In my line of work, I come across a fair few parenting hacks – some of which occasionally make my eyebrows hit the ceiling (egg sock, looking at you).
And I have to admit, I did let slip a ‘yeah right’ when I came across a video on Instagram months ago suggesting that putting out a board with chopped veggies on could get kids to eat more of the stuff.
In fairness to my kids, they’re not terrible at eating veg. My toddler’s even quite partial to an olive. But they definitely prefer fruit, and if I’d previously offered them a bit of raw carrot or a cucumber stick, they’d look at me like I’d vomited on their favourite pair of Crocs.
But given how many people I’d seen banging on about these veggie boards online, I decided to give it a go.
The first time I tried it, I carefully arranged some cucumber sticks, carrot sticks and sliced peppers on a board like I was competing on MasterChef. My kids took one look at it and carried on playing. The youngest took a cucumber stick to appease me, but the rest went in Tupperware which I ended up grazing on for the next few days.
I left it a good few weeks before I tried it again (mainly because of time constraints and not wanting to waste perfectly good veg), but I know that kids need to have a few exposures to these things – or so I’d read somewhere – so, one day I chopped some cucumber sticks, a bit of cooked chicken and cherry tomatoes, and stuck them casually on a wooden board on our dining table.
It was about 3pm, so hunger levels were rising. And you know what? They cleared the lot. (I think the chicken helped entice them in and then it just became a race to finish the rest…)
Another time, I decided to cook vegetables 10 minutes ahead of dinnertime and left them in a bowl on the table. (We were having homemade pizza so I wasn’t worried about them finding room in their tummies for that.) Within minutes, both kids had inhaled a load of carrots, broccoli and baby corn.
According to baby and child nutritionist, Charlotte Stirling-Reed, popping a plate of chopped veg on the table before dinner or when the kids get in from school is “the easiest way to include more veg” in their diets.
It works for a couple of reasons: firstly, they’re usually hungrier at this time; and secondly, there’s no pressure attached to eating it (so less of a power struggle).
The expert also noted that even if they don’t eat it, seeing these foods regularly builds familiarity. “It’s not about perfection. It’s about making it available and taking off the pressure,” she added on social media.
In a separate video on the viral veggie boards, Dr Karan Rajan, a NHS doctor, explained that cutting up veg and popping it on a platter also works because it taps into something known as “unit bias” or the “tendency to want a portion of something”.
“A whole bell pepper feels like work, but snackable bite-size cuts feels gamified,” he said. “There’s no meal commitment, it becomes finger food and, dare I say it, fun.”
The doctor also pointed to a study that showed children eat more fruit and more vegetables when they’re precut and presented as snacks. “Think of fries versus potatoes: snackification works,” he added.
In the comments on Stirling-Reed’s post, plenty of parents swore it worked for them too.
“This genuinely works for my veggie phobes – must do it more!” said one. “Been using this hack for years! It’s such a win. They always eat more veg and complain less,” added another parent.
I tried it again the other night (I chopped tomatoes, cucumber and avocado, stuck it casually on the table and walked away) and, yet again, the kids ate most of the veg on the board before dinner. I left it out and whatever was left got swiped at the end of dinner, too.
I genuinely can’t believe my eldest, who once would pull a face of disgust over cucumber, now eats sticks of the savoury fruit like she’s munching crisps.
Mission accomplished. This hack gets the thumbs up from me. Just remember to give it time if it doesn’t work straight away.
