Parents know this: we all start off wanting the best food for our kids. In a perfect world, their noses wouldn’t crinkle at the sight of broccoli; they would beg us for more peas.
But this is not the case for many of us.
Chaunie Brusie, a mom-of-four who wrote about her lifelong struggle with picky eating on Babble, agrees.
The first picky eater she encountered? Well, herself. She recounts how, as a young girl, she would give her mother grief during mealtime.
When she became a mom herself, she wanted to “instil a natural love of healthy foods” in her daughter. At first, her efforts seemed rewarded.
After breastfeeding for 15 months, she started her little girl on an organic diet.
Eventually, her daughter’s favorite foods became green peepers, sweet peas, and salmon—yes, she says, this is true.
When her first child turned eight and became a sibling to three more kids, her eating habits changed. Mealtime became like a battle. It was one the mom-of-four was tired of fighting.
So, she and her husband decided to conduct a little experiment: they would give their kids free rein in the kitchen.
photo: dreamstime
Since their youngest was barely two, her other three kids were given the power to choose what the family was going to have for dinner each night.
The only rule? Each meal had to have some sort of vegetable. With that, she prepared for the worst.
But, what they chose came as a pleasant surprise.
For night one, her 5-year-old requested orange chicken and stir-fried vegetables. Though it involved sugar, the veggies balanced it out.
Her eldest daughter, who’s 8, had the power over night two; she chose steak fajitas—with extra peppers. This, apparently, was uncharacteristic of her because she lived for fast food. The choice was a hit with her siblings.
The third dinner request, homemade pizza and breadsticks, was prepared by her husband.
The meal-planning experiment continues to be a success. And she’s pleasantly surprised that her kids take dinner seriously, favoring Korean Beef Tacos and Slaw and Chicken Pad Thai over chicken nuggets or hotdogs.
What do you say, moms? Would you give your child full power over meal planning?
READ: 10 Tricky ways to deal with a picky eater
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