I’ve been asked for ways to engage kids in healthy eating, and wanting to share with you some easy ways to do that, I have come up with this post!

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These are some tried and true ways to spark a bit of fun into eating those fruits for children who might say things such as “I don’t like fruit!”

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Oh children of the world we live in, I understand why you’d think that. I sure don't blame you!

Fruit roll ups, gummies and candy bars filled to the brim with ingredients to get you hooked, using millions of dollars to get their products into your mind are chemically programming us to crave, numbing our sensitive tastebuds to the real world around us. Obviously the choice of the engineered addictive products would be the one anyone would feel inclined to pick but hey, let's try to overcome all of that.

What if we make eating our real fruits (and veggies) more fun? Want to try?

I am a loving auntie to darling children who have grown up in the Western world eating things like marshmallows and dispenser candies at the grocery store.

• How am I to compete with ingredients that literally make my precious babies addicted to them?

• How are we supposed to feed our kids food from the Earth in comparison with factory-perfected crack I mean, products.

Since these kiddie’s health (and my own health for that matter) is of utmost importance to me, I spend a great amount of time researching, learning, understanding how I can give them food they will want to eat, that’s nutritious and delicious!

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(Homemade, strawberry-cheesecake bites! Check out the recipe here!

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Without anymore delay, let's get to our list:

1) Let them grow their own seeds/plants:

These are some peppers growing in my garden! What is more fun than watching something grow, caring for it and then having it develop into something you can eat! A favorite plant for this (and easy to grow) is strawberries! I suggest this to the parents of all the little ones I know! The kids love watching their plants grow and are so excited to see them bearing fruit that they cannot wait to eat them! (Also try tomatoes, raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, cucumbers, carrots which all go over really well with the little ones!) We can grow so many wonderfully nutritious foods for us at our own houses! If you don’t have much land, you can use pots on the window sill, plant at a family member’s house, share gardens with your neighbours to save money and have access to the healthiest food you can imagine… is that too much? Am I getting too ambitious?

OK, well at least let us try to add some fruits and veggies to the kids’ diets, right? Some pots outside on the front steps will surely ignite the excitement in our kiddies appetite!

If this is not possible for you and you feel like you can’t grow your own food (if you have questions, please feel free to contact me and I will try to help you!) then let’s try the next best thing:

2) Have the child choose! Give them a choice!

Take the children with you to pick and choose what flavors and smells appeal to them. Let them look at what is available, bring it to their nose, let them smell. Engaging the kids in the process will make them feel more attached and excited to the fruit. I remember my mom used to take me to the fruit aisle at the grocery store and let me pick out what grapes I wanted. I tried many of them over the years as I experimented but found out that I liked the green ones the best. After that I would always say “can you please pick up some grapes?” She would even give me one to try well I was standing there, as if to excite me until we got to the car. It always worked.

Try questions such as:

• “Do you like how it smells?”
• “Would you like to taste this one?”
• “Do you like sweet/sour?" (with example of something they are used to eating that they can relate to)
• “Do you like the color of this?”

3) Sweet as candy:

(without adding artificial flavors or processed sugars!)
This is a smoothie bowl made with frozen fruit and water blended into different colors, then sprinkled with some coconut flakes, sliced strawberries and goji berries!

Fresh fruits are full of their own sweetness, so they can be eaten alone once the palate is prepared for it but I find with my little ones that they like a bit of sweetness added. While I would prefer they eat it raw, if the sweetness helps them eat it, I am not going to complain too much (but slowly wean them off.)

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These additives will tempt the kiddies competing with the vengeance of the artificial sweeteners they are used to!

• Shredded coconut
• Maple syrup/coconut nectar/ honey (if not vegan)
• Dates
  (You can also sprinkle things on top like cinnamon if your child likes the taste!)
  PS: Cinnamon is full of health benefits such as being filled of antioxidants, having anti-inflammatory properties, lowering blood sugar levels etc… it’s really a wonder-spice!

4) Make it playful:

In my experience, getting the kids involved and making it fun is a huge help in whether or not they want to eat your end result. That is why I have all kinds of shapes and colors in my kitchen! I make my treats look appealing to the kids by making them bite-able, finger foods!

It can be made into a game or an activity, a special exercise that you can set up and make fun! Food turned arts and crafts is hugely effective!

For this dish, I used cookie cutters to make the fruits into fun shapes that even I had a ball playing with! After making holes in my banana slices, I used the same cutter to cut the strawberries and put the cutout inside the banana hole! See how fun it looks? They say not to play with your food but you know what? These cutouts are too fun not to? And now, ta-da the kids are eating their fruits!

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I hope these little tips and tricks help you with your own little ones. I try to make my treats kid-friendly since I am just a big kid at heart, I think I am a decent judge ;)

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Tested and approved by my little angels back in the states! Let me know how this goes for you!

My new friend @sunshine247 recently shared one of my smoothie recipes with her grandbabies, making a whole experience out of putting together the pretty pink and orange smoothie and it was a huge success! Here's a picture of the gorgeous gals in the middle of their fun!

Please share these tips with your friends and family so that more little ones around the world can get their real, whole foods that are so important to their health!

This post was inspired by #fruitsandveggiesmonday hosted by one of my favorite souls on here, @lenasveganliving (check out her blog for delicious recipes!)

Sending you love through food, as always! If you are new here, it's great to have you here! I am a food fanatic as you'll surely see, and I am a strong believer in the power it has within it, and the ability it has to heal us! I aim to inspire through my recipes and posts and hope to connect with you here, through your heart. Some say the way to the heart is through the stomach, I might just agree with that theory ;)

Until next time,
XO,
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