One Pot Meals: Highly Recommended For Children

A hard task for each parent is to ensure that their children eat every taste and every vegetable. Kids with fussy eating habits are a parents’ nightmare. A meal-time, at times, transform into a veritable push and pull as the parents have made a certain dish and the kids have their preferences.

We are blessed till now, that our soon-to-be six-year-old twin daughters eat everything served without a bother. I have written about my guess-work about what makes them eat all their vegetables. My wife has her hypothesis, as well. She feels that the girls have been introduced to a certain way of cooking pretty early in their culinary journey and seemingly, this has helped them develop taste buds that accept all the flavours and veggies. Enter the one pot meals.

One pot meals for children is apparently neither an appealing nor an exciting idea. On the face of it, one pot meal goes against the conventional wisdom that a child needs to be introduced to all the various tastes. One pot meal does not fulfil this criterion. Then, how can it serve the task of making children eat all the stuff?

One pot meals introduce each taste and veggies uniquely

Consider a delectable meal spread across various courses/dishes. As a parent, we feel that we have done our task to ensure that a child has options and can have a well-balanced diet. Now, this is an inadvertent pit-fall.

With so much to choose from, the kid would want to have what s/he prefers. That’s the end of the story, as it goes. The parent will keep banging her/his head and the child will also keep replying in a matching fashion. For s/he knows that asking for a dish of preference is very much an option.

More importantly, the child will keep choosing and having food, the taste of which s/he believes s/he likes. The kid would not want to experiment with other flavours on offer.  S/he will stick with the tried and tested much to the parent’s irritation.

Now, consider the one pot meals as the only dish available for serving. The kid does not have an option to choose from. S/he sees the parents eating it and knows intuitively that s/he will also have to eat the same.

More importantly, one pot meals will have a single and unique taste on offer, as per the ingredients used. When the child eats the one pot meals, s/he learns to appreciate the taste and may develop the liking over some time. Though, it is secondary; the child eats is primarily important and it is what counts.

One pot meals have an advantage over every other food dish that it is a meal in itself. And, it does so by using minimal ingredients and staying true to their taste/ flavour. When a child eats a unique flavour without any other flavour simultaneously jostling for taste buds; it helps in developing a taste/liking for the same.

One pot meals are healthy and nutritious

At times, there is a misconception that one pot meals are not healthy and nutritious. Believe me, they are. My wife ensures that without fail, there is a vegetable as a key ingredient. Apart from colour, taste and texture, it also provides vitamins, minerals and natural fiber. The grains/rice fulfils the carbohydrate requirements.  We add beans to complete the protein quota.

Seasonings add to the flavour of foods. Using spices and herbs limit the amount of salt needed in the dish. Moreover, sugar has no relevance. Oil usage is also limited. Ghee can be used as a topping as per the liking and meet the fats requirements.

What can be unhealthy in this? You have the choice to hold back on whatever you feel like; similarly, add whatever you would want to. Yet, the meal will be complete in all regards, unless you skip a complete ingredient in itself.

A child can help in the cooking, too

When a parent is making a meal spread across various dishes/courses, the bandwidth gets occupied in the process. The cooking itself becomes time-consuming and soaks up the energy. There is no way that the parent can involve a child in this process without tearing up her/his hair.

Now, look at the one pot meals. It is simple, requires minimal preparations and leaves enough room to involve the kid in the cooking. When the child gets involved in the process, s/he builds ownership to the cooked dish and makes it easier to have her/him eat the same.

A sure-shot winner

What is more? One pot meals are much more amenable to reduced wastage vis-a-vis ingredients, left-over and prodding the child to eat. It is more peaceful and enjoyable to cook and eat; leaving more calories in the body for everyone in the family at the end of cooking and eating.

One pot meals also give a subtle message to kids that the simple can be fun and enjoyable too. One need not have multiple courses/dishes to cherish the food. Similarly, one also need not have much of paraphernalia to claim a happy and fulfilling life. Life can be as uncomplicated and as undemanding as we can make it to be, ala one pot meals.

The basic reason for us to promote one pot meals for children is that it is about a unique taste and flavour. For a child to be an unfussy/adventurous/accepting eater, it is the taste and the flavour that has to matter; and not the particular dish; per se. One pot meals are not a dish at all. It is what you make it out to be.

Simply put, with one pot meals, it is not the potato curry or the paneer curry or any leafy curry or for that matter, a cheese topping that a child develops liking for, but for the potato, the paneer, the leafy vegetable, the cheese – individually.

Life Skills For Children: Vegetable Shopping

Vegetable shopping is a favourite activity for B +ve and O +ve that they look forward to every week.

Earlier, we used to go to the supermarket for vegetable shopping. I realized that it was not working out with the girls. They liked to touch and pick the vegetables. However, the crates arrangement in the supermarket was not conducive for the girls to get to work. So, we switched over to the weekly market that gets organized on the roads.

It has been a revelation for the girls and for the last two years, we have been doing this every week. The girls get their cloth shopping bags, the shopping list made by their mother and we are ready for the adventure.

I realized that it is not just the experience of vegetable shopping that O +ve and B +ve get in the weekly market; they also learn a number of life skills in the process.

Experiencing the real India

Weekly market happens on the arterial roads with vehicular traffic in full swing. The hawkers and the vendors put their vegetables on the road or on the pushcart – in the open. The girls experience the real markets with dust, dirt, heat, smoke, dogs, puddles, vehicles, people and everything else.

With the supermarket, they were seeing the sanitized environments. Now, they see the real India and they interact with ease.

I do not know how India will be when they grow up to be an adult. However, I feel that the transition from the road-side market to the sterile surroundings of the supermarket is relatively easy than the other way round. Navigating the maze of the weekly market as compared to the aisles of the supermarket may hold them in good stead when they grow up.

