It doesn’t matter if you follow a vegan diet or meat-eating diet — nor does it matter what cuisine you primarily serve — every family will, at one time, have a picky eater. Whether it’s the 3-year-old who won’t touch purple foods or the dad who won’t eat whole grain bread, we all have a bit of the picky eater syndrome. However, picky eating is a problem when it causes dinner table battles or is so long-standing that it can potentially cause health problems. Here are five vegan tricks to get picky eaters to eat (no matter their age).
It doesn’t matter if you follow a vegan diet or meat-eating diet — nor does it matter what cuisine you primarily serve — every family will, at one time, have a picky eater. Whether it’s the 3-year-old who won’t touch purple foods or the dad who won’t eat whole grain bread, we all have a bit of the picky eater syndrome. However, picky eating is a problem when it causes dinner table battles or is so long-standing that it can potentially cause health problems. Here are five vegan tricks to get picky eaters to eat (no matter their age).
Tips for getting picky eaters to eat
1. Be joyful about food
Though you may think your seemingly benign aversion to capers won’t influence your kids, you are their role model. So, if you go “ick” everytime you see a vegan recipe or dish that contains capers, your kids are more likely to pick up your “ick” for capers and perhaps any other foods about which they develop a bad attitude. Celebrate food rather than judge it. This doesn’t mean hoarking out on vegan doughnuts or ditching your vegan diet for beef burgers, it simply means expressing joy for the abundance of foods available to your family. A happy food attitude will beget a family of happy eaters.
2. Don’t let the dinner table be a battle ground
If your kids or an adult in the house balk the vegan meal you’ve spent part (even a small part) of your day cooking, don’t get up and make another meal and certainly don’t get into a fight about it. Set ground rules — when you aren’t sitting at the dinner table. Make it clear (in a calm, participative way) that a meal will be served and that is the only meal that will be served. Your time is valuable and you all deserve to enjoy a sit down meal together as a family without you or another family member having to cook another meal because someone decides to be picky. The rule: If you don’t want to eat the meal, you don’t have to, but you won’t get an alternative meal, either. This sounds tough, but it’s crucial to stick to your guns and not let a power struggle even begin.
3. Ask for meal planning participation
Have a family meeting every Sunday and ask everyone to help plan the week’s vegan meals. This accomplishes two things: your family feels like they are a part of the meal making (and more likely to eat what is cooked) and you get assistance in putting together the week’s vegan menu rather than coming up with it alone.
4. Take your family shopping
Depending on the age of your kids, you can recruit them to help you do the grocery shopping. My 3-year-old inspires many of our meals because I let him loose in the produce aisle to pick fruits and vegetables he wants to try. He is much more excited to eat recipes that feature ingredients he personally picked out — your kids will be that way, too.
5. Get the family involved in cooking
Teaching your spouse and kids about fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, legumes, alternative proteins, and healthy fats is a fun and educational way to prevent picky eater syndrome. Even better, teaching them how to cook these foods will give more significance to every meal you put on the table. Cooking as a family not only makes your meals more meaningful, it prevents picky eating because everyone gets to be involved in feeding the family.
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