Especially with the holidays coming up and plenty of meals out and about, getting your kids to eat healthier foods can be a battle, but a battle YOU can win! It is a matter of being creative, innovative, and not giving up. Use some of these techniques to get your kids to stop being picky eaters.

1. Get them excited about healthy food: Let them smell, touch, taste, ask questions and try fruits, veggies, yogurts and other healthy foods in the kitchen. Ask them what they think of the foods and let them know their opinions count.

2. Get them involved in the kitchen and grocery store: Let them help you with small, kid-safe jobs in the kitchen such as mixing ingredients. Be sure to thank them for their help. Take them to the grocery store and let them pick out some of the healthy foods so they feel involved every step of the way.

3. Give them a say in what they eat: Help your kids make the right food and drink choices from an early age. If they have a say in decisions they will be more excited about what they eat. It’s a great way to get them to take charge of their health. It may take a little more time in the supermarket but it is likely to lead to fewer tantrums at meals.

4. Keep the junk food out of the house: Your kids cannot eat unhealthy snacks if you don’t buy them. Kids will moan at first but soon they will get hungry and reach for the apple instead of the chips.

5. Add healthy food when you can: Find ways to add healthy foods into foods your child already likes. You can put blueberries in pancakes, chopped fruit on whole grain cereal, or small pieces of broccoli in macaroni and cheese. Use whole wheat pasta or bread instead of enriched flour.

6. Sit down together: Try to set aside your meals as family time. Turn off the TV and enjoy eating together.

7. Keep healthy snacks on hand: Bring healthy snacks when you pick them up from school, after sports practice, and at other times when you know their stomachs will be grumbling. Examples would be fruits, sliced veggies, beef jerky, lunch meat, Greek yogurt, homemade protein smoothies.

8. Make healthy food and meals fun: Try cutting up food into fun shapes or making faces out of fruit and vegetables. Putting healthy snacks such as oatmeal cookies or dried fruit into a fun bag can turn healthy foods into a cool snack for your child.

If you follow some of these suggestions, you and your child will get through the holidays on less of a sugar high and still able to celebrate with some nutritional and delicious choices. It need not be all “visions of sugarplums,” helping to build some wonderful holiday food traditions that are healthful will carry throughout the rest of their lives.  

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For additional information or personalized nutrition coaching, please contact Kristen Bell, Registered Dietitian at www.kristenbellrd.com or 310-525-9570.