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I’m taking on the bane of all parents’ existence today: getting kids to eat more vegetables.
I so often get the question “How can I get my kids to eat more vegetables” or “My kids hate vegetables, what should I do?”. So in today’s post, I want to share with you some tips and tricks for increasing vegetable exposure for kids.
But first, a couple of caveats:
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You can’t “make” your kids eat anything – you only control what you offer. More on this in a bit.
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My advice is from the perspective of a mom and natural foods chef with “average picky” kids. By this, I mean that they have their own tastes and preferences but they aren’t extremely picky. So while my goal is to make this advice useful and applicable for as many situations as possible, if you have a child with extreme food anxiety, these may not be the best tips for you and working with a feeding professional is always best.
Sound good? Let’s dive in.
How to Get Kids to Eat More Vegetables
Can I be honest? I’ve sort of been avoiding this topic because I don’t necessarily think my kids are fantastic at eating vegetables. They have a few they like but then there are others they won’t touch at all.
But you know what I realized? That makes me a great person to cover this because I am all of you. I don’t have magical kale munching unicorn kids but rather average kids with average pickiness.
And just to normalize this, it is not rare for kids to be less than enthusiastic about vegetables. Preference for sweet has been a key factor in human evolution – leading us to more calorie-rich items when they were in season. And you need to look no farther than packaged foods to see that we love sweet, salty, and fatty flavors.
Vegetables? They take a little more time to develop a taste for.
I hope my sharing my tips today, both learned from experts and from experience, will be helpful in breaking down some barriers.
Eating More Vegetables Starts with You, the Parent
But first things first, some tough love: kids eating more veggies starts with you.
I’m not comparing kids to dogs, but have you ever been to dog training? When we went and learned how to do all the things like sit and stay, the instructor constantly reminded us that our training was only as good as our consistency in reinforcing the lessons at home.
Getting kids to eat vegetables is a lot like this. Your kids’ experience with vegetables is only as good as your consistent approach and reinforcement.
So how does veggie eating start with you?
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You are in charge of exposure
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Kids mimic the behaviors that they see
This means you have two key responsibilities:
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Keep offering vegetables even when it seems hopeless
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Eat YOUR vegetables and let them see you doing it
Vegetable Exposure is Key to Eating More Vegetables
I have been reminded of this lesson that vegetable exposure is key to eating more vegetables several times recently with my own children. A couple of examples:
- My older guy, almost 5, loves all of the sweet vegetables but has never much-loved greens and other cruciferous vegetables like cauliflower. I still have served them because I like them, but didn’t have much hope for his liking them anytime soon. Then one day he came home from school and told me that they eat raw broccoli and he liked it that was but not cooked. The thing is, I never serve broccoli raw because I don’t like it that way. But I listened to him and put some out at dinner and in his lunch and low and behold he does in fact like raw broccoli!
- My younger guy, almost 2, has never liked avocado from the first day that he tried it. It’s actually been pretty funny because he’s tried it over and over again and makes a face every time. The other day, he wanted a little on his plate when he saw big brother and I eating it. I turned around and all of a sudden he’s eating the avocado. Dipped in ranch, yes, but actually eating it nonetheless. I was shocked!
The thing is that while these events were surprising to me, there is evidence that kids sometimes need dozens or more exposures before even trying something. And if they don’t like it the first time, it could take dozens more times of trying it until they change their mind (if they ever do).
This is why I say that the main thing you can do as a parent is to keep putting a variety of vegetables, loved and not, in front of your children. As frustrating as it can be if they don’t even try it, I can assure you that this is important work that will help your kids eat more vegetables in the long run.
Ready to try it out?
Easy Strategies for Increasing Vegetable Exposure
Here’s what vegetable exposure looks like most often in our house:
Ready to try it in your house? Here are some ideas for increasing veggie exposure to your kids (and yourself):
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Serve veggies alongside things they’re already eating: my kids like separate but experiment to see if combined or separate is better
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Serve vegetable-centric snacks with other favorites like dip or cheese and crackers
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Focus on small portions at first, which are less intimidating, to allow children to try it (or not) on their own terms
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Don’t talk about it too much. The more pressure and bribes you apply the more you send the message that veggies are no good and that they need rewards in order to eat them.
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Start with veggies that they do like and then go from there. I’m willing to bet that there is plenty of great nutrition in the vegetables (and honestly fruits too) that your kids are already eating. Don’t get so caught up in what they aren’t eating that you can’t celebrate what they do enjoy.
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If you want to mix veggies into favorite foods you can have the kids help. While I’m not a huge fan of hiding vegetables (this doesn’t help with exposure), I do love the idea of making vegetable and other healthy foods delicious so they start associating that with things they also enjoy.
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Let your kids play with their veggies. Even playing wtih vegetables without tasting them counts as exposure and can go a long way to helping kids try new things in the long run. We have had great success with some of the activities in the Adventures in Veggieland book by Melanie Potock. My kids especially loved the sweet potato pancakes and cauliflower sheep. You can hear more from Melanie about her approach and why this works in my podcast interview with her here.
Ready to help your kids eat more vegetables? An easy action plan
My action for you this week is to find one new way that you can include an extra vegetable per day for your kids. This might look like a vegetable in their lunch or snack that isn’t usually there or some sliced peppers served alongside dinner.
Just remember you’re in charge of offering the vegetables, not making your kids eat them.
I have a cheat sheet for you of what I shared today in case you’d like to put it up in your kitchen. You can sign up here:
Once you’ve done it, hop on over to Instagram and tag me in your picture of what you did!
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