Food Play! Fun Foods For your 16 Months Old
In this Article
Eating time should be fun for all involved. Kids, in particular, love creativity. Try creative presentations with their meals and you’ll be amazed at how easily everything goes down. Make fun foods for toddlers to eat and even the pickiest toddler can be swayed!
To develop healthy and fuss-free eating habits in a child, parents need to start early- even as early as from the time they take their first morsel. Making food fun to eat is the first step in developing a love for food in children. Be it at breakfast, lunch or dinner, learn to make mealtime fun-time!
5 Fun Food Ideas for Toddlers
1. Add a Splash of Colour
Kids are drawn to bright colours. The same is the case with food. When making their lunch, dinner or putting together a healthy snack, try playing it up with a splash of colours. If your toddler has already started learning different colours, it’s all the better to use colourful food and flavours to her advantage.
2. Bring Creativity to Food Presentation
If you have a fussy toddler on your hands, it’s time to start using creativity on the way you present and serve her food. To begin with, get a hold of shape-cutters to cut out different forms from fruits and vegetables. Try making smiley faces out of poached eggs or make popsicles out of fresh juice. The more you think up newer ways to serve it up on a creative platter, the more your toddler will want to give it a try.
3. Use Fun Names for Foods
Renaming foods with cute names is another way of making food fun for toddlers. It gives items more appeal and especially attracts kids. Some funny names given to vegetables by researchers at a US Food and Brand Lab include ‘Silly Dilly Green Beans’, ‘Power Punch Broccoli’ and ‘Tiny Tasty Tree Tops’. You could also try associating the names of a particular fruit or vegetable to something that’s beneficial for them. Naming foods influences a child’s selection and her taste for it to a great extent.
4. Serve Up Variety
Serving a variety of fun and healthy foods to toddlers takes the monotony out of meals. Select different types of food that will be enjoyable for your toddler and let each meal be served with a different taste and texture, if possible. If there’s something your child doesn’t like, try serving it with another food of his or her choice.
5. Get Your Toddler Involved in Food Selection
When grocery shopping, let your toddler have the honour of selecting fruits and vegetables of their choice. Allowing them to pick out what they want to eat is going to make your job easier at the dining table. Getting them involved in meal preparations will also ensure they have a hand in what they eat and how they want to eat it.
For toddlers, food becomes fun to eat when there’s some excitement involved. You can’t give a toddler the same type of food day in and day out and expect her to relish it. Apply cute, adorable ideas to foods and see the difference it makes to your child’s appetite.
