I have a little obsession right now.
I'm currently in love with anything French.
I love French food.
I love French music.
I love the language. (which by the way are going to start learning.... we just bought rosetta stone and can't wait to get going on it!)
And I really love certain parts of their lifestyle.
Back in 2009 I went to France and Germany with my work on an educational food tour with a group of students. That was when my love of the French started.
As we have continued to prepare ourselves for parenthood, we have discussed a lot of parenting issues. Fortunately we're on the same page on most of the issues. Eating habits and behavior are at the top of that list that we worry about the most. What if our children are picky eaters? (that would kill me!) What if we have one of those bratty kids who throws tantrums in public because we won't buy that crappy toy they want? (wouldn't kill me, but definitely makes me cringe). I can't tell you how much screaming we hear at target every single time we go. (Honestly all I can think is "you're at target! Next to Disneyland this is the happiest place on earth. How can you be that upset at the second happiest place on earth!!??)
So that makes us wonder......How would we deal with these problems?
We've noticed a lot of parents have the "that's just how kids are and you just have to deal with it and not judge me for my kids poor behavior because its totally not my fault" attitude.
Oh boy.
I want to enjoy my children, not endure them. I know parenthood isn't all flowers and puffy clouds, but come on... it shouldn't be a daily test of "can I make it to bedtime when they're out of my hair?".
Double oh boy.
And then I found these books:
I just finished the French kids eat everything (Steve is reading it now) and I'm currently 13 in line at the Library for Bringing up bebe, so I haven't read that one yet. However, I have a good friend who read it and has told me quite a bit about it, and I can't wait to finally get it. I'll give it a review when that happens.
So... my review of French Kids Eat Everything.
I love the French attitude toward eating. I eat more like a French person then an American, so I felt like throughout the whole book this lady was in my head writing down my thoughts on food. The main point in this book is something that I also noticed when I was there: French kids eat everything and are very well behaved, especially during meal times. They go out in public all hours of the day with no tantrums or melt downs. They can sit calmly in restaurants (even late at night) and they don't cry, run around, and make a mess. (sounds amazing right?)
One thing about French parenting that I totally have always agreed with is that parents ARE in fact responsible for their kids behavior. If you have food issues with your kids that you want to change, or just don't want to ever develop these issues, I highly recommend reading this book.
This book was about a woman from Canada who married a French guy and they moved to France for a year and got reality slapped in the face because their kids had atrocious eating habits. It chronicled her journey of turning picky eaters into kids who would eat anything. She proved it is possible to change even the pickiest eaters. Starting out on her French journey was a little irritating. She made all the food mistakes that bother me! I hate it when I hear parents say "my kid doesn't like that" or "my kid wont eat that". She had huge problems with the school system because of that and drove the Mother-in-law crazy (and me crazy). When kids hear you say those things, they believe you and in turn don't like things and won't eat things because of their parents. One thing I have observed over the years is that picky eating starts usually with the mother. Moms usually control their children's eating habits. Kids eat exactly how their moms expect them to. If you expect them not to like things, they won't. On the flipside, if you expect them to like things, they will. What I loved about this book is that concept was the pillar of how this mom changed her kids eating habits..... Before you change your children's attitudes toward food, you have to first change your own. Throughout the book she focused on these 10 rules that the French live by:
#1- Parents are in charge of food education
#2- Avoid emotional eating. Food is not a reward or bribe.
#3- Parents plan and schedule meals. Kids eat what adults eat. No short order cooking
#4- Eat family meals together. No distractions
#5- Eat your veggies
#6- You don't have to like it, but you do have to taste it.
#7- No snacking. Its ok to feel hungry in between meals (they believe snacking is what leads to dinner time problems because they just aren't hungry)
#8- Slow food is happy food. Eat slow! No rushing through meals.
#9- Eat mostly real food
#10- Remember eating is joyful, relax
I agree will ALL OF THOSE!
