Friday, October 8, 2010

The Great Vegetable Search

My kids don’t love vegetables, especially my daughter. I can’t really blame her. I’ve read that kids like what they had in the womb and even the sight of vegetables during my pregnancy with her made me gag. The only thing green I could tolerate was the artichoke and, low and behold, she loves artichokes. Finding a way to get her to eat vegetables is my new holy grail. My son, while he doesn’t love all vegetables is decidedly less picky, but he usually takes a cue from his sister and says yuck anyway. So in my great vegetable search I’ve tried all kinds of tricks: how to hide vegetables in their food (they could tell right away), how to accessorize vegetables with sauces, dips and creams (they lick the sauce right off or just eat the sauce without the veggies), and just plain force (eat this or you’ll never eat another bite of sugar again), but so far nothing has worked. As I mentioned in another post I’ve even pulled the “starving kids in Africa” line (and really meant it), but no go with that so far either.

In some of my research I learned about super tasters, people with more taste buds than others and thus are more sensitive to tastes (sugar tastes sweeter, but bitter, as in vegetables, tastes more bitter). I did the supertaster test on both kids and myself, and it seemed like we were all supertasters. To have a comparison, I also tested my husband who seemed not to be a supertaste. So if the three of us are all supertasters that gives us a little grace when it comes to vegetables, or any food really, but I have learned to love most of these foods, and I want, need, my kids to as well. Since we are gluten-free we need to make sure we are getting all our nutrients, especially the ones that are usually found in whole-grain wheat (not that many people actually eat that either).

My latest ploy is new Laptop Lunch boxes, http://www.laptoplunches.com/, cute little containers with separate boxes, some with lids, and drink bottle. I am always concerned with BPA, phlates, etc… so I like that this don’t contain those toxins. So far it has helped a little, I even cut her sandwich into an angel – she ate the head and wings.

I watched this video on the laptop lunch Web site on picky eaters, http://www.laptoplunches.com/ideas.html#picky, and realized I should relax a little. She’ll be fine and learn to like different food as she gets older.