This month marks the 10th birthday of my second book, Easy Peasy Healthy Eating!
When Easy Peasy Healthy Eating was published, all I could hope for was that it would be helpful to concerned, frustrated parents who simply wanted their picky eaters to love vegetables.
I was so amazed to have not one, but two books out in the world that I honestly didn’t consider how much writing the book would shape the healthy eating habits in my own family.
Now, a decade after I published Easy Peasy Healthy Eating, I can reflect on the lasting, real world impact the wisdom within its pages has personally had.
Here are three healthy eating habits that have surprisingly stuck with my family 10 years after writing Easy Peasy Healthy Eating…
1) Lead with Vegetables
My tiny humans were toddlers when I wrote Easy Peasy Healthy Eating and I immediately adopted one of the first healthy eating habits from it – lead with vegetables.
Each evening, just before dinner, the kids were served a bowl of vegetables. These were usually raw and cut into pieces. Family favorites included celery, carrots, cucumber, broccoli and sometimes apple slices but we mixed it up with whatever fruit and vegetables were seasonally available.
I thought that at some point this healthy eating habit would be superseded by only having vegetables as part of the main course. But ten years on and we continue to lead with vegetables every single night!
Top Tip: The Sacrificial Vegetable – For the vegetable appetizer, put three vegetables on the plate, one of which is less favored. For example, cut up some cucumber, celery and a radish. Place the plate out and wait for the complaints or ignoring of the least liked vegetable. Then watch your darlings munch on the other two vegetables. What just happened is your children happily ate two portions of vegetables! As Meatloaf says “two out of three ain’t bad”. And you never know, one day, the previously disliked vegetable may even be tried and eaten.
Most Surprising: To this day, my tween and teen will ask where their bowl of vegetables is and say ‘Yum, thanks’ when I present it.
2) Grow a Garden
Writing Easy Peasy Healthy Eating encouraged our family to plant a few seeds in our fledgling garden box. There were just so many benefits to growing our own garden including cheap, fresh, organic vegetables, that it was impossible not to give it a go.
We weren’t sure what to expect but that summer we had an abundance of string beans and peas in their pods. Our tiny humans picked and ate their greens straight off the vines.
Ten years later and we still plants beans, peas and other vegetable seeds in late spring. And after a decade, the kids still love picking and eating their way through our abundant crop on lazy summer evenings.
Top Tip: Vegetable Guerilla Warfare – A ‘Mama Story’ from Easy Peasy Healthy Eating: The girls love eating straight out of the garden. They will eat a tomato like you would eat apple, carrying it around and crunching into it just the same. I often pick pea pods out of the garden or a bunch of parsley and wash it and leave it on the table. Just as is. The girls often breeze past and graze at it. Before you know it’s all gone! It’s like vegetable guerilla warfare – they don’t know what’s hit them. – Annabelle
Most Surprising: We partially use our compost bins to refill the garden box before spring planting. Every year we get a surprise with what grows. Last summer we had three varieties of tomatoes and a handful of gigantic pumpkins sprout up! Bonus vegetables. Yum!
3) You Don’t Have to Eat It
Like many people growing up, we were encouraged to clean our plates. Sometimes I was cajoled with “just one last mouthful” and sometimes I was bribed with dessert. Let me state that my parents were doing the best job they could to encourage healthy eating habits with what they knew at the time.
While researching Easy Peasy Healthy Eating, I came across a blog post from Leigh Anderson on scarymommy.com called ‘Six Words That Are Guaranteed to End Picky Eating’ where she offered up this mantra: ‘You Don’t Have to Eat It’.
I immediately adopted this into our family healthy eating habits and the kids have never thought they need to eat everything on their plate. Dessert is not a treat after the main meal is completely finished but something that happens on a regular basis regardless of what is eaten. Sometimes we even have dessert first!
These six magical words have made a real difference to my own approach to eating. This mantra has helped me to try and overcome decades of ‘clean plate’ consumption. Ten years after Easy Peasy Healthy Eatingwas published and I still remind myself constantly that ‘you don’t have to eat it’.
Top Tip: Lightly or Gently Coax – Of course, you can lightly ask ‘Are you sure you don’t want a few more bites?’, or ‘Are you sure you are full?’. Or you can gently remind your kids that there will not be another meal for some time. But ultimately it is far less stressful to simply accept their decisions about their own wee bodies.
Most Surprising: Sometimes my kids will observe me stating something like ‘Boy, I’m so full’ then taking another bite of my meal. It is extraordinarily difficult to undo a long-held belief and I am not perfect! Ten years on, they know the mantra well and so, clearly and firmly will say to me: ‘you don’t have to eat it’.
Happy Book Birthday!
When you write a book you hope it has an impact on the reader but I am genuinely surprised that three healthy eating habits have stuck with my family 10 years after publishing Easy Peasy Healthy Eating. I barely remember a time before we ate raw vegetables before dinner, grew a garden or said to each other, ‘you don’t have to eat it’.
As we mark this 10-year milestone of Easy Peasy Healthy Eating, I want to say how incredibly grateful I am to every parent, caregiver, and reviewer who has shared their picky eater story. I am especially thankful to those who contributed to the good, bad and ugly stories about eating vegetables in the book.
Here’s to the next 10 years of easy peasy healthy eating!
If you enjoyed reading this blog post, check out these ones:
3 Fun Ways That Help Picky Eaters Love Vegetables
3 Reasons Why Parents Still Love Easy Peasy Potty Training After 10 Years
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