Meals Designed for Kids

Brightly colored fruit paints a healthy start to a kid's day.

The quest for meals designed for kids consumes many parents' time. Limited food preferences complicate meal preparation and interfere with peaceable family mealtimes. Time magazine's "Nine Kid Foods to Avoid" shows that many popular kids' food choices are high in calories, sugar, sodium and fat, which leaves many parents wondering what to put on the table. Parents can consider their children's likes and dislikes without catering to whims and capricious demands. Family cooking, kid-friendly foods and healthy choices can solve the daily nutrition crisis and satisfy the fussiest junior gourmet.

Kid-Designed Meals

Helping to shop for and prepare meals gives kids a stake in seeing it succeed. Dr. Stuart Janousky writes, "If a child can take part in assembling or cooking a meal, they are far more likely to eat it." Meal planning and preparation teaches nutrition and food-savvy as well as being a tool for practicing money, measurement and reading skills. As long as you arm yourself with time, patience and a tolerance for more mess than usual, your kids will take pride in their creations and gobble it right down, and make sure you are too.

Set the Example

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's MyPyramid.gov explains that parents who set a good example of healthy food choices and willingness to try new foods are more likely to instill healthy eating habits in their kids. The website recommends offering new foods at the beginning of the meal when the child is the hungriest and trying a variety of foods. Only introduce one new food at a time in small portions.

Healthy Choices

Kids naturally gravitate to high-sugar, high-fat food choices, to the despair of many health-conscious parents. Keep it simple, and cook from scratch whenever possible. Delicious but healthy food choices will make your fussiest eater clamor for more. MyPyramid.gov suggests: fresh pineapple, green peppers, cheese, salmon and whole-wheat pitas with hummus. You also can try adding fresh vegetables to soups, or mango, Swiss chard or tuna to green salad. Nutrition Explorations recommends flavored milk or smoothies, pretzels, cut fresh fruits and veggies, and yogurt, either alone or as a dip. According to Kid Approved Meals, fresh berries, granola, stroganoff, apples, meatballs, chili, potatoes, banana muffins, rice, bananas, orange, apple or grape juice and spaghetti are healthy choices to add to your arsenal of kid-friendly meals.

Fun Food

MyPyramid.gov offers several suggestions to bring fun back into mealtimes: name a food after your child, cut the food into fun shapes with cookie cutters, make whole-grain cracker towers, spell words with pretzels, make funny faces out of fruits and vegetables, dip vegetables in low-fat dressings, hummus or bean spread. You also can try some of their fun recipes: bagel snake, English muffin pizza, smiley sandwiches, frozen bananas, potato pals, frozen graham cracker sandwiches, fruit smoothies, frozen juice cups, and ants on a log.

References

• Time.com: "Nine Kid Foods to Avoid"
• KeepingKidsHealthy.com: Kid Talk - Parenting Your Elementary School Child: "Taking the stress out of mealtimes"; Stuart Janousky, MD: April 2001
• US Department of Agriculture (USDA): MyPyramid.gov: "Set a Good Example? They Take Their Lead from You"
• US Department of Agriculture (USDA): MyPyramid.gov: "Trying New Foods"
• US Department of Agriculture (USDA): MyPyramid.gov: "Offer a Variety of Foods"

Resources

• National Dairy Council: Nutrition Explorations: "Healthy Food Choices"
• Steendahl Enterprises: Kid Approved Meals: "Breakfast and Lunch Recipes Kids LOVE"
• The Nemours Foundation: KidsHealth.org: "What Kids Say about What They Eat"
• US Department of Agriculture (USDA): MyPyramid.gov: "How to Cope with Picky Eaters"
• US Department of Agriculture (USDA): MyPyramid.gov: "Make Food Fun for Picky Eaters"