Do you wish your kids would eat veggies but you just can’t get your picky eaters to try them? Well, today Kate Trout is sharing with us 3 Simple Tips To Get Picky Eaters to Eat Veggies. She is the author behind Maternity Glow, A New Mom’s Guide to Figuring it All Out. She is also Mom to two of cutest little kids and a pro at getting her picky eaters to eat veggies.
How To Get Picky Eaters To Eat Veggies
Do you have a toddler who refuses to eat anything other than mac and cheese and chicken nuggets?
Having a picky eater for a toddler is no fun. Trust me, I should know.
My 3 1/2 year-old daughter used to be the same way. No matter what techniques I tried, I couldn’t get her to eat her vegetables and hardly any protein, either. I was worried about her nutrition and whether she was getting enough nutrients in her diet.
And she was like this from a very young age, when I had to buy certain formulas for her to try, and even organic baby foods because I was wanted to make sure she was having the proper nutrition. (My son has been the same way too, unfortunately).
But, as she got a little older I buckled down and really focused on a couple of tips and tricks that finally got her going in the right direction.
And it all started with getting her involved in the entire process.
So if you have a picky eater of your own, follow these three tips and turn them into a veggie-eating machine.
1. Let The Picky Eater Chose The Recipe
As I mentioned, my entire strategy of getting my picky eater to eat more veggies with my daughter revolved around getting her involved with the meal-planning, from beginning to end. And that all starts out with picking out the recipe.
Pinterest really is a life-saver here. I’m sure most of you are already all over Pinterest, so I won’t go into much detail here, but I made a habit of Pinning nutritious and healthy recipes to my iPad, and showing my daughter all the different pictures.
Full of bright green, yellow, and red colors, she became very interested in seeing the meals on the screen! You may find they want to try recipes with the veggies inside of bread or mixed in with pasta or they may want to try something completely different.
So, step one was complete: we would settle on a recipe that should found interesting (and that was nutritious and contained vegetables), and then we would move on to step two, together.
2. Let Picky Eaters Help With The Grocery Shopping
Once your little one has “decided” on the recipe, it’s time to head to the grocery store!
Yes, I realize that taking a two or three-year old to the grocery store is not the most appealing option for you to consider, but I found it really helped my daughter get involved in the process.
So with our iPad in tow, we traveled together to the store to pick out all of the ingredients. One by one, point to each ingredient on the iPad, and go find it in the grocery aisle. Add it to the basket, and move on to the next ingredient.
Soon, you’ll have a grocery cart full of healthy ingredients that your little one picked out themselves, and are actually excited to try!
3. Let Picky Eaters Help Prepare The Meal
Now it’s time to start cooking!
By now, your toddler has chosen the recipe that she wants to try, and has even gone out with you to store to pick out all of the ingredients, all by herself.
Obviously, you don’t want your little one boiling hot water and chopping vegetables with a sharp knife, but you can involve them in the process for what is appropriate for their age.
That can mean washing the veggies in the sink, or mixing them up in a bowl when they’re all chopped up.
The whole idea here is that you want your toddler to feel as if they are not only involved in the process of putting a meal together, but actually in charge of it as well. This will do wonders for getting your picky eater to eat more veggies!
Conclusion
Once my daughter began to piece together the idea that she was picking out her own food and was therefore making decisions for herself, she started to expand her appetite quite a bit, and soon she was eating vegetables on a regular basis.
It’s not easy having a little one who won’t eat their veggies. As a mom, it can cause you to worry and stress about your toddler getting enough vegetables in their diet.
With enough time, patience, and practice, however, you can change their ways. Follow these three simple tips for how to get picky eaters to eat veggies and your toddler will be eating more veggies than you ever thought possible!
So have you tried any of these simple tips to get your picky eater to eat more veggies? What works best for your kiddos? I hope you don’t have to struggle to get your kiddos to eat vegetables any more!
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Dwight Harvey says
Great ideas! Also try this out. Get them to read a children’s story about animals in the forest who set up a restaurant and cook healthy vegetarian foods and at the end of the story are the recopies from the story! Simple and you can both shop for them and prepare them together and they will really like the time you spend together! You can buy this book right now on Lulu.com and it’s called “Grandma Owls Great Idea”
Liz says
Love the idea of letting them pick out their own meal. This is one of those times when I am wondering why I never thought of that! My four year old is horribly picky, he refuses to eat what I cook most nights and practically lives on grilled cheese sandwiches. I am going to try showing him some recipes for him to pick out today! Thanks for the tips!
Alora Boutique says
What a great resource for parents with picky eaters! I will definitely try these tips 🙂