The best way is to introduce good healthy foods from the very beginning. Children will naturally accept, without question, whatever everyone else is eating and very seldom reject fruits or vegetables. Giving your children the nutrition they need is about taking time to make sure that they get a healthy and tasty diet. Be conscious of what you are buying and what you will be offering your children to eat. By cooking yourself you will avoid the worry about lack of nutrition as you will know exactly what goes into your meals. I realize that convenience foods are great if you are in a hurry but for the sake of your children’s health home cooking really is the most beneficial. If you don’t have time through the week to cook every day, then do as I did, cook a large batch and freeze the rest for in the week. If you have two or three different meals that you cook with enough for another meal to freeze then you will only be ‘cooking’ three or four times a week but it will be nutritious and tasty home-made meals. 

I realize that nowadays there is much peer pressure for children, especially about what they eat and where they go out to eat. Even with a healthy diet is it ok now and then to go out for a hamburger and chips or to have pizza. However, it is important to make this a treat, not the normal meal time food.  

If you have children whose diet at the moment consists of French fries, mashed potatoes, apple sauce, chocolate pudding, and maybe chicken fingers, then you will find it quite a challenge to convert these children to the benefits of healthy food.  If you think about it though,  how could it be worse if you only offer fruits and vegetables and they refuse, could that be worse than the zero nutritional food they have been eating? In fact not only are they zero nutritional foods, they quite possibly are ruining the health of your children by the amount of fat, sugar or salt that may be contained in them along with preservative chemicals. So what do you do? Ok so here is the challenge, try to make healthy food tasty, this is not impossible. Find good health food recipes which taste nice instead of just putting vegetables on their plates next to a slab of meat. Find recipes which include vegetables and meat in a sauce so that they are not staring at ‘vegetables’ on their plate that they ‘don’t like’ Of course they are going to try to manipulate you, so that they can have the foods they like, by not eating.  Believe me they will eventually get hungry, especially if everyone else is really enjoying these tasty ‘healthy’ meals and they are made to sit at the table eating or not with all the delicious smells around.

Incorporate bean soups, such as lentil soup or make lentil or bean burgers. You can even make your own meat burgers as a treat. Changing their tastes in food will be very gradual and you will need much patience, but it is possible. When they start to feel better, have more energy and look better, then they will feel more positive about healthy eating.  You do not need to try and make them into vegetarians but there is nothing wrong with making fresh bean and/or vegetable soups with some cheese sprinkled on it instead of meat based meals all the time. Whatever you cook make sure it is tasty, but not too spicy. Make homemade pancakes with wheat and only sweeten it with pure raw honey. Make fruit shakes and throw in a carrot or romaine lettuce. Make tasty salads with homemade dressings….and also make faces out of the tomatoes and cucumbers and carrots. Make tasty salmon and have them try it, in other words, make it fun and tasty. 

There are so many possibilities and recipes that you can try. Do not give up on your child because they have shown a dislike for a vegetable or fruit. Check and make sure that it is just the one particular fruit or vegetable that your child dislikes. I know for a fact regardless of the whole family eating and enjoying tomatoes, I just could not, as a child, or even now, eat them. Be aware that everyone and that includes every child will have their own taste in as far as particular fruits and vegetables are concerned but it is not possible for them to dislike all vegetables it is just finding the ones they like.

Starting them early is the most important way around it all. My children used to ask for chunks of cucumber as a snack if hungry between meals. I have never forced them to eat vegetables, salad or fruits, it was just part of their upbringing, part of what they accepted as normal. This is where you want to be regarding your child’s nutrition. 

Encourage your children to eat fresh fruits and vegetable and if they want a snack, suggest an apple, banana or some other fruit.

Remember if children eat plenty of fruits and green leafy vegetables, they are also getting their calcium requirements, this does not mean you can’t include some almond milk or rice milk if you want or have a home-made rice pudding as desert (made with brown sugar).

The focus is to keep introducing them to new foods so that they develop a taste for natural foods that will help them develop and grow as they should.