December 7, 2008 will be a day that lives on forever.Annika ate peas - willingly!
I offered her a salad, and she dug into it. She avoided any lettuce with a hint of dressing, and started scooping up the "beans." She gobbled them up and went back to her pizza. She asked what kind of beans they were and I said "sweet peas." And, then she had a story about teachers planting sweet peas at her daycare years ago.
Here's the timeline of events:
0-7 years: cried, gagged (!), protested, negotiated and segregated green peas.
3 years: introduced her to raw sugar snap peas and that went well (sans dressing/dips).
5 years: introduced her to edamame with extra salt. I get the edamame in the pod and I steam/salt them. It's more rewarding to eat the bean after one has worked at it.
5-6 years: introduced frozen snap peas and it wasn't welcomed.
7 years: she ate the frozen snap peas without protest.
7 years: she ate the peas from my salad. These were frozen peas, which I microwaved for 1 minute and tossed in salad.
I'm really excited because it proves
1. You have to keep trying, even if it takes years.
2. Children eat what parents eat. Why should a child eat vegetables if parents do not?
3. Food marketing works. Two key words have been "sugar" and "sweet," which helped promote this vegetable.
4 comments:
I like how you documented the evolution of peas. I refused to eat coriander when I was that age.
I'm trying not to freak out with her picky habits because I remember I ate my first tomato when I was 12.
I hide Ds peas in a spoonful of banas or some other fruit. It looks gross but she eats it.
I challenge you to introduce okra at year 8. It will take atleast another 20 before she warms up to it. Might as well start early.
Phoenix
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