Become A Master At Disguises

You know I sometimes feel that parents need to go on a Master Class and learn how to become a Master of Disguises.

 

Meaning Maggie?  Meaning at times all toddlers HATE eating healthy food especially veggies and fruit and it becomes all out war between parent and child at mealtimes.

 

Instead of it being stressful for all concerned, if you stay one step ahead of your toddler and disguise veggies and fruit in the food they do like, everyone wins.  Let’s face it, when a toddler says NO – they mean No! haha.

 

So here are some suggestions.

 

Firstly what I have found is most toddlers love finger food, Pasta and it’s varying accompanying sauces, macaroni and cheese, muffins, jelly (Jello) and cordial to drink.  I am sure I have missed something that your child likes to eat if so write it down and see what can be applied from what I write here.

 

Now let’s play the Master Disguise Game.

 

Finger Food: There can be lot of variety in finger food.  Many people think of it just as sandwiches or fruit – this is where you can become creative. 

 

How about making some small fish patties – make them into a small meatball size.  You can use drained tin tuna, fresh white fish steamed and flaked, tin salmon. Cook and Mash potato and sweet potato together before adding the fish.  You can even hard boil an egg and chop it very, very finely and add that to the mix.  Roll in breadcrumbs and lightly brown them in a fry pan.  These are great and excess can be frozen for later use.  When serving to your toddler, you can even let them dip these in their favorite sauce, even home made salsa if they like that.  This is a great way to get them to eat fish.

 

Meat Balls:  Many toddlers love burgers, well why not make little meat balls, but when making them add VERY FINELY GRATED Carrot and a Little Sweet potato.  Roll into small balls and gently cook in pan.  Again these can be eaten as is or dipped into some of the toddlers favorite sauce.

You can also make Fries or wedges most toddlers love this, however, instead of just plain potato also make them from Sweet Potato and Pumpkin.  So in their dish they have a some of each.  If they like to dip them instead of Sour Cream – use Greek Yogurt with a small dish of homemade Salsa. 

 

Can you see where I am going here?

 

Next let us look at Pasta.  In the chiller sections of most supermarket’s you can buy good quality Pasta’s.  If not you can even get your toddler to help you make your own. 

 

When making your child’s favorite Pasta Sauce, add VERY FINELY GRATED carrot, pumpkin, sweet potato, zucchini, squash, etc.  Make sure you serve this sauce to everyone else in the family, as your toddler may become suspicious.

 

When making your child’s cheese sauce for the macaroni, add some finely grated squash or WHITE Sweet potato.  Most people know about the orange variety, however, you can get one with purple skin, which is white inside.  This is fantastic, finely grated into a cheese sauce.

 

Muffins.  Please make these yourself, my BASIC muffin base is as follows, I then add whatever I want to this.

 

2 ½ cups of Organic Self Raising Flour, 1 cup Caster Sugar, 2 organic eggs, ¾ to 1 cup of oil.  Make this mix and to this you can add, blueberries, raspberries (I use frozen) or anything your toddler loves.

 

You can make the muffins as large or small as you want. 

 

Cordial – many toddlers love the taste of cordial especially the “Red” cordial and hate drinking plain water.  Here is a great way to get a healthy “Red” Cordial. 

 

Juice 1 x small peeled uncooked beetroot and 6 apples.  This tastes yummy, looks like red cordial, but is very healthy.  Do not strain to get any fiber out of it, as fiber is important for your child.

 

If they like fruit juices, please make your own for them, far, far healthier without any added sugar or corn syrup.

 

Of course all children love smoothies.  You can add many things to their smoothies including fiber.

All in all if you become a Master of Disguises your toddler will eat its veggies and fruit.

 

Until Next time

 

Love and Light

 

P.S.  If your having trouble with toddler tantrums – Parenting 21^st Century Kids will definitely be able to help you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tagged as: food for toddlers, ways to get children to eat veggies, ways to get toddlers to eat veggies