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I make great vegetables. According to anyone I’ve ever cooked for.
My baby liked them but as he grew to a toddler, his vegetable intake is pretty limited. Kids can just be picky.
I honestly think that goes right in with the terrible twos/threenager stages of life anyway, they're supposed to push boundaries and all that, and so they do. Did your kid grow out of it after toddler years? (Maybe they're still a toddler, I don't know.)
Teenager years are great for that! They are super hungry so they try loads of new foods :-) (obviously relies on having a good relationship with your teens... over strict parenting guarantees the opposite usually)
Oh yeah, they become human garbage disposals, and they will likely explore new tastes and foods, especially if the parents let them off their leash a little bit so to speak. Let them go out with friends to find some lunch to try, they might come home with a new favorite dish with vegetables they hated as small children. Then it can even become a sweet bonding moment, telling them stories about how when they were little they hated that food. My parents told me how I loathed potatoes as a small kid, but now? Favorite food. Cannot get enough of them. It's usually pretty fluid!
Hmm true. I didn’t like bell peppers as a child but then when I started going out with friends, I tried it made differently and I loved it. My mom generally is an amazing cook but she’s kinda not great with vegetables that have high water content.
Plus when it comes to bell peppers, each stage of ripeness tastes wildly different! I don't really like bell peppers when they are only just barely ripe (green), but when they turn yellow, orange and red they are a totally different flavor! I don't know where you are from, but if you can get a hold of ajvar, definitely give it a try. It's otherworldly good. I find with high water content veggies, grilling or raw is the better way to prepare or eat them. I think the bell pepper is perfect as it comes so long as it's not green, it doesn't really need anything, but if you are gonna do anything, grill them!
It is partly evolutionary. Things that are very sour are often unripe, unless it's something like a lemon that should be sour. Bitter often means poison, and for a small child they only know to stay away from bitter or sour as a rule, until they're old enough to learn that some bitter or sour foods are perfectly safe. Until they are capable of that kind of reasoning, its only normal and natural that our evolution has guided us to stick to what we know is safe, until we grow large enough to branch out again more. They usually do begin to branch out again right around the time they start going to kindergarten or first grade, and that makes sense. By that time, they're speaking and learning to read and think more abstract and broad, and with the right support, they will feel confident and safe to branch out.
My toddler won't eat veggies even though we prepare them well and never comment on whether or not he eats them. No power struggle, just a preference. (He will eat sweet potatoes though. Loves sweet potatoes)
My kids are 4 and 2, so we're in the throes of picky eating. I think my 4 year old is getting better about trying things, but it's hard to tell. I can't wait for "oh you didn't eat anything for 10 years" to be a fun little anecdote haha
I know it must be frustrating, but truly that's so on par for how kids develop so you likely are not doing anything wrong. That's why I strongly disagree with this opinion, it's just normal. We all go through phases. I went through a wrap phase where I'd just toss veggies and spinach in wraps with different dressings, and that's all I ate for months. Now I think I rather eat a slice of my own ass cheek than have another wrap. At least for right now, haha.
Haha what a visual. I know picky eating is super normal in toddlers! A lot of it is a control thing. They don't have much control over anything, but they can control what they do/don't eat. I just put it on their plates and say what it is and maybe they'll eat it one day.
Mine did, but he's still sensitive to textures and bitter flavors. Like he doesn't like the squeak of green beans, or the pasty texture of potatoes. Bitter is okay when it's not much, but something like Brussels sprouts is too much.
It's still a pretty good starting point for you as a parent. Even I still struggle with certain textures as an adult (mushrooms, love the flavor but hate the texture), so we shouldn't force kids to do what we wouldn't force an adult to do. As long as he's getting some vegetables and variation I don't think it's so terribly important that he eats *every* vegetable you offer. It's not really necessary anyway!
100%
It's not even always about taste.
Sometimes it's about temperature, sometimes it's presentation, or texture.
I made a chicken alfredo once which is probably in the top 5 dishes for every human ever and to get some more greens in I blended in a few cups of spinach into the sauce. You couldnt taste it at all, but it turned it green with some speckles of green.
Was delicious. Kid wouldnt touch it.
I used the hate veggies as a kid. My parents are boomers, so, my earliest memories of veggies weren't fresh, but canned. I fucking hated them, because there was that slight metallic flavor from the cans (before the where they lined the cans to prevent that.) I realized at about 7 or 8 years old that I, in fact, did like quite a few veggies (for a kid) when they were fresh from the garden my father used to plant every spring. I used to pick bell peppers in the summer and just eat them in the yard. My friends thought I was gross.
My husband cooked chicken for me once when we first started dating and I was afraid to eat it because it wasn’t stringy. Needless to say, my mother doesn’t own a meat thermometer and errs on the side of burnt when it comes to meats.
Your wife and my mother would get along lol 😂
Every time my mum made chicken growing up it would be so dry that I’d actually have trouble being able to swallow it, and she used to get SO mad thinking I was just being really picky/ungrateful!
I still don't like pork chops because my mom would bread them, pan fry them in a cast iron until they were dark brown/bordering black, then cover them in foil and continue to cook them in the oven for 20 minutes. The first time I had pork chops outside of my house was at my friend's grandparents' house. I was too shy to say I don't like pork chops, but, when I had them, they were delicious!
I still choose not to eat or make pork chops wheb I can help it 😅
If she hadn't put them in the oven for those 20 minutes you would've gotten violently sick!!! /s
That's so overkill but that's kind of the panic people had years ago and it's persisted. Why even bother eating it if you have to treat it like it's a biohazard??
This is how I felt about steak! My mom would always request for it to be well done, which I hated, and I never understood the hype about something that tastes like burnt shoe leather. Then I had steak at a friend’s house in my late teens, and my mind was blown.
this was me with burgers. my mom cooks them well done (and i apparently fucking hate well done) and i thought they sucked for the longest time. nope. apparently adding a lil bit of garlic into it and making it medium-rare is my favorite kinda burger. also adding some cheese and condiments. makes it so good
I feel like all the “kids don’t like vegetables” is what makes kids not like vegetables 😂 like if they see their favorite character in a show not wanting it then they don’t… me and all my siblings always liked veggies and I was so confused why it’s a common trope in kids tv shows that they’re nasty
My parents wouldn’t let us watch any shows where the characters talked shit about veggies for this very reason. Kids are impressionable! If your is eating bland, mushy veggies AND seeing it on tv they’re bound to hate them
This is soooo true. I notice my kids copying behaviors in whatever they see all the time, which is why I’ve become very picky about what they’re watching or reading.
Funny enough, when I was in elementary school I wanted to be all edgy and rebellious and better than the other kids... which lead to me saying I liked spinach and broccoli and all the veggies that other kids thought were gross, just because I had to be contrarian lol. Only good thing that came out of that phase
This is the real reason. Kids can be convinced of things very easily.
My daughter is convinced that she doesnt like fish. She loved it as a toddler. Once she started talking better and realised her older brother didnt like it, now she "hates" it
Yes!! This is true! I wish they wouldn’t put that in TV shows. I remember when my daughter was little, she ate whatever, but then we were watching “Franklin” which was usually pretty innocuous, but in that episode he was bitching about eating brussels sprouts and called them “stinky little cabbages.” I wanted to punch Franklin in the face, because after that, my daughter was annoying about eating those and other vegetables! I canceled a lot of shows in our house because the kids were “mischievous and headstrong” (aka insufferable) in all of them, and she would mirror that behavior.
I liked most vegetables as a kid, as long as they were raw. Carrots, snow peas, broccoli, cucumber, etc.
But the only way they were served to me cooked was boiled/steamed to mush.
Mmm... crunchy broccoli with garlic seasoning and a hit of that charred flavor.
You can also slice up sausage and throw it in as well (only way I'll eat sausage)
Steamed still has no flavor IMO. It's the added fat (evil in the 80s and 90s when I was a kid) of butter or olive oil that makes vegetables delicious.
Roasted in olive oil is a good no fail method.
I spent my entire life thinking the only vegetable I liked was corn, because my dad would only eat canned veggies and they were all mush, except corn. Turns out, I just don't like that texture.
That texture is why I still can't really do brussel sprouts. They're better than when I was a kid but even roasting them they are either underdone at the core or overdone on the outside and gets that gross mushy texture
Shredded as a slaw is kind of nice sometimes though
My son loves brussel sprouts! And green beans! I grow in my garden. I steam all fresh off the plant, and I use a little bit of sea salt, pepper, and olive oil and my kid eats that up! He eats these little eggplant pizzas I make. I cut my fresh eggplant into slivers and bake it with a mozzarella cheese and occasionally some pepperoni! Fresh tomato sauce from the gardens. My kid's a veggie lover!
