July 26, 2011 Take a Walk on the Wild Side: A New Way to Introduce New Foods
If your kids are resistant to new foods you're selling the wrong stuff.
Try any (or all) of these techniques and watch your kids clamor for new foods.
- Let your child pick out a new treat at the grocery store at least once a month. No restrictions.
- Go to the ice cream store but insist that everyone in the family try something new.
- Buy a box of Dunkin’ Donuts Munchkins and do a blind tasting.
- Let your child dig into a bag of candy...blindfolded.
- Have each member of your family choose a treat, and then have everyone pass their treat to the family member on their right. Take a bite. Pass to the right again.
FYI: I'm not suggesting you add more crap to your kids' diets. I'm suggesting you use the crap they already eat a little more strategically. Remember, it doesn't matter what your kids eat. What matters is how often they eat it.
I can hear you saying, “I have no problems introducing new cookies. It’s new real foods my kid won’t touch.”
Let's face it, being open to new foods is a state of mind. Read Mind Over Matter.
Most kids willingly eat new junk but parents don’t call a new flavor of ice cream new, so it falls under the radar. When parents do call something new, it’s usually healthy and boring. So kids get it into their heads that new foods are bad and boring, that they're more like broccoli than brownies. No wonder kids are resistant.
Toddlers get it right. I always canvass parents at workshops to see what new foods they recently offered. The list usually looks something like this: vegetable, chicken, fish...
But new cookies, cakes, ice cream and candy are just as new as any new vegetable. See where I’m going?
Get your toddler used to the idea that new foods are amazing, delicious, awesome and worth the risk, and eventually you’ll have no problem selling other new foods too.
- Make sure new foods are tasty. Read You Catch More Flies with Honey and When the Less Nutritious Choice is Right.
- Don't encourage your kids to eat new foods; ask them to taste and tell. Read Nix the Negativity.
- Allow your kids to spit out foods. Read Why Some Kids Should Spit; What "I don't like it" and "I'm not hungry" Really Means.
- Don't stifle your kids. Read Onion Soup? No Way! Mac and Cheese? OK!
- Use familiar foods and flavors to link to new foods. Read The Magic of Yogurt.
~Changing the conversation from nutrition to habits.~
Reader Comments (2)
We had (and still have!) a set of very simple house rules that have worked well for us. My daughter has always been a pretty good eater -- I chalk about 80% of that up to luck and about 20% of that to design -- and this is what's worked in our family:
1. She has to take a little bit of everything from the dinner onto her plate. Sometimes if we're serving three or four vegetables we'll let her pick the one/two she wants the most.
2. She doesn't have to eat anything she doesn't want to. HOWEVER...
3. She can't have a third helping of anything until she's eaten everything she started with. So she can't just fill up on her favorites without eating at least a few bites of whatever we cooked.
About 75% of the time she does try the disfavored food and not infrequently she'll take seconds on it. And during times when we've served the same food quite often for awhile -- when we had a CSA we had so many tomatoes that I put out a bowl of sliced tomatoes with a little salt for almost every dinner, for example, and when asparagus is in season we eat a ton of that -- those foods have always become favorites.
Love the blog! It always gives me interesting perspectives on kid-feeding.
Victoria,
It sounds like you've found a formula that works for your family. That's great!
Thanks for your kind comments about the blog. If you ever have a topic you would like me to write about, just let me know.
Dina