Want to know the best ways to encourage your kids to follow a healthy diet? Many people find it near impossible to follow a healthy diet as busy entrepreneurs. After all, between client meetings and commutes, it’s hard to find time for exercise and healthy eating. However, when you’re a parent, this can be even harder – especially when you’re responsible for ensuring your children follow a healthy diet.
This becomes especially tricky if your children are fussy eaters, as they’re less likely to jump at the chance to eat fresh fruit and vegetables over other, less healthy options. With that in mind, here are some simple ways to encourage your children to follow a healthy diet.
5 Ways To Encourage Your Kids To Follow a Healthy Diet
1. Give Them a Choice in What To Eat
One way you can ‘trick’ your children into eating a little healthier is to give them some choice on what they eat. For example, you could ask them what fruit they’d like in their lunchbox or what they’d like for dinner – giving them a few different (healthy) options to choose from.
This way, they don’t feel like they are being forced into healthy eating; they’re making their own decisions just like a ‘grown-up’ would.
2. Puree Fruits and Veggies
Finding new ways to serve fresh fruit and vegetables to your children means they may be more likely to readily accept them into their diet. For example, pureeing fruit can make it easier to eat, as it can be served by a spoon, and the texture is often softer and much smoother.
It can also make for a more fun dining experience. You can find out how to make strawberry puree here, though the same techniques can be applied to different fruits and vegetables depending on your tastes or personal preferences.
3. Teach Them The Vale of Eating Healthy
Children are naturally curious. In fact, it’s estimated that young kids ask, on average, 300 questions a day. As a result, they’re likely to have many questions about healthy eating and why they need to choose things such as fruit over chocolate and candy. This means that you need to share as much knowledge with them on this as possible. After all, they are more likely to follow your advice if they understand your motivations, as it can otherwise feel like they are being lectured for no reason.
4. Cook Together
Cooking together is another great way to help your children get excited about healthy eating. This is because you turn cooking (and eating) into a fun family activity, which also gives you the chance to spend some quality time together. Furthermore, it helps your children develop useful skills that they can carry into adulthood. If you’re dealing with a busy schedule, you could batch cook on the weekends so that the only thing you need to do is reheat meals when you’re hungry as opposed to cooking from scratch each day.
5. Make Meal Times More Fun
Another way to make cooking together more entertaining is to turn it into something of a challenge or competition. For example, you could take turns choosing different recipes to follow and choose your favorite at the end of the week. Also, present healthy foods in fun ways that entice them to try it.
Final Thoughts
We hope these five ways to encourage your kids to follow a healthy diet have been useful to you and that you will try some of these tips to see if it helps. You’re never too young or old to start following a healthy meal plan and live a more fulfilling and healthier lifestyle.