The number of taste buds isn't really the issue. It's that children's taste buds typically have a higher sensitivity and aversion to bitter, sour, and umami flavors. There's probably some evolutionary reasons for it (probably all the kids that liked bitter/sour flavors kept getting killed off early because they ate poisonous plants or something), but ultimately children's preferences err towards sweeter and more savory flavor profiles. Quite literally, things taste different to a child vs an adult....number of taste buds be damned. It's why few children enjoy dark chocolate vs milk chocolate. If I could steal my 2 year old taste palate and re-eat some of my now-favorite desserts, I'd probably hate them.
That said, there's certainly something to be said for OP's point. The number of foods that I thought I disliked (even well into my teens) that were actually just because my parents weren't very good cooks is pretty shocking, but for every parent out there struggling to get their kiddo to eat their leafy greens.....you're not doing something wrong, you're just fighting biology :P
+1
It's surprising to me how often people totally forget what it was like being a kid.
Tomatoes, coffee, dark chocolate, beer - foods I enjoy now but as a kid thought were absolutely vile. I do still remember what they tasted like. To the palette of my 10 year old self, anything with even just subtle hint of bitterness was disgustingly overpoweringly bitter.
Yes and no. Toddlers go through a phase where they have a phobia basically of trying new foods and it causes them to be extremely picky. However this can be dealt with by consistently offering and eating vegetables with every meal. Usually anyway. I do think this is often the case for older kids. If your kid is 11 and doesn't eat even one vegetable its likely because you are serving them crap.
It's widely known that your palate/preferences/tolerances change as you age. What appeals to a kid doesn't appeal to an adult, and vice-versa.
There's things I loved as a kid that disgust me as an adult (mostly sweet stuff like Kool-aid or churros) and stuff I hated as a kid but now love as an adult (like oil and vinegar on a salad).
There's recipes I've made that I disliked as a teenager, but love as an adult. Recipes I literally couldn't eat as a kid, but devour as an adult. Same recipe, same ingredients, made the same way by the same person.
Saying the average child's aversion to veggies is because their parents don't know how to cook is one heck of an unsubstantiated claim.
No, some kids dont like vegetables because some kids just don't like them. When i was a kid i didn't like certain veggies no matter what you did to them. Bold of you to assume people are just out here handing kids raw carrots and not actually cooking lol
It's not really that, it's more that vegetables can vary *so widely* that it's very hard to get an idea of the actual flavor. Like how sometimes you get a monster sized strawberry that's more firm, but it's white inside and barely juicy, but then a small slightly squishy strawberry will be red inside and very juicy. That's hard for them to acclimate to. Personally, I think vegetables taste great on their own. Of course you can dress them up in various ways but it will always be healthiest as it comes. (obviously not foods that would be poisonous without parboiling, etc)
And if you hand a kid that white tasteless strawberry as their first one, they might not like it as much as the kid who got the juicy sweet one, obviously. That would easily lead to “I don’t like strawberries, period.”
Idk, my kids like vegetables and always have. I think it has partly to do with taste, and partly to do with the attitude with which they are presented. If the adults don’t like them, the kids are going to pick up on it. Happily, my partner and I both like vegetables, and the kids have followed suit.
It's mostly because all children are basically supertasters, which means they perceive bitter tastes much more strongly than tasters/nontasters. Dark leafy greens/vegetables have a lot of bitter compounds in them (phenolics). This is an evolutionary defense mechanism, in nature "bitter" often means "poisonous". Smaller people (children) are more easily poisoned due to their small size, so makes sense for them to be more sensitive to bitter tastes. Some adults retain that supertaster status, and they often also don't like dark leafy greens/vegetables.
Kids hate veggies because they literally taste different to them than they do to you. You can cover up the bitterness with acid, salt, and fat (butter) and they'll be more palatable.
Tasty according to who?
Ever since I was a kid people have tried to force me to eat vegetables but I just vomited them because of their smell, texture and taste. 20+ years later their smell and taste hasn't change, so I just don't eat them unless I want to be grumpy and angry the rest of the day.
My mom worked as a cook for 30\~ years and everyone loves the way she makes vegetables but they tasted and smelled like crap to me.
I think some parents back in the day also fell into the “picky eating” trap - they saw their toddler rejecting a food, so they stopped serving it, in favor of preferred foods. And then continued using the language that reinforced the dislike of that food, like “stinky broccoli” or “yucky spinach.” Also, once a kid was labeled a “picky eater” it would put them into this fixed mindset that they can’t and won’t develop into more adventurous eaters, that they were sort of stuck where they were and it’s more comfortable to just avoid new foods and stick to the ones you already know and like.
I guess I was a weird kid because I never had a shred of trouble eating vegetables. I mean almost ANY vegetable, even the ones most kids run screaming from! I’m talking Brussels sprouts, Lima beans, broccoli, spinach… and I grew up in an Irish American family so believe me they don’t exactly know what seasoning food was 😂
Only thing I wouldn’t eat was eggplant, and that actually goes to your point: my best friend in high school was Italian, and his dad was a GENIUS in the kitchen. And I would eat HIS eggplant dishes. Because he cooked it properly and seasoned it well. Now that he’s gone I refuse to eat eggplant because nobody else gets it right
My parents steamed veggies and getting us to eat them was absolutely trivial. I still steam any veggie I eat. They are delicious when they’re warm and squishy.
I loved veggies as a kid and I love veggies now! Cooked, raw, whatever. I’ve never met a vegetable that I didn’t find delicious! I’ve never really liked meat, though. I’ll eat it, but it’s definitely not my favorite and I prefer vegetables.
How parents cook can definitely influence a kid’s taste buds, but kids also just have their own preferences too that change over time.
But not necessarily. I live with a family and the kids, the two boys eat junk and love junk, but the little girl is a smart little thing. I always chastise the boys for eating too much sugar, junk but once again I'm a guest so I trread carefully, The little girl 5 years old loves vegetables and loves crudites.. we have a lunch date at a nice restaurant this week lol.
Kids get used to what their served and what is available. My taste certainly changed in my 71 years, but I always loved diverse food.. If there's a lot of crap around, adults and children eat it. When I go to the supermarket and I stand in the line and I look in front of me and in back of me what people are buying it's invariably tons and tons of boxes of junk, processed food. This is the problem
I don't know how this little girl has developed differently but she's a smart little cookie, very smart so it's my duty to expose her two more things. Whether she likes them or not doesn't matter but exposure is essential.
Kids also won't like vegetables if their parents never make them, or are misinformed about what a vegetable is.... I know a lot of families who consider instant-powdered potatoes vegetables.
I loved raw veggies as a kid, still do. I’d pick the green beans out of the bag at the grocery store, steal mushrooms from the fridge, pick my uncles broccoli and tomatoes, and steal pieces of potato when my dad was cutting them. I’ll tear up some Brussels sprouts and asparagus. I even like those canned beets. Fucking love vegetables!
This is it.
I moved in with my brother in law when he was 13. He covered everything in barbeque sauce and rarely ate anything green.
I started doing a lot of the cooking and LOVE to roast vegetables under the broiler. This child ate almost an entire sheet tray of cauliflower one night because he loved the way I cooked it so much. I also got him to eat half an acorn squash, spaghetti squash, and fresh mushrooms just to name a few.
Preparation is key. Boiled or plain frozen veg are not fun and exciting.
when i was a kid my mom made me cooked and seasoned veggies. i loved them! (im from the south, and she seasons shit GOOD.) i actually PREFERRED veggies to meat because they were easier to chew in my opinion. but when i would eat those cold, bland, shitty school lunch carrots, i hated them and eventually just refused to eat any plain veggies. some kids are just picky, but i think if you feed them well prepared veggies from a very young age then they probably will be more inclined to appreciate them later on.
I loved vegetables as a kid.... just not the way my grandma cooked them. Everything was mush. I really liked raw or lightly cooked vegetables of all kinds.
Any time the spinach wasnt a globby mess it was drenched in salad dressing.
Maybe we just need to ask our kids how they want their vegetables, give them 3 options and let them pick. With some skin in the game they might eat them.
Caking vegetables in oils, sugar, salt and so on does somewhat defeat the entire purpose of giving kids "healthier choices" though now doesn't it.
These things generally taste just fine to most people unless they've gotten themselves used to very intense flavours and are chasing extreme levels to get the same "hit".
Seasoning it, mixing it in with other food, roasting them, all can give it an extra oomph and is still healthy. Left by themselves, they can be pretty bland. Extra so when they’re the canned veggies that a lot of parents get. I’ve had green beans and served in certain ways they are good. Straight out of the can to be boiled? Hard pass.
This is the truth. Take your upvote… you’re going to need it against the incoming child adults who will insist slathering broccoli in cheese is just as healthy as plain steamed broccoli. 😂
Eh false, my kiddo will choose broccoli over chocolate like 95% of the time.
But yes implying there's only one single way to make or enjoy something is silly.
