Sending in veggies in school lunch...that come back uneaten every single day- what to do?

[Anonymous]

i finally got veggies to 'click' at dinner by always putting the veggies on his plate with the rest of dinner. i'd purposefully not give a LOT of the main course. then when he wanted more of the (yummy) main course, i'd say not until you eat some of your veggies. That eventually because 'all of your veggies.' now he likes them and they always get eaten.

[Anonymous]

It does get better around 4ish! Have you tried the frozen veggie medley (carrot cubes, peas, corn, green beans)? For whatever reason my picky kid would eat that (frozen, not warmed up) when she would eat no other veggies. Weird, but she liked it.

[Anonymous]

Smart kid. Vegetables are gross.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I forgot to mention that DS has food allergies- who knows if that comes into play- I seriously doubt it b/c his allergies are to peanuts and treenuts...seemingly unrelated, right?

My dd who is PN/TN allergic sounds like your son. Stubborn and would never touch a carrot or tomato at lunch or any other time. I don't send them. What's the point? I send stuff I think/know she will eat because she has 20 minutes to eat lunch, and I want her to eat. She is 7.5 by the way. I felt like I had a small triumph yesterday because now she likes fruit rolls ups. It is sad that I am happy about that.

[Anonymous]

Oh, OP, I feel for you. I am still battling to get more veggies into my finicky five-year-old. If your DS will eat muffins, try these:

http://www.fitsugar.com/Banana-Smoothie-Muffin-Recipe-29204287

I cut the sugar to 1/3 cup, make these as mini muffins, and put three or four chocolate chips on top of each muffin before they go into the oven. I told DS that I used green food coloring (it helped, I think, that he'd just done a food coloring "science experiment" and understood how food coloring worked) -- the spinach makes them bright, Kermit-style green. But they are delicious and do not taste of green, even a little bit. He loves them, and often takes one in his lunch to school. (And before you uppity DCUMers without picky kids get all up in arms that a muffin is not a veggie, I know. I'm certainly not suggesting that eating one of these muffins is the same as downing a plate of kale. But it is a food product that my son will consume with green vegetable matter inside. That's all I was looking for at the time I found this recipe.)

Also, OP, you mentioned zucchini muffins -- I make those too, but peel the zucchini, shred it, and then coarse chop it. It virtually eliminates the green bits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You should just send only veggies! Let him starve I kid I kid. That's what olden day parents would do.

Have you tried pureeing it into sauces? There still might be specks but perhaps have the color of veggie match the sauce?

Apparently I'm an "olden day" parent then because that's practically what I did when my girls were refusing to eat veggies. We went vegetarian for a week and by day 3 they were happily eating their veggies. A few days without other options and they were apparently hungry enough to eat them. For the record, I didn't starve them...made sure other options that they liked (fruit, some whole grains like brown rice and oatmeal) were available. They were allowed those in limited quantities though, to ensure that they were hungry enough to get to the point that they'd eat their veggies. Now they're 11 and 7 and chow down on pretty much any veggie without any issues.

[Anonymous]

Have you tried combining veggies with things he likes? Like short pieces of celery with peanut butter (sunbutter for your kid since he is allergic to peanuts) inside. I take the parts that are like a U and fill it so that the sunbutter is inside and then cut them about 3/4 to 1 inch long. They are bite-sized and they turn sunbutter into finger food. Also try cutting the curved tops and bottoms from red peppers and cutting them into curved bite-size pieces and putting hummus inside.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Send fruit

OP. I do send fruit daily; he could eat fruit until he popped.

Start calling the veggies fruit.

[Anonymous]

Look up online recipes from The Sneaky Chef and Deceptively Delicious. When my son was that age we had to hide things. Here's what he liked

-Mac & Cheese (we snuck in pureed squash)

-pasta with meat sauce (carrot and red pepper puree in meat sauce)

-turkey chili with various purees thrown in (carrot, red pepper, etc)

-pumpkin pancakes or bread

chocolate cupcakes where you sneak in some pumpkin and the chocolate frosting uses avocado for some of the fat

-broccoli cooked in chicken broth-no hiding it. Once we told him he could pretend he was a dinosaur eating trees he was all into it.

[Anonymous]

Yeah, one idea might be to find a new veggie he's never tried (IDK-- jicama? a white eggplant?) and call it by a fruit name or something. IDK.

Otherwise, I think I'd send a little in the lunchbox at least a couple times a week, just in case. But I wouldn't sweat it, and I wouldn't mention it.

[Anonymous]

I have a NON VEG EATING KID. I love 'er, but this part of her behavior drives me to distraction. Kid #2 is a veggie hoover, however.

I would say focus on getting healthy non-veg foods in your kid's lunch. We go for

1) savory: sandwich w cream cheese and turkey; PB & J; or hummus and crackers (which she dips herself)

AND

2) sweet: banana, apples (more likely to be eaten if sliced), applesauce, berries, low-sugar fruit salads; oranges (most likely to be eaten if sliced in the round or peeled segments), or fruit yogurt

AND

3) "snack": popcorn (unsalted, home-popped); cheese slices/sticks


At least that way I know she's eating stuff that is more or less healthy...

At dinner time we offer dessert only if a certain amount of healthy veg has been consumed. Dessert is usually something like a marshmallow, gummy bunnies, one scoop ice cream, chocolate banana pop. Enticing, right? Well, I guess she super duper hates veg, because she often goes without. DD#2, however, shovels everything in.

[Anonymous]

Vegetable Bingo! Print (or better yet have him draw) pictures of various vegetables you want him to try onto a bingo board. Every time he eats that veggie, mark a spot.
When he has filled the board, he should get a special surprise. Something like getting to pick a restaurant or a trip to his favorite park with you are great ideas.
Allow him to help you plan his lunch menu a bit too.
Allow him to physically pack his lunchbox.
Get him involved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have you tried pureeing it into sauces? There still might be specks but perhaps have the color of veggie match the sauce?

I use the sneaky chef recipes which are color camoflauged purees, basically, and it works out very well. A lot of the foods he doesn't think he likes to eat, he does eat.

[Anonymous]

Have you tried edamame in the pod? My DD likes to eat them because she thinks it's fun to pop the edamame out of the pods.

My SIL just sends a fake toy vegetable with her child's lunch so the teacher doesn't judge her for not sending a veggie.

[Anonymous]

I haven't read all if the responses, but I really like the Deceptively Delicious cookbook that Jessica Seinfeld released years ago. My kids actually like vegetables, but someone gave this book to me as a gift. We have liked whatever recipes we have tried (cauliflower mozzarella cheese sticks, butternut squash Mac 'n cheese). There is a bit of prep work involved, but it is worth it.