Most children resist eating vegetables, but in our family eating in “courses” solves the problem!
I can still remember my stomach growling. I was hungry and cranky when I came into the kitchen looking for dinner.
“I’m hungry Mom,” I would whine almost every day while my working mother flew around the kitchen preparing dinner.
And on most of those days, she handed me a carrot stick, freshly peeled. My twin sister and I would readily accept the offering – we would devour almost all of the raw carrots and she would have to swat us away so she had something to cook.
We knew nothing else was coming before dinner and somehow veggies tasted so much better when we were starving and begging for food.
Besides, we loved to get our carrots eaten before the meal. Then when the carrots were passed around at the table, we could skip over them and get to the stuff we wanted!
Now, as a mom, I use the same technique I learned as a child – feed hungry kids veggies first!
I almost always feed my kids their vegetables before the rest of their meal.
Many kids prefer the taste of raw veggies to cooked and so slipping a plate of colourful raw veggies with low fat dressing for dipping can be a perfect appetizer. (My twin sister’s kids prefer their frozen peas still frozen!)
I love the relief when my kids have had their full servings of veggies before I even sit down to eat. No inevitable battles about eating their cold, soggy vegetables when they are “too full!”
Even if your meal includes cooked veggies, you can still give your children their vegetables first and insist they eat those before they get the rest of their meal. This works especially well when the main course is a child favourite like Macaroni and Cheese!
I can’t tell you how fast a plateful of broccoli can disappear when a child’s hungry tummy is waiting for their Mac n’ Cheese. It is magic.
Please Note: This practice may meet with resistance and whining at first. But hopefully your children will get the hang of it and you will find yourself eating your meals in peace. If it doesn’t work... try cash. ;)
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