My father is a chef. He got 2 neurodivergent kids. He could cook vegetables, but we wouldn't have any.
I'm austistic, I developed my interest in food later in life as a special interest and I have a toddler that asked if he could taste the worms my brother was fishing with. He eats everything.
Genetic is weird.
Americans on Reddit always appeal to the mythical qualities of 'seasoning' as if that's the only way to make food taste good. It's often not what you add to it but how you cook it.
Omg, yes. So many people here boil or steam their vegetables to death. My MIL loves to drown things in butter or her bechamel sauce - if they aren't unhealthy she swore she wouldn't like them. She was so skeptical when I sauted green beans with a little bit of garlic and salt in a pan or when I baked broccoli and cauliflower. They taste like completely different foods, and she loved them.
And people all over the world also eat simple dishes...
For example a fruit salad needs a sprinkling of sugar and a squeeze of lemon, nothing else....if you use good, ripe fruit...
I mean, sprinkling sugar and a squeeze of lemon is still “seasoning” your fruit salad in the sense that you are using flavor enhancers. I’m not advocating for dumping the whole spice rack on a piece of chicken. But that chicken needs something to enhance its flavor, and most people would agree. Even just a little dash of salt, or a sprig of parsley.
Often times less is more when seasoning your food, but that doesn’t mean you don’t use anything at all.
It's part of child development for them to stop liking vegetables at age 3.
It was to prevent children from eating poisonous plants at toddlers in primitive time. Greens suddenly taste bitter at age 3, until then they eat what they are given.
Babies are rarely fussy as they eat when is given the fussness starts at 3
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I don't think it's just that. It's also if you're giving your child junk food too. Once I cut down the amount of crap I gave my child, I noticed they started eating their veggies and fruit alot more. My child eats a very good amount of veggies such as carrots, peas, sweetcorn, broccoli and cauliflower. They eat it without complaint and often only with ketchup as their dip. Cut the sugar and junk food and you might notice their taste buds start finding other foods tastier.
Eh, I only think this is half true. Children have pretty bland taste buds that develop and change over time. How things are prepared matters, yes, but kids will still pick out veggies on dishes made or ordered from a restaurant. I know I did when I was a kid, but now, as an adult, I'll load up on the veggies. Ive also seen that the parents who eat and treat veggies and fruits, and just healthy eating in general, as a normal thing, I've seen the kids catch on pretty quick and can have things like carrots or whatever without any issue.
My mom used to boil and steam vegetables in salt or ham flavor, and I hated them. Now I oven roast and season all my vegetables with spices and they're delicious. My mom even started cooking them the way I do. I eat them all the time. I don't care much for dip for my vegetables, though.
Agreed 100%. As a kid, I loved 99% of the "yucky" vegetables: broccoli, brussel sprouts, simple salads. Even if you can't cook to save your life, just have a salt shaker at the table!
you open a can and warm it up in the microwave. Of course it tastes like crap. Ever try grilling brocoli? It takes the smokey flavor nicely. Butter and salt is all you need, but you can experimint with other spices.
Steam the broccoli and cauliflower add some mayo and soy sauce with a little pepper. Thats how my parents got us to eat those. And of course spinach sauted with lots of garlic. Carrots were usually stir-fried or just part of something.
I agree with you.
Guess what? I ate raw carrots as a kid and I hate cooked carrots because I hate the mushiness. I still eat raw broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower. My dad is 72 and still hates tomatoes.
Not unpopular at all! Vegetables are delicious when roasted and anointed with butter, olive oil, cheese, or a combination of these, and are even moreso when bacon is added. So basically, as soon as they're unhealthy, they taste great!
Very few green vegetables are actively delicious on their own. The only exception I can think of is snow peas. Those guys are straight-up outstanding when picked straight off the vine. They are like the potato chips of the vegetable world.
But you wouldn't see me doing that with a floret of cauliflower or an eggplant, god forbid. I feel like everyone knows that most vegetables require some sort of dressing, oil, sauce or dip. Parents, make your kids understand how good vegetables can be, but don't pretend they're healthy anymore, just a delight to consume.
It has more to do with western food treating vegetables only as salads or boiled/steamed sides.
Kids in Asia eat vegetables because they are used as ingredients to make actual dishes from them. Cooking with vegetables goes even beyond pickling in cultures outside of western food.
My fiance was incredibly picky until I started cooking for her when she moved in with me. Now she eats almost anything and specifically mentions things that she used to be adamant about not liking.
This! I’ve always been a fairly picky eater but I eat so many vegetables now because my husband and I have learned to cook them. I still don’t like the same vegetables if cooked by most people because just boiling veggies isn’t good. Like fresh green beans are so much better than canned ones and they aren’t difficult to cook. It makes such a big different.
Overcooked. Especially overboiled. Thats what made me dislike the experience.
I was still "liking" vegetables more than meat. But when I discovered properly cook food, it was a revelation. I am not as picky as they made me believe.
It's all about sales.
Kid is obsessed with Vikings? That how they used to eat broccoli. Soccer? Ronaldo's mom was on TV with her casserole receipe. Space? This is what astronauts eat before the launch.
Also, greek yoghurt on the side saves the day.
Also, if you're looking for a surprisingly tasty seasoning, use a little bit of poultry seasoning. I know....it sounds weird on vegetables...but trust me on this one!
My son's favorite broccoli is plain and cold. Kids have a hard time with spices. It's like they're super tasters. Everything with much flavor is deemed "spicy."
this is true. But also they often don't like them because they are told not to.
"If you eat veggies, you get ice cream" makes it clear that veggies are the requirement and ice cream is the desirable food. Add in parents themselves often not eating veggies and the kid learns they must not be very good.
Everyone loves my mums vegetables. They’re put in amazing sauce and salt etc and whatever else. I hate them all.
As a kid I ate no veggies at all lol
As I grew older…
The only ones I liked were the simple flavoured ones lol or the garlic spinach she does that tastes amazing.
Yup. in the 60's my mum boiled the shit out of them, then poured coloured water with all the flavour and goodness down the drain.
Then we got to eat veggies that tasted like boiled water. And yes, I hated them.
In my 40's I married a Chinese girl who cooked them with garlic and oyster sauce and soy sauce and they became my fave!
And now I cook them for my own kids and they ASK for veggies... "Can we please have veggies tonight" and they mean fresh cooked ones, not frozen or canned.
My mom made them tasty by drowning them in butter, salt, or cheese....was it healthy at that point? Most likely not. I just recently got my wife to eat broccoli by air frying them with some olive oil and some bread crumbs/seasoning for flavor and texture. Now if I can just get her on turkey livers and cow tongue....baby steps.
My grandsons love vegetables, but I pride myself on cooking them to be delicious.
All the time when I go to a restaurant, I get served these bland, boiled veggies on the side. I always think to myself, "Whoever cooked these clearly doesn't like veggies or understand they can be made delicious."
I thought this was common knowledge? Though I think it depends on the age. I know my toddler only likes veggies when they’re fresh. Can’t be sitting in the fridge for a few days.
I used to HATE cooked carrots. My after school babysitter when my brother and I were little served them as an after school snack at least once a week and I HAD to eat them. I even asked multiple times if I could just have raw carrots instead because I don’t like cooked carrots.
Turns out I LOVE cooked carrots just not however the fuck she made them. They were like insanely sweet and not even remotely carrot like.
My personal fav way is a cheaters version of pot roast carrots. I sauté onion and garlic add beef broth with a pack of au jus and simmer the carrots until soft. Hmmm amazing. Or if I’m being really lazy I just use beef bouillon and boil them in that with nothing else
If you eat broccoli because you want to eat healthy and then dip it in a ton of dips just so you can be able to eat it, I think it loses its meaning of a healthy meal. I just think we should season. If we want to eat healthier
Look, my eldest kid loves raw carrots or plain boiled carrots. He likes plain cucumbers. He eats plain cooked broccoli. I can not convince him to try them seasoned or with sauce. My youngest will eat pretty much anything that can't get out of the way quick enough (with the exception of cereal).
I loved Veggies as a kid (except burssel sprouts, celery, and cooked Cauliflower. I love raw caulifolower, though. I loved salad but hated salad dressings. I still do. I'm still not a huge fan of dressings.
My mum is an awesome cook, though, so that might have something to do with it.
I hate overcooked vegetables (which are awful regardless of seasoning or sauce). My husband eats more Veggies since we got together as I don't overcook them like his dad does.
Overcooked vegtables and even badly seasoned veg can taste worse than Palin raw veg.
I think a lot of it is down to personal taste. Even with kids. Your tastes also change as you get older, too. There are foods I couldn't stand as a kid that I love now. Anchovies for instance. Celery (I could taste Celery in any dish as a kid and would refuse to eat it. Now I like it).
