How to Encourage Healthy Eating in Your Toddler

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How to get your toddler to eat healthy food

Picky eaters. I’ve been there.

There have been nights where I did everything right. Despite the teething baby crying non-stop and the cranky toddler needed attention I’d manage to get a healthy meal onto the table for dinner.

Which my toddler would take one look at and refuse to touch.

And then demanded crackers.

Which she got.

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So how do you get your toddler to eat healthy food?

One of the more difficult parts of raising healthy kids is feeding them nutritious food. Of course, they want more cake and candy, they don’t want their broccoli, and they have no idea why a balanced meal is so vital. But don’t give up; there are lots of easy ways to encourage them to eat healthier.

Get the Toddler Involved in the Cooking Process

If you are having trouble getting your toddler to eat healthy meals or snacks, why not let them participate in the prep or cooking process? Kids are very hands-on, so when they see what goes into preparing meals, they often want to eat what they helped make. You can even get their help picking recipes and take them to the store with you. When you get home, do meal prep together and let them stir or do safe things in the kitchen. This might depend on their ages and skill levels. You are bound to have your kids more interested in their food when they know they helped. I had my daughter measuring and mixing ingredients as soon as she was able to stand at the counter (we used this stool to make sure she was safe). Another task she loved was drying the salad in the salad spinner.

An extension of this is also making sure your kid know where their food comes from. If you have a young child try taking them to the grocery store and let them pick out a new fruit to try (my daughter picked dragon fruit last time). Start a small garden and let your kids have free range of it. We don’t have a yard but we’re lucky enough to have a big deck and we have a VegTrug and a container garden. Last year we had strawberries, tomatoes, peas and beans along with our herbs. My daughter would go out there for an afternoon snack and would happily eat the cherry tomatoes and beans directly from the plants. This year I’m going to have her more involved in tending and watering our plants. In the spring try going berry picking with your kids and in the fall take them to an orchard.

Stop The Food Battles

As hard as it may be; stop trying to force your kids to eat their food. Reading Ellyn Satter’s book How to get your kids to eat: but not too much was a turning point for me. Ellyn lays out the Division of Responsibility when it comes to feeding your kids. Her golden rule for parenting with food is this:

Parents are responsible for what is presented and the manner in which it is presented.

Children are responsible for how much and even whether they eat

I can not recommend her book enough as it goes into details on how to cope with picky eaters. However, by just implementing her golden rule we eliminated so many food battles in our house. My kids now know that we eat at the table and they will be presented with options of what to eat. I make sure that throughout the day I’m offering mostly fruits, veggies and unprocessed food. We have our treats as well but in moderation. My daughter also knows that if she says she really doesn’t like something that I won’t force her to eat it. She’s not allowed to say a food is yucky – a simple no thank you is all that is required. I do try to preempt an outright refusal by getting her involved in making the meal if I think she’s not going to like it (see the point above).

Most importantly, by following Ellyn’s golden rule I’ve allowed myself to relax about meal times.

Try to Make a Game Out of Eating Healthy

While at home, you can turn your healthy eating into a game for the younger kids or when one of your kids is a little more stubborn about eating certain foods. This can also turn into a learning experience. If one of your kids is learning basic math in school, get out some slices of fruit and practice adding and subtracting with it. Your child has now learned basic math and is also eating the fruit when they’re done with the lesson. This is a major win-win! With a toddler or preschooler talk about the food you’re currently eating. Ask them if their grapes are juicy or crunchy? Is their orange sweet or salty? Make it fun, have them prove you wrong if you claim your pepper is mushy or your banana is crunchy.

Karen Le Billon has done a great job of coming up with fun food games to play with your kids. I was first introduced to her through her first book French Kids Eat Everything where she chronicles moving from Vancouver to France and the food transformation her daughters had to go through. Her second book Getting To Yum is intended to guide parents in teaching their kids to enjoy eating all kinds of foods. She covers taste training but also has a ton of games based on tasting food. I often pull out this book at snack time and my daughter and I will play a food game while enjoying our afternoon tea.

Allow the Occasional Treat and Offer Healthy Snacks

Following a healthy diet doesn’t mean never being able to have anything that is a ‘treat’. By completely denying all treats, your kids might have that rebellious nature and want to pig out when they do get one of their favourite things. However, if you offer the occasional bowl of ice cream or piece of pie after dinner, they are more inclined to eat healthy so they get their treat. For your school-aged kids chose a day of the week where they know they’ll be getting a treat from their snack.

Snack choices are so important especially for your toddler who loves to graze. I always try to offer a fruit or vegetable option before I bring out the crackers. If you have a school-aged kid send them to school with healthy food you know they will enjoy. Lunchtime at school is not the time to try out an unfamiliar vegetable on your child. As you’re not there to encourage them chances are that lunch is ending up in the compost.