If we assume our children won’t eat what we cook, then our assumption is right. If we never try it, neither will they. When my daughter was in preschool, I was determined to create, teach, (any other verb you can think of) a healthy eating lifestyle for her. At approximately three, I would ask if she had a hungry lion in her tummy which prompted a story for my correspondence writing course. My assignment was coming due and now I had somewhat of a good story. But to make it a better story, I wanted to give the children a message about healthy food without making it preachy and boring. But rather, every healthy food the character selects for the hungry lion in his tummy, the lion is able to perform according to what the food provides him. It was then a picture book was born, A Hungry Lion in My Tummy, www.mannersrock.com. It was this book that encouraged me to stay strong as a parent and not fold to the easiness of children’s meals. My husband and I enjoy staying home, therefore we cook. Rule #1: Our daughter eats what we eat. It is very important to feed children what we eat in order to expand their pallets. While my daughter was still a preschooler, meals were fixed with onions, spices, herbs, hot sauce on the side—we held nothing back and she didn’t know it any other way. I’d be in the kitchen, thinking, she is not going to eat the onions in this meat. And sure enough she did. Eventually, our daughter’s pallet was very broad for her age and it made life so easy because we didn’t have to create a special meal just for her which I had no plans on starting in the first place. She learned flavor and grew to like it. If we did eat out on Friday nights, a children’s meal was not ordered. I gave up on the occasional fried food with French fries and ordered grilled chicken or fish with a vegetable and a salad, so I could share it with my preschooler. She wasn’t deprived. I let her have a burger or chicken fingers with fries once in a blue moon—okay a little sooner than that, but she was too small to miss the grease, so why would I worry about that? Rule #2: Do not order children’s meals for your preschooler; it will pay off in the long run. Children’s meals should be used as a privilege, not as routine. Think about taking a vacation with your family and ordering your child a typical children’s meal that consists of fried foods and French fries—that is two meals a day your child is without veggies or anything green. Our daughter is approaching ten, this fall, and she gets the healthy eating. Is she allowed to order burgers, chicken fingers and fries? You bet she’s allowed because she knows it’s not our way of eating—we consider it a special treat. We were in Beaver Creek, Colorado for a week in June and my rule was she could have one fried meal about every third day. We have to set food boundaries for our children just as we do with everything else. I think of it as depriving my child if she doesn’t learn about different foods and preparations. It’s a matter of expanding her tastes for a lifetime.
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