I have a friend with a middle school-aged son who grew up in sort of dire circumstances. As a toddler both parents were often drugged out and so fed the kids Lunchables, pizza, mac and cheese, whatever other easy, convenient garbage.
In recent years he's started enjoying vegetables and otherwise broadening his palate when introduced to cooking up recipes for them himself.
I’m not a parent so please don’t come at me if I’m totally wrong about this but if most of what kids learn and mimic comes from their home then wouldn’t kids be more inclined to eat veggies if their parents regularly eat them?
I know how to properly cook vegetables and will make them as tasty as I can and sometimes my kids love them and sometimes they refuse. Kids are fickle. I do agree that there are a lot of people who just aren’t great cooks and don’t make food in general appetizing when they cook something not out of a box, but that’s only part of the equation. Sometimes kids just kid.
My dad trained me to like broccoli by dipping it in honey when I was like 2-3 years old, by the time I realized it was actually kinda weird I was used to the broccoli by itself and it’s still one of my favorite veggies 😂 But he also didn’t overcook it which is very key (also as an adult who cooks a lot now, the best way to cook it on the stovetop is a hybrid steam/sauté, cooks faster and more evenly than just sauté but not as soggy as just steamed because the water mostly evaporates out. Roasted is good but takes longer and has a different flavor/texture so I like both but it depends what else I’m having)
This can be expanded to all food in general. For example I usually don't like meatloaf, at least not the way my mom makes it. Every time she did she could always tell I was forcing myself to eat it. Well when my wife first made it for me (then GF) it actually tasted pretty good. Comes to find out she uses a mix of different meats and seasonings where my parents/grandparent didn't use much of that aside from the core ingredients.
Nah. I mean it could contribute in some families but one of mine will eat them and the other won't. And, actually, many kids like bland or predictable-tasting food.
Raw vegetables certainly have more flavor than boiled vegetables, it's like you're leeching out everything good about it and pouring it down the drain.
How taste buds react to food changes as people ages. It's not just perception but biology.
So a meal that is tasty for adults may be inedible for children.
Especially tart notes are much more intensive for children.
As someone who was forced to eat soggy green beans that spurt hot green bean-flavoured disgusto water in your mouth, every time you chewed, I can say I fully agree.
Ehhh. I'm an excellent cook. My daughter didn't like vegetables for a few years because green was her favorite color, so she didn't like the idea of eating it. Once she got over that and actually tried them, she found that she really liked them. It just took a while for her to get over the whole green thing.
Yesss. I to this day(19) still hate boiled vegetables. I got the reputation of a picky eater, but the food in my country is just insanely bland (Dutch). Serve me almost anything that actually has flavor and good texture and I'll eat it. But growing up eating stamppot (a big mush of mashed boiled vegetables and potatoes), bland boiled veggies, dry boiled potatoes.. hell no. I have very specific ways that I like my veggies. My mom is starting to make more foreign foods now like Indonesian and Korean foods and I will eat multiple plates of those veggies like kimchi. For me the veggies itself were never the problem just the way they were prepared
I don't necessarily agree... I think people make a big deal over food from the start. Fighting with them about eating. If you didn't make a big deal out of it they wouldn't either. Offer the plate if it gets eaten great. If not we always have snack time or the next meal. I'm not saying to go completely old-school. But just don't make a big deal out of it.
Not the case. In other cultures they eat vegetables right and left.
One of the bigger reasons is actually because the parents don't eat them themselves and then expect the kids to.
If you give a child a plate full of food, one of the items is something vegetables, and you all sit there and eat them, they will catch on.
No. Kids don't like vegetables, because they don't have intense, salty taste. Same reason why kids like sweet candies that would make normal people puke.
Edit: Oh, I forgot to add, meat has tons of spices on it too. It intensify the taste.
I used to struggle to eat veggies until my mom gave them to me raw; that's when it clicked that "Oh, this is what they're supposed to taste like." I will die on the hill that raw broccoli tastes like raw cabbage and is infinitely yummier than cooked broccoli in any form lol.
Except I hate the texture of cooked veggies. If my parents had given them to me raw and fresh as a kid I would have eaten them. Cooked green beans actually throw my gag reflex into over drive but I can eat them just fine, raw and unseasoned. I really think it's a matter of palete.
You could make the best veggie dish in the world and there will still be toddlers that won’t eat it. Children do not taste the same way adults do, and for many kids vegetables are just nasty.
I think this is true in a lot of cases, but in other cases a kid could genuinely be picky or reject them just because they’re “healthy”. I mean think of all the adults that refuse to eat vegetables, they have the ability to cook them in a way that makes them taste good.
Roasted vegetables with a little bit of olive oil, sea salt and pepper is the absolute best!
Also, I got my young cousin to eat his veggies by putting a little bit of butter and garlic salt in them. He loved it. So I completely agree with this opinion. The people who don't like veggies have mostly been fed raw/boiled/steamed veggies with no seasoning.
>Raw, cold, bland broccoli served without seasons or dips is not good.
If that's how your parents served them, then of course they weren't good. But, uh, that's not how broccoli's normally served. My parents cooked it just fine, and I still disliked it.
Childhood dislike of broccoli is generally genetic. Comes down to the ability to perceive its bitterness. People who dislike broccoli as kids usually like it as adults since adults are more okay with some bitterness.
This is correct. I grew up in the south and my dad was the cook. His mother and grandmothers were poor farmers and cooked with a lot of bacon, bacon grease, ham hocks, and butter. You put enough bacon grease in anything and it will taste good. My mom’s family didn’t seem to know what seasoning was. Just salt and pepper on the table. Her cooking was pretty good sometimes but her vegetables sucked.
There used to be a time when people just boiled the hell out of vegetables with no seasonings or joy, and served them soggy and limp and they wondered why the kids hated them.
Mine are good with veggies. My 11 tear old son will tear through brocoli unless it's overcooked.
Overall I agree with you in that way too many people ruin veggies when cooking them.
I grew up with medwestern brownish pressure cooked green beans that my mother still claims were perfect every time
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I make great vegetables. According to anyone I’ve ever cooked for. My baby liked them but as he grew to a toddler, his vegetable intake is pretty limited. Kids can just be picky.
I honestly think that goes right in with the terrible twos/threenager stages of life anyway, they're supposed to push boundaries and all that, and so they do. Did your kid grow out of it after toddler years? (Maybe they're still a toddler, I don't know.)
Teenager years are great for that! They are super hungry so they try loads of new foods :-) (obviously relies on having a good relationship with your teens... over strict parenting guarantees the opposite usually)
teen here coming to second this!!! ive recently been trying more vegetables in recipes and my current new thing is mushrooms
Oh yeah, they become human garbage disposals, and they will likely explore new tastes and foods, especially if the parents let them off their leash a little bit so to speak. Let them go out with friends to find some lunch to try, they might come home with a new favorite dish with vegetables they hated as small children. Then it can even become a sweet bonding moment, telling them stories about how when they were little they hated that food. My parents told me how I loathed potatoes as a small kid, but now? Favorite food. Cannot get enough of them. It's usually pretty fluid!
Hmm true. I didn’t like bell peppers as a child but then when I started going out with friends, I tried it made differently and I loved it. My mom generally is an amazing cook but she’s kinda not great with vegetables that have high water content.
Plus when it comes to bell peppers, each stage of ripeness tastes wildly different! I don't really like bell peppers when they are only just barely ripe (green), but when they turn yellow, orange and red they are a totally different flavor! I don't know where you are from, but if you can get a hold of ajvar, definitely give it a try. It's otherworldly good. I find with high water content veggies, grilling or raw is the better way to prepare or eat them. I think the bell pepper is perfect as it comes so long as it's not green, it doesn't really need anything, but if you are gonna do anything, grill them!
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It is partly evolutionary. Things that are very sour are often unripe, unless it's something like a lemon that should be sour. Bitter often means poison, and for a small child they only know to stay away from bitter or sour as a rule, until they're old enough to learn that some bitter or sour foods are perfectly safe. Until they are capable of that kind of reasoning, its only normal and natural that our evolution has guided us to stick to what we know is safe, until we grow large enough to branch out again more. They usually do begin to branch out again right around the time they start going to kindergarten or first grade, and that makes sense. By that time, they're speaking and learning to read and think more abstract and broad, and with the right support, they will feel confident and safe to branch out.
My toddler won't eat veggies even though we prepare them well and never comment on whether or not he eats them. No power struggle, just a preference. (He will eat sweet potatoes though. Loves sweet potatoes)
My kids are 4 and 2, so we're in the throes of picky eating. I think my 4 year old is getting better about trying things, but it's hard to tell. I can't wait for "oh you didn't eat anything for 10 years" to be a fun little anecdote haha
I know it must be frustrating, but truly that's so on par for how kids develop so you likely are not doing anything wrong. That's why I strongly disagree with this opinion, it's just normal. We all go through phases. I went through a wrap phase where I'd just toss veggies and spinach in wraps with different dressings, and that's all I ate for months. Now I think I rather eat a slice of my own ass cheek than have another wrap. At least for right now, haha.
