If you have kids, you’ve probably experienced the battle that dinner time can become when a kid refuses to eat what’s been served. So parents come up with different strategies to get picky and stubborn eaters to actually eat. Someone asked the parenting section of Reddit, “Is it bad to lie about what is in a dish in order to get a kid to eat it?”
And hundreds of parents have weighed in with their thoughts on rebranding what’s on the menu:
- “I love the fun names trick. I successfully branded chili as ‘cowboy chili’ after a book that had cowboys eating out of an ambiguous pot, and my 4 year old now LOVES it.”
- “A lady I know used to tell her kids that she was making ‘golden fluff’ for breakfast because they insisted they hated scrambled eggs. Golden fluff was their favorite. But scrambled eggs? Yuck.”
- “I have a picky eater too and I will mention the things the kid likes in the dish and omit the things they don't like.”
- “My step son told me he didn't like green onions (says he hates all onions), so I started calling them scallions. He loves them, and I'm not technically lying”
- “My kids don't like curry. But they like chicken, rice, and ‘sauce.’”
- “In our house, broccoli is also known as dino trees, because otherwise my preschooler won't touch it.”
- “Telling your child tonight's meal is ‘pizza chicken’ and not chicken parmesan is about survival.”
- “If you have to rename rice ‘baby pasta’ or call roasted potatoes ‘French fry balls,’ then so be it.
- “Tonight, my picky eater, who professes to HATE any form of squash, happily ate zucchini when I gave her its name in French.”
- “I do this to my husband too. ‘What are the green flecks in the lasagna?’ ‘Oh, just seasoning, herbs, you know’ I certainly didn't blitz up a fat wad of spinach with the ricotta or anything.”
- “I’ve been adding spinach, carrots, zucchini, and a host of other offensive foods to my children’s meals since they started on solids. Spinach brownies? Don’t mind if I do. Zucchini cookies? I’ll have 5. Carrots shredded into every red sauce I’ve ever made? 100%”