Adding kid-friendly flavored dips and sauces can get children to be less fussy about eating their greens, Arizona State University researchers find.
Most parents have difficulty in getting their children, especially younger ones, to eat their greens and vegetables. According to statistics, less than 10 percent of all 4 to 8 years olds consume the daily dose of vegetables recommended by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). Moreover, more than one third of all children don't consume vegetables on a typical day.
A common trick used by parents to get children to eat their greens includes poring peanut butter, cheese sauce and even ketchup over the vegetables. On conducting a new study, Arizona State University researchers found that this trick doesn't only get kids to consume vegetable but also makes them look at greens in a more favorable manner.
For the study, parents of 29 children of ages three to five were asked to fill out a survey about the kids' views on 11 vegetables including whether they liked or disliked the vegetable, or had never tried it. Since cauliflower and Brussels sprouts are two items children dislike the most, they were used to measure the level of dislike or like among the kids in the study, according to a Mother Nature Network blog.
In the second part of the study, the children were divided into groups of five or six and were given either cauliflower or Brussels sprouts once per day for seven days. The vegetables were boiled. Each group was served the boiled vegetables either plain or with unsweetened cream cheese or with sweetened cream cheese.
Less than one in five children that were served plain sprouts said they liked the vegetable, whereas about two-thirds of kids who got sprouts with either type of cream cheese said they liked the vegetables.
In the last part of the study, all children were given plain boiled vegetables. Researchers noted that the children who had previously said they "liked" Brussels sprouts ate more of them than kids who had expressed dislike.
"Children develop food preferences at a young age, yet tend to be really picky at this age, so it's important to sustain healthy habits which will persist into adulthood," Devina Wadhera, also a researcher at Arizona State University and the study's other author, told Reuters Health.
A similar study was conducted last year by Penn University researchers who suggested flavored dips and sauces can entice children into eating more vegetables regularly.
According to ChooseMyPlate, a USDA initiative, all 3 to 5 year old children must eat at least one and a half to two cups of vegetables daily.
"This has the potential to change the eating habits of children, including eating more vegetables, and this in turn will affect childhood obesity," said Elizabeth Capaldi-Phillips, a psychologist at Arizona State University and lead author of the study.