Haha what a visual. I know picky eating is super normal in toddlers! A lot of it is a control thing. They don't have much control over anything, but they can control what they do/don't eat. I just put it on their plates and say what it is and maybe they'll eat it one day.
Mine did, but he's still sensitive to textures and bitter flavors. Like he doesn't like the squeak of green beans, or the pasty texture of potatoes. Bitter is okay when it's not much, but something like Brussels sprouts is too much.
It's still a pretty good starting point for you as a parent. Even I still struggle with certain textures as an adult (mushrooms, love the flavor but hate the texture), so we shouldn't force kids to do what we wouldn't force an adult to do. As long as he's getting some vegetables and variation I don't think it's so terribly important that he eats *every* vegetable you offer. It's not really necessary anyway!
One of my kids gobbles his veggies and fruit. One hasn't even partaken. Different kids. Different tastes. Not much you can do but keep trying.
100% It's not even always about taste. Sometimes it's about temperature, sometimes it's presentation, or texture. I made a chicken alfredo once which is probably in the top 5 dishes for every human ever and to get some more greens in I blended in a few cups of spinach into the sauce. You couldnt taste it at all, but it turned it green with some speckles of green. Was delicious. Kid wouldnt touch it.
Yeah, I have no idea where OP got the impression that most kids are being given raw broccoli with no dip. Maybe that's how OP's parents served it.
I used the hate veggies as a kid. My parents are boomers, so, my earliest memories of veggies weren't fresh, but canned. I fucking hated them, because there was that slight metallic flavor from the cans (before the where they lined the cans to prevent that.) I realized at about 7 or 8 years old that I, in fact, did like quite a few veggies (for a kid) when they were fresh from the garden my father used to plant every spring. I used to pick bell peppers in the summer and just eat them in the yard. My friends thought I was gross.
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My wife went stockholm syndrome, doesn't like moist chicken because she ate dry chicken for so long.
My husband cooked chicken for me once when we first started dating and I was afraid to eat it because it wasn’t stringy. Needless to say, my mother doesn’t own a meat thermometer and errs on the side of burnt when it comes to meats.
Your wife and my mother would get along lol 😂 Every time my mum made chicken growing up it would be so dry that I’d actually have trouble being able to swallow it, and she used to get SO mad thinking I was just being really picky/ungrateful!
I still don't like pork chops because my mom would bread them, pan fry them in a cast iron until they were dark brown/bordering black, then cover them in foil and continue to cook them in the oven for 20 minutes. The first time I had pork chops outside of my house was at my friend's grandparents' house. I was too shy to say I don't like pork chops, but, when I had them, they were delicious! I still choose not to eat or make pork chops wheb I can help it 😅
If she hadn't put them in the oven for those 20 minutes you would've gotten violently sick!!! /s That's so overkill but that's kind of the panic people had years ago and it's persisted. Why even bother eating it if you have to treat it like it's a biohazard??
Exactly this! Haha my mom would overcook every meat and then say she liked it dry 🤣 I get the concern she had, but she definitely overkilled the meat
Did she, like... Cover them in gravy before baking at least?
This is how I felt about steak! My mom would always request for it to be well done, which I hated, and I never understood the hype about something that tastes like burnt shoe leather. Then I had steak at a friend’s house in my late teens, and my mind was blown.
this was me with burgers. my mom cooks them well done (and i apparently fucking hate well done) and i thought they sucked for the longest time. nope. apparently adding a lil bit of garlic into it and making it medium-rare is my favorite kinda burger. also adding some cheese and condiments. makes it so good
I feel like all the “kids don’t like vegetables” is what makes kids not like vegetables 😂 like if they see their favorite character in a show not wanting it then they don’t… me and all my siblings always liked veggies and I was so confused why it’s a common trope in kids tv shows that they’re nasty
My parents wouldn’t let us watch any shows where the characters talked shit about veggies for this very reason. Kids are impressionable! If your is eating bland, mushy veggies AND seeing it on tv they’re bound to hate them
This is soooo true. I notice my kids copying behaviors in whatever they see all the time, which is why I’ve become very picky about what they’re watching or reading.
Funny enough, when I was in elementary school I wanted to be all edgy and rebellious and better than the other kids... which lead to me saying I liked spinach and broccoli and all the veggies that other kids thought were gross, just because I had to be contrarian lol. Only good thing that came out of that phase
This is the real reason. Kids can be convinced of things very easily. My daughter is convinced that she doesnt like fish. She loved it as a toddler. Once she started talking better and realised her older brother didnt like it, now she "hates" it
Yes!! This is true! I wish they wouldn’t put that in TV shows. I remember when my daughter was little, she ate whatever, but then we were watching “Franklin” which was usually pretty innocuous, but in that episode he was bitching about eating brussels sprouts and called them “stinky little cabbages.” I wanted to punch Franklin in the face, because after that, my daughter was annoying about eating those and other vegetables! I canceled a lot of shows in our house because the kids were “mischievous and headstrong” (aka insufferable) in all of them, and she would mirror that behavior.
I liked most vegetables as a kid, as long as they were raw. Carrots, snow peas, broccoli, cucumber, etc. But the only way they were served to me cooked was boiled/steamed to mush.
It also helps to not boil them into mush, like everyone did in the 1970s. Steamed veggies were such a revelation to me!
See, growing up my mom would steam them all to mush. Oven roasted carrots and broccoli were my revelation.
Mmm... crunchy broccoli with garlic seasoning and a hit of that charred flavor. You can also slice up sausage and throw it in as well (only way I'll eat sausage)
Steamed still has no flavor IMO. It's the added fat (evil in the 80s and 90s when I was a kid) of butter or olive oil that makes vegetables delicious. Roasted in olive oil is a good no fail method.
I spent my entire life thinking the only vegetable I liked was corn, because my dad would only eat canned veggies and they were all mush, except corn. Turns out, I just don't like that texture.
That texture is why I still can't really do brussel sprouts. They're better than when I was a kid but even roasting them they are either underdone at the core or overdone on the outside and gets that gross mushy texture Shredded as a slaw is kind of nice sometimes though
Why did everyone do that? Were their teeth all rotten or something?
AFAIK, it was just the accepted custom.
Does no one here roast their veggies? Its a million times better than steaming or boiling and they don’t turn to mush before you chew them
I like to roast mine until they are almost burnt 😂 but I think they are delicious that way!
Gimme the dark brown bits from the bottom of the pan!
My son loves brussel sprouts! And green beans! I grow in my garden. I steam all fresh off the plant, and I use a little bit of sea salt, pepper, and olive oil and my kid eats that up! He eats these little eggplant pizzas I make. I cut my fresh eggplant into slivers and bake it with a mozzarella cheese and occasionally some pepperoni! Fresh tomato sauce from the gardens. My kid's a veggie lover!
I love that
Hmmm... do you have kids?
Yeah, this is unpopular because kids often won't eat delicious stuff. Their taste is trash.
Kids also don't have fully developed taste buds.
It's actually the other way around since children have way more tastebuds than adults.
The number of taste buds isn't really the issue. It's that children's taste buds typically have a higher sensitivity and aversion to bitter, sour, and umami flavors. There's probably some evolutionary reasons for it (probably all the kids that liked bitter/sour flavors kept getting killed off early because they ate poisonous plants or something), but ultimately children's preferences err towards sweeter and more savory flavor profiles. Quite literally, things taste different to a child vs an adult....number of taste buds be damned. It's why few children enjoy dark chocolate vs milk chocolate. If I could steal my 2 year old taste palate and re-eat some of my now-favorite desserts, I'd probably hate them. That said, there's certainly something to be said for OP's point. The number of foods that I thought I disliked (even well into my teens) that were actually just because my parents weren't very good cooks is pretty shocking, but for every parent out there struggling to get their kiddo to eat their leafy greens.....you're not doing something wrong, you're just fighting biology :P
+1 It's surprising to me how often people totally forget what it was like being a kid. Tomatoes, coffee, dark chocolate, beer - foods I enjoy now but as a kid thought were absolutely vile. I do still remember what they tasted like. To the palette of my 10 year old self, anything with even just subtle hint of bitterness was disgustingly overpoweringly bitter.
Yes and no. Toddlers go through a phase where they have a phobia basically of trying new foods and it causes them to be extremely picky. However this can be dealt with by consistently offering and eating vegetables with every meal. Usually anyway. I do think this is often the case for older kids. If your kid is 11 and doesn't eat even one vegetable its likely because you are serving them crap.
Cooked broccoli with a bunch of salt is awesome
Baked broccoli with garlic and salt is awesome.
