Tips for encouraging veggies

[Mommy Moo]

My kids love veggies. My 3 year old loves it when I call broccoli "baby trees", or cut carrots into "wheels".  I think presentation is a lot of the battle.  I've also played a little game of sorts with her where I say "What happens to your face when you eat a carrot?" and she'll eat a carrot and make a funny face so it's fun to eat them.  I only do this on occasion though because I don't want to make a habit of that. For the most part though my kids love their veggies anyway and it's not a struggle.

[Sylvia.]

i just posted about meat and vegetables, these are great ideas, i have a very long way to go about learning how to cook for a small child, i am now going to read and reread your tips and try one, wish me luck

[MomtoRee]

I use a lot of the ideas listed, but here are a couple more ideas:

1.  Mix a little cream cheese with smashed mixed veggies, spread on crescent rolls, top with chopped turkey or chicken, and roll up!  Dd loves these and eats them up. 

2.  Veggie lasagna.  Mix thawed chopped spinach, grated carrots, mushrooms, garlic, and any other veggies with pasta sauce.  Layer between noodles and cheese.  For the cheese layer I mix cottage cheese with an egg instead of ricotta cheese so she gets the protein too and mix that with Mozzarella.  As long as there is enough noodles and cheese mixture she shovels it in.

3.  I make turkey meatloaf and mix in smashed veggies with everything else. Same thing with burgers.

4.  Put a little bit of peanut butter on the  cooked veggies.  She loves it on cooked carrot chips and squash sticks.

5.  I make rice/veggie burgers. 

6.  Dd won't eat Green beans warmed out of the can but she will eat them if I put them in the crockpot all day with turkey bacon and onion.  Eats them by the handful like this. 

7.  The last trick I use is when I am fixing dinner and she wants a bite I keep a container of veggies by me to give her.  Seems she eats almost anything while helping me fix dinner. 

We used to have trouble getting her to eat her veggies but now she usually eats them without "tricking" her.  I think that she got used to the taste of them, but I still sneak them in everything that I can when I am cooking.

[mumofone]

I have to confess I am not much of a cook, but I do want ds to eat healthy.  Does anyone have quick easy recipes?  I don't eat meat but dh and ds do.  I'm going back to work soon and worrying already 

[belindamom]

Hello everyone.  These are such helpful tips.  I have had such trouble with my children.  Both are picky eaters.  Your tips are so helpful to me and I am going to try them.  I have tried everything and the only thing that is helping is a DVD my friend told me about. It is called it's time to eat from tinyguides.com and the DVD shows other kids eating foods.  My son wants to copy the kids on the television screen and the other day asked for a strawberry because another child on the video was eating one - I almost fainted I was so happy!  Maybe this can help other moms out there.    I am also curious..should we be giving our children a multi-vitamin each day>

[mumofone]

Hi belindamom
My sister said her children started eating more veggies after watching 'Charlie and Lola'.  It makes all the vegetables into something exciting and then the little girl eats them all.  Hey whatever works 

[J&Jsmom]

Vegetable soup - I make butternut soup, leek, potato and courgette soup, broccoli and potato soup, sweetcorn chowder

Because i have sons, apparently the more revolting you make a food sound, the more likely they are to eat it. So for example, strips of yellow pepper are yellow worms, slices of onion are slugs, sweetcorn pieces are ladybirds etc.

[mum101]

I put DD up on a chair at the bench and she inevitably puts every food on the bench in her mouth!  She gets excited about being up there and 'helping' and thinks its a challenge to grab the food before mum can. 

mashed pumpkin, grated zucchini and leftover bolognese sauce mixed together and put on a toasted 'english muffin' goes down a treat for a snack. 

The best meal for DD is a beef and rice (or soft noodle) dish. 
Simmer the beef steak in beef stock, cool, then puree.  Add cooked rice, tinned crushed tomatoes, and peas.  I love it too, it tastes mostly of beef and the texture is lovely.  A tasty healthy option.  Freezes well. 

Corn and cauliflower patties were a hit for a while, but seems to be a bit bored of them.  Freeze fairly well too.

[mum101]

A recent cooking escapade resulted in DD eating raw pumpkin, zucchini, and sweet potato!  She was hoovering it down. 
Has anyone else seen this happen before?  Or is DD just mad! 

[fiona1973]

when i make spag bol i put in veg and cos they are covered in the sauce my little one loves it.

[dkjokisch]

I put finely grated carrot in anything with orange cheese - mac and cheese, grilled cheese sandwiches, etc.  Dd doesn't notice the difference.  It just makes the cheese look clumpy.

[webfoot]

I swear the best invention in the world is the Pamperd Chef Micro Steamer.

Here is one on ebay
http://cgi.ebay.com/Pampered-Chef-Microwave-Rice-Cooker-Steamer_W0QQitemZ270021291055QQihZ017QQcategoryZ20633QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I bought this when Amy was just turning 1, since I've had it we eat steamed veggies every lunch and dinner. You can throw in frozen, canned, fresh. You drain off the fluid and throw in a smidgen of butter, umm, umm. For me as a busy mom I can do a 1/4 cup of forzen veggies in the winter (we have lots of fresh in the summer from our garden) and lickety split before I was serving Kraft mac and cheese, and now we have a tastey Veggie and the bonus is if I eat the left overs and ignore the Kraft. lOL!

It's all good ;-)

[MrsKirky]

DS has recently started to boycott veggies, too.  He used to love almost all of them, but I think he learned to be picky at the day care - they serve everything, but if you eat all your favorites, you get more of your favorites (for ds, this is fruit and meats).  I have done the grating and hiding thing, too.  We have a VitaMix (really powerful blender) that disguises any veggie any way I want. 

Just a new trick I tried...He didn't like the dried veggies, either, but I bought some freeze-dried corn and tomatoes and peas and he loves them!  They were a little pricy, but I am sure it's temporary, since daddy and mommy both love their veggies! 

[mom2avie]

1. Get creative. Make faces and gobble up eyes and noses. Build a house or boat. Just have fun!

2. Try cooking in every method possible. Boil, steam, leave them raw. And try different sizes and textures.

3. Lead by example.

4. Let the kids pick out new veggies and help with cooking.

Here's the resources I love for ideas, recipes, and nutrtional facts:

http://www.funwith5aday.org
http://www.familyfun.com
http://www.annabelkarmel.com

Ashley
Avery 3.30.04

[BabyBsMommy]

DS is a bit younger at almost 11 months but I swear he eats like he's a lot older!  He is usually quite good with veggies but goes through bouts where he turns up his nose.  These are some of my tricks when he does that -
- grilled cheese - I puree some veggies really smooth and spread it on the sandwich before I add the cheese
- soups, especially squash and broccoli ones
- add cheese, lol, and he'll eat almost anything!

Because of his age, I still have the luxury of not putting everything in front of him at once so I take full advantage of this while I can and will often offer him his veggie pieces first.  This way, he is hungriest when he sees them and will eat more of them than when I give him something else he likes better like meat or bread/pasta first!  He will always eat those other things after he takes the edge off his initial hunger with the veggies!