You want your little one to grow up healthy and strong, and that means eating their veggies. Children should eat a variety of colorful vegetables prepared in healthy ways, but statistics show that most kids aren’t getting enough. The USDA suggests that 2- and 3-year-olds eat a cup a day, and 1 ½ cups for 4-8-year-olds. With most toddlers and preschoolers, that can feel like a hopeless challenge.
Here’s some hope:
A study conducted by the Cornell University Food and Brand Lab showed that preschoolers ate more when their vegetables were given fun, catchy names. The kids ate about twice as many “X-ray Vision Carrots” at lunch than they did on the days when they were just labeled “carrots.” And the effect continued over time, with kids eating about 50 percent more carrots even on the days when they were no longer given the cool name.
“Giving a food a fun name makes kids think it will be more fun to eat,” said lead author Brian Wansink. “And it seems to keep working—even the next day.”
You can come up with your own fun names for fruits and veggies, but here are a few to get you started.