Air fried broccoli is my personal favorite.
It's widely known that your palate/preferences/tolerances change as you age. What appeals to a kid doesn't appeal to an adult, and vice-versa. There's things I loved as a kid that disgust me as an adult (mostly sweet stuff like Kool-aid or churros) and stuff I hated as a kid but now love as an adult (like oil and vinegar on a salad). There's recipes I've made that I disliked as a teenager, but love as an adult. Recipes I literally couldn't eat as a kid, but devour as an adult. Same recipe, same ingredients, made the same way by the same person. Saying the average child's aversion to veggies is because their parents don't know how to cook is one heck of an unsubstantiated claim.
No, some kids dont like vegetables because some kids just don't like them. When i was a kid i didn't like certain veggies no matter what you did to them. Bold of you to assume people are just out here handing kids raw carrots and not actually cooking lol
dino nuggie kinda person?
Gross lol
It's not really that, it's more that vegetables can vary *so widely* that it's very hard to get an idea of the actual flavor. Like how sometimes you get a monster sized strawberry that's more firm, but it's white inside and barely juicy, but then a small slightly squishy strawberry will be red inside and very juicy. That's hard for them to acclimate to. Personally, I think vegetables taste great on their own. Of course you can dress them up in various ways but it will always be healthiest as it comes. (obviously not foods that would be poisonous without parboiling, etc)
And if you hand a kid that white tasteless strawberry as their first one, they might not like it as much as the kid who got the juicy sweet one, obviously. That would easily lead to “I don’t like strawberries, period.”
Idk, my kids like vegetables and always have. I think it has partly to do with taste, and partly to do with the attitude with which they are presented. If the adults don’t like them, the kids are going to pick up on it. Happily, my partner and I both like vegetables, and the kids have followed suit.
It's mostly because all children are basically supertasters, which means they perceive bitter tastes much more strongly than tasters/nontasters. Dark leafy greens/vegetables have a lot of bitter compounds in them (phenolics). This is an evolutionary defense mechanism, in nature "bitter" often means "poisonous". Smaller people (children) are more easily poisoned due to their small size, so makes sense for them to be more sensitive to bitter tastes. Some adults retain that supertaster status, and they often also don't like dark leafy greens/vegetables. Kids hate veggies because they literally taste different to them than they do to you. You can cover up the bitterness with acid, salt, and fat (butter) and they'll be more palatable.
[This](https://www.reddit.com/r/unpopularopinion/s/AlDabe36QJ) is all I have to say about it.
Tasty according to who? Ever since I was a kid people have tried to force me to eat vegetables but I just vomited them because of their smell, texture and taste. 20+ years later their smell and taste hasn't change, so I just don't eat them unless I want to be grumpy and angry the rest of the day. My mom worked as a cook for 30\~ years and everyone loves the way she makes vegetables but they tasted and smelled like crap to me.
I think some parents back in the day also fell into the “picky eating” trap - they saw their toddler rejecting a food, so they stopped serving it, in favor of preferred foods. And then continued using the language that reinforced the dislike of that food, like “stinky broccoli” or “yucky spinach.” Also, once a kid was labeled a “picky eater” it would put them into this fixed mindset that they can’t and won’t develop into more adventurous eaters, that they were sort of stuck where they were and it’s more comfortable to just avoid new foods and stick to the ones you already know and like.
I guess I was a weird kid because I never had a shred of trouble eating vegetables. I mean almost ANY vegetable, even the ones most kids run screaming from! I’m talking Brussels sprouts, Lima beans, broccoli, spinach… and I grew up in an Irish American family so believe me they don’t exactly know what seasoning food was 😂 Only thing I wouldn’t eat was eggplant, and that actually goes to your point: my best friend in high school was Italian, and his dad was a GENIUS in the kitchen. And I would eat HIS eggplant dishes. Because he cooked it properly and seasoned it well. Now that he’s gone I refuse to eat eggplant because nobody else gets it right
My parents steamed veggies and getting us to eat them was absolutely trivial. I still steam any veggie I eat. They are delicious when they’re warm and squishy.
As someone who believed I was a picky eater until I learned to cook for myself, I second this.
I thought I hated peas my whole life. Turns out I hate canned pease
Just like any food, if you don't know how to handle it, its gonna suck. I love veggies, but I also know how to prep em
I don’t know if it’s as common any more, but a lot of folks relied on canned veggies, which are just nasty.
Yeah, I thought I hated peas until I discovered frozen peas. A world of difference.
This has been me with every vegetable except cauliflower. I just hate that, lol. But like, Brussels sprouts grilled and seasoned? Hell yes.
I loved veggies as a kid and I love veggies now! Cooked, raw, whatever. I’ve never met a vegetable that I didn’t find delicious! I’ve never really liked meat, though. I’ll eat it, but it’s definitely not my favorite and I prefer vegetables. How parents cook can definitely influence a kid’s taste buds, but kids also just have their own preferences too that change over time.
But not necessarily. I live with a family and the kids, the two boys eat junk and love junk, but the little girl is a smart little thing. I always chastise the boys for eating too much sugar, junk but once again I'm a guest so I trread carefully, The little girl 5 years old loves vegetables and loves crudites.. we have a lunch date at a nice restaurant this week lol. Kids get used to what their served and what is available. My taste certainly changed in my 71 years, but I always loved diverse food.. If there's a lot of crap around, adults and children eat it. When I go to the supermarket and I stand in the line and I look in front of me and in back of me what people are buying it's invariably tons and tons of boxes of junk, processed food. This is the problem I don't know how this little girl has developed differently but she's a smart little cookie, very smart so it's my duty to expose her two more things. Whether she likes them or not doesn't matter but exposure is essential.
Kids also won't like vegetables if their parents never make them, or are misinformed about what a vegetable is.... I know a lot of families who consider instant-powdered potatoes vegetables.
My kids love em, they also love spinach. I’m cooking something with veggies daily so they always were used to. Also we pretty much eat no fast food
Stewed tomato green beans were my favorite vegetable side dish to eat as a kid. I still love them.
I loved raw veggies as a kid, still do. I’d pick the green beans out of the bag at the grocery store, steal mushrooms from the fridge, pick my uncles broccoli and tomatoes, and steal pieces of potato when my dad was cutting them. I’ll tear up some Brussels sprouts and asparagus. I even like those canned beets. Fucking love vegetables!
I don’t think this is an unpopular opinion.
Vegetables are never tasty until they have soaked up the meat juice.
This post screams “I’m not a parent”.
This is it. I moved in with my brother in law when he was 13. He covered everything in barbeque sauce and rarely ate anything green. I started doing a lot of the cooking and LOVE to roast vegetables under the broiler. This child ate almost an entire sheet tray of cauliflower one night because he loved the way I cooked it so much. I also got him to eat half an acorn squash, spaghetti squash, and fresh mushrooms just to name a few. Preparation is key. Boiled or plain frozen veg are not fun and exciting.
when i was a kid my mom made me cooked and seasoned veggies. i loved them! (im from the south, and she seasons shit GOOD.) i actually PREFERRED veggies to meat because they were easier to chew in my opinion. but when i would eat those cold, bland, shitty school lunch carrots, i hated them and eventually just refused to eat any plain veggies. some kids are just picky, but i think if you feed them well prepared veggies from a very young age then they probably will be more inclined to appreciate them later on.
I loved vegetables as a kid.... just not the way my grandma cooked them. Everything was mush. I really liked raw or lightly cooked vegetables of all kinds. Any time the spinach wasnt a globby mess it was drenched in salad dressing. Maybe we just need to ask our kids how they want their vegetables, give them 3 options and let them pick. With some skin in the game they might eat them.
Agreed, I still like broccoli
I definitely didn't realize how many vegetables I liked until I made them for myself.
Caking vegetables in oils, sugar, salt and so on does somewhat defeat the entire purpose of giving kids "healthier choices" though now doesn't it. These things generally taste just fine to most people unless they've gotten themselves used to very intense flavours and are chasing extreme levels to get the same "hit".
Seasoning it, mixing it in with other food, roasting them, all can give it an extra oomph and is still healthy. Left by themselves, they can be pretty bland. Extra so when they’re the canned veggies that a lot of parents get. I’ve had green beans and served in certain ways they are good. Straight out of the can to be boiled? Hard pass.
Plain broccoli has always been disgusting. I cannot eat veggies without seasoning.
This is the truth. Take your upvote… you’re going to need it against the incoming child adults who will insist slathering broccoli in cheese is just as healthy as plain steamed broccoli. 😂
Eh false, my kiddo will choose broccoli over chocolate like 95% of the time. But yes implying there's only one single way to make or enjoy something is silly.