Let me address them one by one:
#1- Parents play a HUGE role in their children's eating habits, specifically the mother. Its important to expose children to a variety of foods at an early age and stop assuming what kids do and don't like. You (the parent) shouldn't project your own negative food feelings onto your children. I hear parents say all the time "you don't have to eat that... that's yuckie." In France calling ANY food "yuckie" is not cool. I remember being at restaurant in Paris and there was pickled turnips on the table and I thought they were really sour. Apparently I made a Face. And the server gave me the most disgusted look I have ever received. How dare I. But that's how it is. When a child doesn't like something, its assumed they just haven't tried it enough times. It's not ok to not like something. Its rude. Food education also has to do with helping children to understand what they are putting into their bodies. They fully believe and live "you are what you eat". They care more about eating good quality food vs. North America where as long as its a lot of food and its cheap, we'll cram it in our mouths without regard to what it actually is.
#2- We break this rule in America ALL THE TIME! Food is very emotional. We use food and in turn we are all obese and have a variety of health issues. We eat when we're bored, sad, happy, mad...... In France they only eat certain times of the day and by waiting for that time they are actually hungry. They never eat just because. With children we food bribe ALL THE TIME. This is going to be an issue when we have kids and go the the grandparents house. I hate it when children are told "if you don't eat your dinner there's no dessert." I hate this because it villainizes dinner. Dinner becomes a punishment. Something you just have to get through to get the "good stuff". It always results in tears, pouting, and screaming. Those things should not exist at the dinner table, and DON'T exist at French dinner tables. We give babies food to keep them quiet and entertained. The book said we use food as a pacifier, and I totally agree. "Food is not a pacifier, a distraction, a toy, a bribe, a reward, or a substitute for discipline". There are other ways to reward, discipline, and entertain children. Now I'm not opposed to the occasional special treats, but they should be just that.... special.... not an everyday occurrence.
#3- Kids eat what parents eat. No exceptions. Stop making separate meals for your kids. Kids will eat more then pizza, butter noodles, and Chicken Mcnuggets. Something I have always planned on doing (and the author did this with her girls) is when children are old enough, include them in menu planning. Buy cookbooks with pictures and let your children look through books and pick out things they want to make. If they're involved in picking out dinner, they're more likely to be excited to eat it. I say 3-4 years old is old enough for this.
#4- Eat together as a family. At the table. Not in the living room. Not in the bed. Not in front of the TV. And everyone stays at the table until everyone is done. This doesn't happen in very many houses because we're all "so busy". We're not too busy for soccer, ballet, piano, swim classes, play dates, etc., but we are too busy to sit down as a family at the dinner table. I'm calling crap on that one. I have always felt this is so important. Since its just me and Steve I will confess we have had plenty of meals on the couch in front of the TV. After reading this book we tried for one week setting the table and eating there each night. No TV. That was the best week ever. We enjoyed our nights more, had more energy (because we weren't loafing on the couch), we spent more time with each other talking. It was great. Couples ARE families. You don't have to have kids for this to be important. Another thing I liked in the book is that kids are taught to eat off of tiny versions of grown up dishes. Dinner is a special occasion EVERY night. There are no plastic princess or Dora cups and plates. They use glasses, real forks and spoons, china. I love it. If it feels fancy and special, its more exciting and enjoyable.
#5- Eat veggies. Love veggies. A variety of veggies. There are so many awesome vegetables out there but most people limit their veggie intake to zucchini, corn, frozen peas, green beans, broccoli, and asparagus. Now there is nothing wrong with those, but there is so much more out there. I LOVE fresh beets, parsnips, kale, fresh pea pods, fennel, celery root, radishes, cauliflower.... The list could go on forever. Kids will love these too.... if they are exposed to them early on and are taught by their parents that they are delicious and not just "eat them because they're good for you". The book suggested using vegetable purees with babies. And instead of their first solid being rice cereal (wonder why kids love rice and pasta so much? Usually its their first meal), they use diluted vegetable purees mixed with milk (or formula) and gradually add less and less milk until its a puree, then eventually they introduce it in its whole form. I am doing this one for sure.
