by Ganelle Davis

Created on: December 06, 2011   Last Updated: December 08, 2011

Children are exposed to clever television advertisements from the fast food industry and peer pressure from their peer groups at school to indulge in these fast, non nutritional meals.. They are constantly enticed to eat junk foods. As parents, we must indoctrinate  the principle of eating good foods as opposed to junk foods as soon as our children transition from the baby bottle to table foods. As parents, we must introduce fresh fruits and vegetables to them very early in their developmental stage. We can teach a child to avoid the trappings of eating junk foods.

Junk foods are seldom if ever filling and always consist of preservatives,artificial coloring, sugars and loads of trans fats and salts. The long term shelf life of these products is the most important concern to the manufacturer of these products. We can guard against these junk foods filtering into our homes if we menu plan our meals for our children and continue to be consistent in providing healthy food choices for them

We must keep in mind that most junk foods are cleverly packaged in colors that are appealing to a toddlers discriminating taste. The fast food giant with the golden arches entices our children with promises of toys and winning sweepstakes to amusement parks and kid friendly restaurants to visit for their Happy Meal.

Most kids love red, associated with cherry or strawberry flavoring and purple associated with grape or their favorite cartoon character. Why not serve your children, healthy, nutritional foods on colorful paper plates and napkins to bring color to the meals that are being served at home.  We can start by making a healthy breakfast each morning to stave off hunger pains or their tiny tummies grumbling before the lunch hour. Fresh colorful fruits in the morning are a good start for a nutritional meal. The cereal boxes that are heavy laden with artificial coloring and sugars should be avoided at all cost.

Everyone agrees it is expensive to eat healthy. Please consider this, you either pay the exorbitant cost of a  box of cereal. Add to that cost, missed days of school because the child is sick  or missed pay days from your work to stay at home with a sick child. See there, that sugar laden box of cereal may have been convenient to prepare in the morning, but look at the actual cost.  

Each meal eaten at home should be appealing to the young child. Heart shaped cookie cutters are great for jazzing up ordinary turkey or cheese sandwiches. Menu planning should include some of the desires of the child. It's true mac and cheese is one of the foods most favored by children. why not add some colorful broccoli alongside their favorite dish. 

Let's invest in the nutritional health of our children. They are worth the investment, aren't they? In this tradition, parents are establishing kid friendly meals for your children to enjoy.

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