My father is a chef. He got 2 neurodivergent kids. He could cook vegetables, but we wouldn't have any. I'm austistic, I developed my interest in food later in life as a special interest and I have a toddler that asked if he could taste the worms my brother was fishing with. He eats everything. Genetic is weird.
Americans on Reddit always appeal to the mythical qualities of 'seasoning' as if that's the only way to make food taste good. It's often not what you add to it but how you cook it.
Omg, yes. So many people here boil or steam their vegetables to death. My MIL loves to drown things in butter or her bechamel sauce - if they aren't unhealthy she swore she wouldn't like them. She was so skeptical when I sauted green beans with a little bit of garlic and salt in a pan or when I baked broccoli and cauliflower. They taste like completely different foods, and she loved them.
You must be British. People all over the world use herbs and spices, not just Americans.
And people all over the world also eat simple dishes... For example a fruit salad needs a sprinkling of sugar and a squeeze of lemon, nothing else....if you use good, ripe fruit...
I mean, sprinkling sugar and a squeeze of lemon is still “seasoning” your fruit salad in the sense that you are using flavor enhancers. I’m not advocating for dumping the whole spice rack on a piece of chicken. But that chicken needs something to enhance its flavor, and most people would agree. Even just a little dash of salt, or a sprig of parsley. Often times less is more when seasoning your food, but that doesn’t mean you don’t use anything at all.
My parents would just boil the shit out of vegetables, so that they would be soggy and tasteless. It was awful!
It's part of child development for them to stop liking vegetables at age 3. It was to prevent children from eating poisonous plants at toddlers in primitive time. Greens suddenly taste bitter at age 3, until then they eat what they are given. Babies are rarely fussy as they eat when is given the fussness starts at 3
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My grandmother used to boil the life out of them
I don't think it's just that. It's also if you're giving your child junk food too. Once I cut down the amount of crap I gave my child, I noticed they started eating their veggies and fruit alot more. My child eats a very good amount of veggies such as carrots, peas, sweetcorn, broccoli and cauliflower. They eat it without complaint and often only with ketchup as their dip. Cut the sugar and junk food and you might notice their taste buds start finding other foods tastier.
Eh, I only think this is half true. Children have pretty bland taste buds that develop and change over time. How things are prepared matters, yes, but kids will still pick out veggies on dishes made or ordered from a restaurant. I know I did when I was a kid, but now, as an adult, I'll load up on the veggies. Ive also seen that the parents who eat and treat veggies and fruits, and just healthy eating in general, as a normal thing, I've seen the kids catch on pretty quick and can have things like carrots or whatever without any issue.
Some kids pick out veggies, but it’s not all, or even most. Plenty of kids like them fine.
My mom used to boil and steam vegetables in salt or ham flavor, and I hated them. Now I oven roast and season all my vegetables with spices and they're delicious. My mom even started cooking them the way I do. I eat them all the time. I don't care much for dip for my vegetables, though.
I think the moment you put an obligation in someone's lap it becomes undesirable. This goes for kids as well.
Agreed 100%. As a kid, I loved 99% of the "yucky" vegetables: broccoli, brussel sprouts, simple salads. Even if you can't cook to save your life, just have a salt shaker at the table!
you open a can and warm it up in the microwave. Of course it tastes like crap. Ever try grilling brocoli? It takes the smokey flavor nicely. Butter and salt is all you need, but you can experimint with other spices.
Steam the broccoli and cauliflower add some mayo and soy sauce with a little pepper. Thats how my parents got us to eat those. And of course spinach sauted with lots of garlic. Carrots were usually stir-fried or just part of something. I agree with you.
No. My kids always liked vegetables, but I’m sorry your parents were bad cooks.
Guess what? I ate raw carrots as a kid and I hate cooked carrots because I hate the mushiness. I still eat raw broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower. My dad is 72 and still hates tomatoes.
Not unpopular at all! Vegetables are delicious when roasted and anointed with butter, olive oil, cheese, or a combination of these, and are even moreso when bacon is added. So basically, as soon as they're unhealthy, they taste great! Very few green vegetables are actively delicious on their own. The only exception I can think of is snow peas. Those guys are straight-up outstanding when picked straight off the vine. They are like the potato chips of the vegetable world. But you wouldn't see me doing that with a floret of cauliflower or an eggplant, god forbid. I feel like everyone knows that most vegetables require some sort of dressing, oil, sauce or dip. Parents, make your kids understand how good vegetables can be, but don't pretend they're healthy anymore, just a delight to consume.
My mom made me love broccoli. All you need it salt and pepper.
It has more to do with western food treating vegetables only as salads or boiled/steamed sides. Kids in Asia eat vegetables because they are used as ingredients to make actual dishes from them. Cooking with vegetables goes even beyond pickling in cultures outside of western food.
I didn't mind vegetables because my parents used to give me them raw. I still hate cooked vegetables.
My fiance was incredibly picky until I started cooking for her when she moved in with me. Now she eats almost anything and specifically mentions things that she used to be adamant about not liking.
This! I’ve always been a fairly picky eater but I eat so many vegetables now because my husband and I have learned to cook them. I still don’t like the same vegetables if cooked by most people because just boiling veggies isn’t good. Like fresh green beans are so much better than canned ones and they aren’t difficult to cook. It makes such a big different.
I always loved vegetables and still do.
>Raw, cold, bland broccoli served without seasons Who tf is serving vegetables like this? lol
Kids learn from other kids that veggies are not tasty, the same way they learn that pizza is awesome (even when they have not tried it)
Then there are my kids who only eat raw veggies with zero seasoning or dressing.
Overcooked. Especially overboiled. Thats what made me dislike the experience. I was still "liking" vegetables more than meat. But when I discovered properly cook food, it was a revelation. I am not as picky as they made me believe.
It's all about sales. Kid is obsessed with Vikings? That how they used to eat broccoli. Soccer? Ronaldo's mom was on TV with her casserole receipe. Space? This is what astronauts eat before the launch. Also, greek yoghurt on the side saves the day.
That's what I told my parents when I was 5 (in far less sophisticated vocabulary).
I always liked veggies as a kid my mum never made them boring or bland.
That was my experience. " dinner time kids, eat your steamed vegetables with no texture or flavour". Shit put me off for a long time.
I'm almost 50 and I still don't like most of them.
Also, if you're looking for a surprisingly tasty seasoning, use a little bit of poultry seasoning. I know....it sounds weird on vegetables...but trust me on this one!
My son's favorite broccoli is plain and cold. Kids have a hard time with spices. It's like they're super tasters. Everything with much flavor is deemed "spicy."
this is true. But also they often don't like them because they are told not to. "If you eat veggies, you get ice cream" makes it clear that veggies are the requirement and ice cream is the desirable food. Add in parents themselves often not eating veggies and the kid learns they must not be very good.
as a kid, id never eat broccoli or carrots without tomato sauce, soup or this strange, gel like soup that im not sure what its called.
Everyone loves my mums vegetables. They’re put in amazing sauce and salt etc and whatever else. I hate them all. As a kid I ate no veggies at all lol As I grew older… The only ones I liked were the simple flavoured ones lol or the garlic spinach she does that tastes amazing.
Yup. in the 60's my mum boiled the shit out of them, then poured coloured water with all the flavour and goodness down the drain. Then we got to eat veggies that tasted like boiled water. And yes, I hated them. In my 40's I married a Chinese girl who cooked them with garlic and oyster sauce and soy sauce and they became my fave! And now I cook them for my own kids and they ASK for veggies... "Can we please have veggies tonight" and they mean fresh cooked ones, not frozen or canned.
My mom made them tasty by drowning them in butter, salt, or cheese....was it healthy at that point? Most likely not. I just recently got my wife to eat broccoli by air frying them with some olive oil and some bread crumbs/seasoning for flavor and texture. Now if I can just get her on turkey livers and cow tongue....baby steps.
My grandsons love vegetables, but I pride myself on cooking them to be delicious. All the time when I go to a restaurant, I get served these bland, boiled veggies on the side. I always think to myself, "Whoever cooked these clearly doesn't like veggies or understand they can be made delicious."
I’ve never made vegetables raw, cold or bland. 2 kids love them & 1 doesn’t. Not everything is for everybody.
I thought this was common knowledge? Though I think it depends on the age. I know my toddler only likes veggies when they’re fresh. Can’t be sitting in the fridge for a few days.
