How many *different* fruits and vegetables does your kid eat per week?
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Anonymous
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Not volume of produce, but number of varieties.
I have been having some health issues, so my mom-- a doctor-- has advised me (among other things, of course!) to try and eat 25 different fruits and vegetables per week. The amount of each individual variety is unimportant, although I'm sure a single leaf of arugula might not allow me to count arugula. This got me thinking about my kid-- and kids in general-- and how varied their intake is. What about yours? Do you make any efforts along these lines, or do they eat a variety organically (so to speak)? |
Anonymous
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Generally:
Apples Strawberries Blue berries Grapes Carrots Cucumbers Lettuce Red peppers Green beans or broccoli Peas Sometimes mango or pineapple |
Anonymous
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No one in my family gets anywhere near that variety, mostly because I have neither the time to meal plan and shop to that extent nor the money to hire a personal chef.
We tend to buy what's in season, so we get a reasonable variety over time, but not in any given week. |
Anonymous
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Offered and eaten in varying amounts between home & school over the course of a month:
Apples Oranges / clementines / grapefruit Berries Kiwi Pineapple Banana Melon (cantaloupe, honeydew, watermelon) Peas Carrots Limas Edamame Peppers Onions Cucumbers Tomatoes Broccoli Cauliflower Eggplant Squash / zucchini (yellow, spaghetti, butternut, etc.) Veggie bites or patties with: spinach, kale, broccoli, edamame, sweet potato, etc. Then a few like star fruit or mango or artichokes that we might only have a couple times a year. So he’s regularly exposed to 25+ but he’s also 3, so sometimes just eats peas and blueberries for a week straight. |
Anonymous
| We do 2 fruits and 2 vegetables a day. So probably 20 total because we do eat some of the same like broccoli and green beans. |
Anonymous
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Yeah, not happening for us. The only vegetables we eat regularly are green beans, broccoli, edamame, carrots, spinach, cucumber.. and that's stretching it. And I'm still pretty sure that's more than most of our peers.
Fruits we eat mostly what's affordable with exceptions. In winter we only have bananas, apples, pears. Lately we've been eating pineapple, apples, mango, bananas, pears, strawberries, and we'll eat more berries and cherries for like a week over the summer. |
Anonymous
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3yr old more like over a month:
Apples Banana Strawberries Blueberries Lemon Limes Kiwi Mango Pineapple Carrot Fennel Green beans Peas Broccoli Celery Potatoes Cucumber Tomatoes |
Anonymous
You really buy 20 different fruist and vegetables each week? |
Anonymous
| OP, does your mother have advanced nutritional training? I mean, I appreciate that she's a doctor, but the vast majority of MDs have incredibly poor nutritional knowledge. |
Anonymous
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I’d say we’re varied, but it’s more week to week vs. 25 in the same week. Eg. I’ll buy kale one week, cabbage another week, chard another week vs all three in the same week. Who has the budget for that?
This week: Cabbage, spinach, cucumbers, three colors of sweet peppers (count as 1) raspberries, Asian pear, sweet potato, butternut squash, carrot, parsnip, broccoli, sweet pea, cauliflower, orange, avocado, watermelon. That’s 16, so no where near that recommendation, but I’m pretty happy with it. |
Anonymous
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DD is 2.5, so I'm still trying to get her palate to expand.
She likes fruit more than vegetables (unsurprisingly). Fruit she'll eat: Raspberries Bananas Blueberries Blackberries Cantaloupe Grapes Watermelon Clementines Vegetables she'll eat: Carrots Peas Corn Butternut squash (in soup) Pickles (do they count?) Then she'll eat tons of different vegetables in soup (tomatoes, celery, rutabaga, etc.) that she wouldn't eat on their own. That's far from 25, but I'm pretty happy, given her age. |
Anonymous
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In the course of last week -
Apples Bananas, Grapes Mango Oranges Strawberries Blueberry Melons Pineapple (can) Guava Lemon Vegetable and herbs - Onions, Ginger, Garlic, raw Turmeric, Tomatoes, Mint, Cilantro, Green chillies, Thai Basil, Lemon Grass, Galangal, Shallots Spinach Eggplant Okra Wax Gourd Corn Bell Peppers Eggplant Broccoli Cabbage BokChoy Snow Peas Peas Mushrooms (4 types) Cauliflower Zuccini Brussles Sprout Potatoes Okinawa Purple Yams Red Pumpkin Baby Corn Water chestnut Bamboo Shoots Yard long beans Green beans Sunflower Sprouts Mung Bean Sprouts Mustard Greens Purlane (Kulpha) Kale Cucumber POH-TAH-TOES |
Anonymous
Did I write baby carrots? |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
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My regular weekly grocery shopping includes:
- 3-4 main fruits/berries. This week it was a cantaloupe, apples, couple of mango, and strawberries. Last week it was pears, grapes, and a few kiwis. Have my mind set on a pineapple next week, not sure what else - will see what looks good. - Lettuce - variety changes from week to week, but we always have some sort of lettuce. Often romaine, red leaf, or mixed spring greens. - Spinach, to add a darker leaf to salads - Cucumbers - Bell peppers - Carrots and/or celery - Tomatoes (usually cherry tomatoes this time of year; switch to full-size from my garden in the summer) - Broccoli - Green beans - 2-3 other vegetables to use in side dishes for dinner. This week was cauliflower, asparagus, and brussel sprouts. Last week was zucchini and snap peas. On any given day, my kids have: - Fruit with breakfast - Fruit with lunch, and/or applesauce as a snack - Sometimes a vegetable with lunch too (especially if it's an applesauce day) - Salad with lettuce, spinach and some combination of bell peppers, cucumber, tomatoes, carrots, celery - A cooked vegetable with dinner So in the course of a week, I'd say they eat about 4 different fruits and 10-12 different vegetables - but only a few of those are the same every week. We do a lot of seasonal variation. Watermelon in the summer, apples/pears in the fall, citrus in the winter. |