Is cabbage your favorite food, too?
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- April
- 17
So I asked the Pumpkin what she wanted me to make for her to eat on her fourth birthday. She said, “rice and cabbage.” Perhaps I’m taking the idea of teaching her healthy eating habits a bit too far.
Seriously, though, my child is as vulnerable to the allure of junk food as anyone’s. Even though dinner always includes at least two vegetables and her lunch is often a big plate of broccoli with parmesan cheese, she has a big sweet tooth and a taste for french fries. A taste, I’ll admit, that is my fault.
It all started last fall shortly after she began taking dance lessons on Saturdays. To say that her compliance in obeying the teacher was poor is an understatement (more on that another time). To encourage her to follow directions, I made a deal with her (we’re big on deals): If she obeys, she gets a treat of french fries at the neighboring cafe. Well, two seasons later and this reward is pretty firmly seated in her synapses. She knows that if she has a good class, she will be eating french fries.
It’s a big treat for her. I do feel a bit unhappy about it because I know she enjoys it so much, and I fear I am circuiting her brain to perceive food as reward. Next year, I am going to try introducing something different, like a trip to the bookstore. Though that has the problem of being expensive and teaches another problematic behavior: shopping. Maybe I can think about an experience as a reward that’s free and desirable.
In the meantime, I’ll make her the cabbage (purple) and rice on her birthday. (Though NOT at her party. I won’t subject our family to cabbage for a celebration!)
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on Friday, April 17th, 2009 at 12:21 pm by Julie Moran Alterio.
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potatoes colcannon.