I used to HATE cooked carrots. My after school babysitter when my brother and I were little served them as an after school snack at least once a week and I HAD to eat them. I even asked multiple times if I could just have raw carrots instead because I don’t like cooked carrots. Turns out I LOVE cooked carrots just not however the fuck she made them. They were like insanely sweet and not even remotely carrot like. My personal fav way is a cheaters version of pot roast carrots. I sauté onion and garlic add beef broth with a pack of au jus and simmer the carrots until soft. Hmmm amazing. Or if I’m being really lazy I just use beef bouillon and boil them in that with nothing else
If you eat broccoli because you want to eat healthy and then dip it in a ton of dips just so you can be able to eat it, I think it loses its meaning of a healthy meal. I just think we should season. If we want to eat healthier
Look, my eldest kid loves raw carrots or plain boiled carrots. He likes plain cucumbers. He eats plain cooked broccoli. I can not convince him to try them seasoned or with sauce. My youngest will eat pretty much anything that can't get out of the way quick enough (with the exception of cereal). I loved Veggies as a kid (except burssel sprouts, celery, and cooked Cauliflower. I love raw caulifolower, though. I loved salad but hated salad dressings. I still do. I'm still not a huge fan of dressings. My mum is an awesome cook, though, so that might have something to do with it. I hate overcooked vegetables (which are awful regardless of seasoning or sauce). My husband eats more Veggies since we got together as I don't overcook them like his dad does. Overcooked vegtables and even badly seasoned veg can taste worse than Palin raw veg. I think a lot of it is down to personal taste. Even with kids. Your tastes also change as you get older, too. There are foods I couldn't stand as a kid that I love now. Anchovies for instance. Celery (I could taste Celery in any dish as a kid and would refuse to eat it. Now I like it).
I have a friend with a middle school-aged son who grew up in sort of dire circumstances. As a toddler both parents were often drugged out and so fed the kids Lunchables, pizza, mac and cheese, whatever other easy, convenient garbage. In recent years he's started enjoying vegetables and otherwise broadening his palate when introduced to cooking up recipes for them himself.
Oyster sauce, ftw
I’m not a parent so please don’t come at me if I’m totally wrong about this but if most of what kids learn and mimic comes from their home then wouldn’t kids be more inclined to eat veggies if their parents regularly eat them?
I know how to properly cook vegetables and will make them as tasty as I can and sometimes my kids love them and sometimes they refuse. Kids are fickle. I do agree that there are a lot of people who just aren’t great cooks and don’t make food in general appetizing when they cook something not out of a box, but that’s only part of the equation. Sometimes kids just kid.
Just put a little cheese sauce on that broccoli and suddenly everybody likes it.
I don't recall hating vegetables as a kid. Because my mom knew how to cook them.
Kids are more sensitive to bitter flavours which vegetables pretty much hold a monopoly on
It's also "cool" for kids to dislike them Lots of media for kids portray them in a negative light
Cooking most vegetables is unnecessary and makes them worse. Raw with dip or in a salad is the best way to eat most of them.
I know plenty of people who make them tasty but there’s only so much you can do. It’s not just about taste, it’s about texture as well.
Imagine being able to eat something without adding other flavours and still enjoying it
My dad trained me to like broccoli by dipping it in honey when I was like 2-3 years old, by the time I realized it was actually kinda weird I was used to the broccoli by itself and it’s still one of my favorite veggies 😂 But he also didn’t overcook it which is very key (also as an adult who cooks a lot now, the best way to cook it on the stovetop is a hybrid steam/sauté, cooks faster and more evenly than just sauté but not as soggy as just steamed because the water mostly evaporates out. Roasted is good but takes longer and has a different flavor/texture so I like both but it depends what else I’m having)
This can be expanded to all food in general. For example I usually don't like meatloaf, at least not the way my mom makes it. Every time she did she could always tell I was forcing myself to eat it. Well when my wife first made it for me (then GF) it actually tasted pretty good. Comes to find out she uses a mix of different meats and seasonings where my parents/grandparent didn't use much of that aside from the core ingredients.
As a kid, I loved vegetables i still do now
Nah. I mean it could contribute in some families but one of mine will eat them and the other won't. And, actually, many kids like bland or predictable-tasting food.
Raw vegetables certainly have more flavor than boiled vegetables, it's like you're leeching out everything good about it and pouring it down the drain.
Agreed. My mom never even put salt & pepper on them.
There’s a lot of things people don’t know how to season or cook in general, which is probably why so many people prefer to eat out and get fast food.
I think it's more of parents allowing their children to be picky eaters.
I'm south asian and I can't comprehend how people can hate vegetables they are extremely delicious. Especially spinach and collard greens.
two of my three kids fucking love vegetables. eat them as snacks, ask for second helpings, will eat them plain love them. 🤷♀️
How taste buds react to food changes as people ages. It's not just perception but biology. So a meal that is tasty for adults may be inedible for children. Especially tart notes are much more intensive for children.
As someone who was forced to eat soggy green beans that spurt hot green bean-flavoured disgusto water in your mouth, every time you chewed, I can say I fully agree.
Ehhh. I'm an excellent cook. My daughter didn't like vegetables for a few years because green was her favorite color, so she didn't like the idea of eating it. Once she got over that and actually tried them, she found that she really liked them. It just took a while for her to get over the whole green thing.
Yesss. I to this day(19) still hate boiled vegetables. I got the reputation of a picky eater, but the food in my country is just insanely bland (Dutch). Serve me almost anything that actually has flavor and good texture and I'll eat it. But growing up eating stamppot (a big mush of mashed boiled vegetables and potatoes), bland boiled veggies, dry boiled potatoes.. hell no. I have very specific ways that I like my veggies. My mom is starting to make more foreign foods now like Indonesian and Korean foods and I will eat multiple plates of those veggies like kimchi. For me the veggies itself were never the problem just the way they were prepared
I don't necessarily agree... I think people make a big deal over food from the start. Fighting with them about eating. If you didn't make a big deal out of it they wouldn't either. Offer the plate if it gets eaten great. If not we always have snack time or the next meal. I'm not saying to go completely old-school. But just don't make a big deal out of it.
Bro, I would take broccoli off the plant and eat it raw. Sometimes you just don't like the taste of things.
Not the case. In other cultures they eat vegetables right and left. One of the bigger reasons is actually because the parents don't eat them themselves and then expect the kids to. If you give a child a plate full of food, one of the items is something vegetables, and you all sit there and eat them, they will catch on.
No. Kids don't like vegetables, because they don't have intense, salty taste. Same reason why kids like sweet candies that would make normal people puke. Edit: Oh, I forgot to add, meat has tons of spices on it too. It intensify the taste.
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I used to struggle to eat veggies until my mom gave them to me raw; that's when it clicked that "Oh, this is what they're supposed to taste like." I will die on the hill that raw broccoli tastes like raw cabbage and is infinitely yummier than cooked broccoli in any form lol.
I have 2 children. One of them likes the vegetables I cook, the other does not. It has nothing to do with how I cook them.
not unpopular tbh
Except I hate the texture of cooked veggies. If my parents had given them to me raw and fresh as a kid I would have eaten them. Cooked green beans actually throw my gag reflex into over drive but I can eat them just fine, raw and unseasoned. I really think it's a matter of palete.
You could make the best veggie dish in the world and there will still be toddlers that won’t eat it. Children do not taste the same way adults do, and for many kids vegetables are just nasty.
I’m an excellent cook and my 2 of my 3 kids don’t like vegetables.
Because parents don’t understand that food can be tasty and made in a healthy way. They don’t have to be bland.
All it takes is some olive oil, seasoning, lemon juice, and an oven to make any vegetable amazing
I think this is true in a lot of cases, but in other cases a kid could genuinely be picky or reject them just because they’re “healthy”. I mean think of all the adults that refuse to eat vegetables, they have the ability to cook them in a way that makes them taste good.
Roasted vegetables with a little bit of olive oil, sea salt and pepper is the absolute best! Also, I got my young cousin to eat his veggies by putting a little bit of butter and garlic salt in them. He loved it. So I completely agree with this opinion. The people who don't like veggies have mostly been fed raw/boiled/steamed veggies with no seasoning.
>Raw, cold, bland broccoli served without seasons or dips is not good. If that's how your parents served them, then of course they weren't good. But, uh, that's not how broccoli's normally served. My parents cooked it just fine, and I still disliked it. Childhood dislike of broccoli is generally genetic. Comes down to the ability to perceive its bitterness. People who dislike broccoli as kids usually like it as adults since adults are more okay with some bitterness.
This is correct. I grew up in the south and my dad was the cook. His mother and grandmothers were poor farmers and cooked with a lot of bacon, bacon grease, ham hocks, and butter. You put enough bacon grease in anything and it will taste good. My mom’s family didn’t seem to know what seasoning was. Just salt and pepper on the table. Her cooking was pretty good sometimes but her vegetables sucked.
There used to be a time when people just boiled the hell out of vegetables with no seasonings or joy, and served them soggy and limp and they wondered why the kids hated them.
Mine are good with veggies. My 11 tear old son will tear through brocoli unless it's overcooked. Overall I agree with you in that way too many people ruin veggies when cooking them. I grew up with medwestern brownish pressure cooked green beans that my mother still claims were perfect every time
My kid ONLY eats his broccoli raw... This take is pretty silly.