put pieces together into an animal shape.  If your child has a stuffed rabbit, you can have him feed vegetables to the rabbit.  He may absentmindedly eat them after he's done playing.
9. Talk about vegetables.  Name each new vegetable, and comment on what it looks like and tastes like.  New foods are scary to kids, and any information is reassuring.  Skip the nutrition lessons, though.  They make it seem like your child should be eating the vegetable because it is nutritious, and not because it's tasty.  Although this may be true, your child will rebel if he knows this.
10. Keep a veggie and dip tray on the counter.  In general, don't let your child forage in the kitchen.  You should decide what he should eat.  However, a tray of vegetables lets him satisfy his hunger and gain some independence.  
11. Have all-vegetable meals.  Once or twice a week you can have vegetable dinners.  Give your child two or three dishes that have vegetables in them.  They can have other ingredients too, but make sure the vegetable is one of the main ingredients. 
12. Grow vegetables. Your child will be more likely to eat vegetables if he helped grow them himself.  If you don't have room for a garden, you can grow some herbs or a tomato plant indoors.
13. Use fresh vegetables.  Vegetables take a week or more to get to the supermarket.  Fresh vegetables from a farmer's market or community supported agriculture taste much better.

Tips for Older Kids and Teenagers (You can use the tips in the previous section too.)

1. Help them ignore peer pressure.  Kids brag about eating junk food.  Your child may feel left out if other kids get chips and candy for lunch and he doesn't.  Try to find genuinely healthy food that looks appealing.  Try to elicit the support of other parents in providing healthy meals for all kids.  
2. Teach them about nutrition.  Don't preach, but do teach your children that some foods have extremely bad consequences.  Diet is the #1 cause of death in modern cultures.  You want to reassure your child that you love him and you want the best for him.  
3. Teach them about the immediate consequences of healthy food.  Most children have noticed that eating too much candy or chips makes them feel sick.  Gently call attention to this. 

Related Articles


Why Children Don't Like Vegetables -- And What You Can Do About It
Cure Your Junk Food Kid in 6 Weeks
Vegetables and Dip: Tasty and Fun for Kids
Children Don't Like Mushy, Slimy Textured Foods -- Until They Get Used to Them 

See the Latest Article...

Find me on Facebook or Twitter.

How to Introduce a New Food so Your Kid Loves it

Wouldn't it be wonderful if you knew a way to get your child to like any food you wanted?

Imagine walking down the produce aisle of the supermarket and picking up asparagus, kale, or turnips, and knowing that in 6 weeks your child would be eating it enthusiastically.

Researchers have studied the processes by which children come to like new foods.  If you randomly feed your child different foods, you probably won't hit on the correct formula.  But by following these steps, you can systematically teach your child to like any food.


Lesson 1: Introducing a New Food for the First Time

1. Wait until your child is hungry.  Hunger makes anything taste good!  Give your child the new food before his meal, as an appetizer.
2. Make it taste good.  If you're trying to get your child to be an asparagus fan, don't just boil the asparagus and plop it down in front of him.  Find a 5 star recipe on the internet and make a delicious asparagus dish.
3. Make it taste familiar.  If asparagus is covered with your child's favorite cheese sauce, it won't seem so scary.  Use ingredients that your child loves in your asparagus dish.
4. Use fat.  Most mammals, including humans, have an instinct to eat high fat foods.  Covering the asparagus with cream sauce or sprinkling it with parmesan cheese will make it taste better.  Don't worry about the fat being unhealthy.  Children need more fat than adults, and you can gradually reduce the amount of fat as your child learns to like the asparagus.
5. Don't force him to eat it.  It doesn't matter whether he ignores it, eats a bite, or gobbles up the whole thing.  He's still learning to like it.  Any exposure to a food will make it seem more familiar, and therefore less scary. 

Lesson 2: The Next 6 Weeks

1. Don't feed your child junk food during this 6 weeks.  Junk food, especially sweets, will make healthy food like vegetables not taste as good.  A few days without junk food will cleanse your child's palate and make him more open to the tastes of real food.
2. Give the food to your child twice a week.  Wait a few days before you give your child the asparagus again.  Mammals have an instinct to wait a few days after eating a new food to make sure it isn't poisonous.  During this time, the food isn't as appealing.  
3. Give it to your child at least 15 times.  Scientists have found that it can take up to 15 times for a child to learn to like a food.
4. Eat the same food yourself.  Your child should see you eating the same food as he eats.  This reassures his unconscious mind that the food is tasty and safe.  Baby mammals have an instinct eat the same foods as their parents because food that their parents eat are not poisonous.

By this time, your child will probably be a confirmed asparagus-lover!  If not, wait for a few months and repeat the process.  Your child's tastes can change radically over time.  What he doesn't like now, he may love a few months later.

Related Articles
Cure Your Junk Food Kid in 6 Weeks
The One Bite Suggestion - Help for Picky Eaters
Teaching Kids to Like Whole Grains is Easy
Children Like the Food They Grow Up With

See the Latest Article...