Make Good Food Fun For Your Kids
Feeding my children a healthy holistic diet is one of the most important aspects of parenting to me. Providing them with the best food nature has to offer ensures that they are healthy, energetic, and happy kids. What parent doesn’t want the best for their children? Yet the world we live in makes it difficult to make healthy food choices. Processed, chemical and preservative laden junk is EVERYWHERE. From supermarket checkouts to billboard signs on the highways, my children are bombarded with images of junk food.
According to Statistics Canada, in 2004 26% of children aged 2 -17 were considered overweight or obese, and according to the Canadian Diabetes Association a child born in the year 2000 has a 1 in 3 chance of developing diabetes. It seems clear to me that something is seriously wrong with the state of food in North America. We are doing a very poor job of providing our children with basic nutrition. And without proper nutrition our children cannot function at their optimal levels. I’m always told that I’m lucky my kids are such good eaters. And I am! But it hasn’t come without a lot of hard work, dedication, research, and a passion for giving them the very best start in life I can. I’d like to share some of the ways we make food interesting and fun in our household in hopes it will inspire others to think twice when deciding healthy food choices.
Avoid Processed Food
For me, the bottom line when shopping is that we avoid processed food. We hit the produce isle, the bread isle, and bulk nuts, seeds and legumes. Almost everything I buy is organic. I don’t eat meat and it follows that my kids don’t eat much meat either, as I don’t cook it. They eat it when we’re out, but rarely at home. Every couple of weeks we buy some organic eggs, and the same goes with cheese and yogurt. With yogurt, I buy organic yogurt or kefir and then add my own organic fruit and honey or maple syrup to sweeten it. They drink a mix of almond, rice, soy and cows milk. Our grains are wheat, spelt, kamut and rice. Our diet is simple, yet rich in flavour. I make my own cereal for them. Soaked grains with some cinnamon, chopped fruit and honey is one of their favourite breakfasts. Lunch is usually sandwiches and veggie sticks, and dinner quite often consists of a homemade soup or vegetable stew. For added nutrition I often make fruit and vegetable smoothies and have a salad with every meal. Over 50% of our diet is raw, living food.
Make Them Part Of The Shopping Experience
Familiarizing kids with food and making them part of the shopping experience will help them to take an interest in food and enjoy it more. My four year old writes out the shopping list and we always ask the kids to think of anything we might need when we make that list. Being part of the experience is something that makes them enjoy the food more when we go to eat it. My kids pick out the fruit and veggies from the produce isle. They help me search for the bins that house the bulk products, and write the numbers on the tags. Going grocery shopping is fun business for not only the kids, but me too!
Give Them More Control Over What They Eat
Another way to get kids to enjoy food is to give them more control over what they eat. Have a bucket of veggies cut up so that they can help themselves when they’re hungry throughout the day. Veggies are a free for all in our house and the kids love them. A few cubes of cheese, a handful of crackers, chopped up fruit and homemade dips are also foods that can be put in the fridge in an area where the kids can reach and decide for themselves what goes into their body.
Check out these recipes that we often have on hand in our house.
- Caramel Dip with Apple Slices
- Garlic Yogurt Dip for Veggies
- Manna Bread and Fruit Bowl
- Fresh Simple Salad with Lemon Mustard Dressing
Especially when it comes to snacking, having something wholesome and readily available will make healthy eating easy and superbly delicious!
Be Aware Of Where The Food Comes From
Taking kids to a local vegetable farm or growing a small garden with them is also fun work that will give them a positive association with food. Being aware of where the food comes from is very important. A lot of hard work goes into making sure those organic veggies make it to the supermarket and our table. Just like money doesn’t grow on trees, veggies don’t magically appear in the supermarket. Seems pretty obvious to us, but young children who haven’t been exposed to the true source of food won’t have a clue. A family trip to a local farm can turn into an informative family adventure. My kids beg to go berry picking and potato digging in the summer! Some of our fondest memories are helping with the gardening on my friend’s farm, and picking vegetables that we take home to have for dinner.
Rely Less On Packaged Foods & More On Fresh
Eating good food IS time consuming. Ultimately you’ll have to decide what works best for your family. I know my grandmother used to spend hours in the kitchen every day. For most people today, this isn’t realistic. But we do need to find a way to rely less on packaged foods and more on fresh foods. There needs to be a little more balance than the package you throw in the oven that requires zero preparation. I find that when you’re passionate about something, as I am about nutrition and my kids, I FIND the time. It might be baking large batches on the weekend when my husband is home to watch the kids; or making double batches of a recipe so that I have two dinners instead of one. Sometimes the kids get right in there and help me! Our children need healthy food and they are powerless to eat it unless we feed it to them. We cannot expect them to function at their very best unless we give them every opportunity to be their best. Healthy nutrition is the starting point.
Tips for healthy shopping:
Whenever possible buy organic. Not only does this mean your fruit and vegetables have no harmful pesticides, it also ensures a strict set of environmental procedures was followed to protect the land. With regards to meat, it means no antibiotics and growth hormones were pumped into the animals, and the animals are usually pasture fed and free to roam as opposed the inhumane conditions that characterize mainstream mass meat production. You might have to pay a bit more, but believe me, you’ll be thankful you did!
Avoid white breads, rice, and flours. About the only good use for white flour is making playdoh! If it says “enriched” it’s not healthy. Healthy choices don’t need to be enriched. Opt for whole grains such as spelt, kamut, barley, brown rice, or whole wheat. Variety is also better than always eating the same thing.
Avoid packaged foods as much as possible. If it’s in a box or can, chances skyrocket that it’s been processed with lots of salt, sugar or other additives. Read the labels and if you don’t know what something is its probably best to educate yourself before you purchase the product. Chemicals and preservatives can be nasty business.
When it comes to sugar, avoid refined sugars. Sucanat, maple syrup, honey and agave nectar are all more healthy choices in the sugar department. But even with these more healthy alternatives, go easy on all sugars. Bottom line is we get enough sugar from our fruits and vegetables and really don’t need anymore.
Try shopping more in bulk and making more of your own foods from scratch. Crockpots are a great meal to come home to. Online food blogs are a super way to search out easy prep meals that taste great. You can find recipes for everything from crackers to cereals to breads. And the best part about homemade? It almost always tastes better!
Excellent article erthmom! This is some great material even for grown-ups. I’m learning lots here. Thanks for your contribution!
So glad it helped! You’re right about this material being for grown ups too….the bonus of having good wholesome food for the kids is that I get to eat it too!!!