#6- Love this one. You don't have to like it, but you do have to taste it. When kids say they don't like something, tell them "that's ok, but you do have to taste it." I even have to say this to grown adults in my cooking classes. Its sad. Adults still think that eating something they don't like will literally kill them. I HATE salmon. But guess what... on that one day a month at work where we do fish cooking, my class cooks salmon two different ways. Times that by 20 students and that's 40 plates of salmon I have to taste. Do I enjoy it? Nope, not at all. But do I do it? Yup. Its hard to get people to understand that they can eat things they don't care for. In my job you HAVE to know how to cook everything, regardless of how you feel about it. So even though I would never cook myself a piece of salmon and voluntarily eat it, I eat it when I have to. I know how to cook it. And I haven't died yet. In France they believe you have to try something new at least 7-10 times before you can form an opinion of it. So when a kid doesn't like something, its because they haven't tried it enough and it keeps getting introduced until they learn to like it. In America, we give our kid something once, they don't like it, and so we never serve it again. We even go a step further and TELL children, "you don't like that". That is a huge mistake. And the whole hiding vegetables in things, lame. Yes they are eating vegetables and love the flavor of those vegetable, but they don't know they love the vegetables.
#7- Oh this no snaking rule is almost impossible to follow in America. We're snackers. But the point here is if you snack all day, you won't be hungry for the most important meal: Dinner. Which is why a lot of kids struggle to eat at dinner. They're just not hungry. You eat at set times, in a set place (the table), with your family. No exceptions. Bonus: cleaner cars, and car seats aren't crusted with goldfish and cheerios. We feel in America that its bad to feel hunger. We don't like to feel hunger. In France hunger is ok. It makes you appreciate your meal more. They get one "snack" a day called a "goûter" usually right after school which is something simple like a crepe, vegetables with a vinaigrette, small piece of a baguette, or a small piece of dark chocolate. Since they only get this one snack a day its special and looked forward to, and its small enough to tie the children over to dinner time, which is usually at 7 or so.
#8- Slow food is actually coming back in California. Cooking should be enjoyable. Eating should be enjoyable. We shouldn't rush through either one. Cooking and eating is not a chore. Stop thinking of it as one. This is a big reason we eat on the go so much (fast food) is that we look at eating is an inconvenient necessity. It shouldn't be. Even if you're a crappy cook, do it more and you won't be crappy. Look through cookbooks and try recipes. You get better by doing and not avoiding. Also, by eating too quickly we eat way too much food. Read this post on 100 days of real food. Love this post because it addresses this issue.
#9- Eat mostly real food. I loved this one the most because this is how we already eat. We don't eat processed foods if we can help it. Processed foods don't exist in France. That's how it should be. Processed foods are full of chemicals and nasty things and if people read labels they would be furious as to what manufacturers are allowed to put into food. We voluntarily eat poison on a daily basis in our country. We have had a HUGE rise in obesity, ADD, Autism, food allergies, and aggressive behaviors in children in the past 15 years (or so) in our country. The only thing that has really changed in that time frame is what we feed our kids. When I was a kid MacDonald's was a "treat", not a regular occurrence. We didn't eat as much candy and junk. My mom worked, but she still cooked. This is so important. We live in a society of over protective parenting, but we poison our children.... and its ok. People who restrict processed foods and "junk foods" are made fun of in our country and told "you need to live a little and relax". Its sad. I know a lot of parents who have the above listed challenges with their kids who have changed their diets and seen huge results. I could stand on my soap box all day on this one. Cook more real food. Its just as easy to make rice pilaf from scratch with 3 ingredients (Onion, rice, chicken stock) as it is to make a box of rice a roni.
#10- Eating is joyful. Yelling at your kids to eat it not joyful. Tears at the table are not joyful. The author went in depth on this one because this was her biggest challenge with her girls, but in the end she succeeded and it became joyful. Dinner should be something to look forward to. It brings people together. It should be special every single night.
Overall, I agreed with her 10 rules. There are a couple that would be hard to do in America (no snacking and eating real food) only because our culture makes it hard to do. Kids eat outside of the home so much and you typically have no control over what they are given at those times. What I have learned is all you can do is educate (rule #1) kids on food and having good eating habits and that will help them to make better choices when they aren't at home. I also know you can't forbid things like soda and processed stuff, but you also don't have to supply them for your kids. If they eat them at grandma's house or a friends house, then fine. That makes it a treat, and that's ok. Seriously encourage all parents to read this. There are tons of great ideas and methods to try to "cure" picky eating from a mother who didn't think it was possible with her kids. Its gave me comfort to know that my fear of having a picky eater doesn't have to happen if I do things right and teach my kids how to eat and love it.