Talking to strangers

Due to the very nature of the weekly market on the road in the open, there are actually not many children out shopping. So, when the hawkers, vendors and the fellow buyers see two girls moving from one push-cart to another, they ask their names and what they are doing.

As the girls stay-at-home and do not go to formal learning environment, the weekly market serves as a good mechanism for them to get introduced to people and speak to them.

Understanding the concept of money

The girls pick their vegetables and also pay for their buy each time, taking turns.

In the weekly market, nobody accepts digital payments. So, we have to pay in cash. The girls understand that there are Rs. 50/-, Rs. 100/-, Rs. 200/- and Rs. 500/- notes. These are to be paid to the vegetable uncles and vegetable aunties and we get the change in return.

I understand that the girls are missing out on knowing about card payments and mobile wallets. But I suppose they will pick up along the way.

Knowing real vegetables

The girls did learn about vegetables from their books. However, they are all neatly coloured and of uniform shape and size. The supermarket sells graded and sorted vegetables, many a time. Going to the weekly market, the girls know how to pick tomatoes – red and medium-sized, and to avoid tomatoes with holes, that are green and soft. They know how potatoes and onions can be really out of shape and huge and tiny. They know how to pick brinjals, they know how arvi comes with so much of soil attached to it.

I felt that supermarkets, though they sold exotics, were weaker when it compared to stocking local leafy vegetables and gourds. The weekly market does not sell exotic vegetables. But they have all the local leafy vegetables and gourds – based on the season.

This has ensured that the girls know pretty well about the local vegetables basis their vegetable shopping experience.

Working at home with their buy

Coming back from the weekly market, the girls know that all the vegetables have to put in their respective baskets and bags. They practise their counting while putting the vegetables in their place. Having the ownership of their buys, the girls help their mother in the kitchen with all the cleaning, chopping, cutting and preparing the curries.

I suppose this has really helped in ensuring that B +ve and O +ve eat all the vegetables.

Going to the weekly market has another advantage that the girls do not get distracted by the processed food – chips and chocolates and the likes that the supermarket tries hard to sell to children.

Conclusion

Vegetable shopping can be a chore and difficult to get children excited about this task. However, for some reason, this has turned out to be an exciting weekly mission for O +ve and B + ve, till now.

I suppose they are not just learning vegetable shopping, they are learning a number of life skills along with.

How we introduced vegetables to our children?

As our twin daughters turn four years, we try and figure out how we are faring as parents. One of the things that stand out as an achievement for us is that both the girls eat all the vegetables.

I have tried to figure out how and why this has happened? To be honest, the points mentioned below are what we feel as parents that have contributed to our daughters eating all the vegetables. Though, it is very much possible that we can be wrong and that our daughters would have anyways had vegetables or they are having it for some other reasons.

Taste everything

We encourage our daughters to taste – and this means practically everything that is found in the kitchen. They taste all vegetables – raw (barring uncooked potato, I suppose they have put everything in their mouth), all spices (barring chilli powder of course), uncooked rice, all pulses, aata, kneaded dough. You name it and they would have tasted it. I do not remember when this started, but it was fairly long back for sure, and I suppose this contributed to their developing adventurous taste-buds. Yes, they have fairly good digestion too to digest whatever they taste and no issues on that front either.

Buy everything

Earlier, we used to buy vegetables from the supermarket. We realized that kids wanted to pick their own vegetables but were not able to reach the crates. So, we started going to the local market where vegetables are sold on either road-side or on push-carts.  Both the places our daughters are able to reach, pick and put vegetables in their own cloth bags. Once they pick and buy, I suppose it leads to some kind of ownership for them to eat their vegetables.

Prepare everything

Both the girls love helping their mother in the kitchen. Cutting vegetables is a family task with both kids busy cutting vegetables with their scissors and steamed vegetables with their toy knives. Similar to buying, I suppose this also leads to owning up their vegetables – they cut and put spices in curry preparation.

Once ready, we always announce that today’s vegetable curry has been made courtesy the efforts put in by the two young girls, their beaming smiles follows and their eating the vegetables.

Never an announcement for new trials

The girls’ contribution to buying and preparing vegetables happened along the way. When they started eating their vegetables, I remember that we never announced what was made for lunch/dinner. We just sat for food and started feeding them. I suppose the statements like “you have what you like”, “it is ok if you do not like” would have made them defensive and create a doubt in their minds about what is being fed to them. Rather, it was always made to look like business as usual and that it is expected of them to eat whatever is served.

Surprisingly, they ate and eat even now.

No question about liking vegetables but statements

We have never asked them if they liked what they ate. Rather, we make statements that today’s vegetable curry was excellent, yum, tasty and they join the chorus.

No favourite vegetables

We have not taught them the word “favourite“. They, of course, know about its existence as they have been asked a number of times by others about their favourite colours/vegetables. The answer prompted by us is that they like all the colours and also, all the vegetables.

It might be said that we are not helping our children to decide or making their choices all-across. I am not so sure, but this seems to have helped to treat and eat all the vegetables equally and also to dress up in all-coloured clothes.

No small servings

We have ensured that there are no small servings. Whatever is made, gets served in the same size as earlier time with a statement that we need to eat and finish what is served in the plate.

There are a lot of things that the girls do not give an ear to, but somehow they seem to follow this piece of instruction.

I suppose the above points have helped in developing an attitude to try out everything. They have never been rewarded for eating their vegetables or any conditions attached along with.

There are also below points that seem to have helped in developing their taste-buds to vegetables.

No salt or sugary foods

The girls are yet to taste soft drinks or canned juices. Same goes for French Fries /  Lays / Kurkure and the like. I suppose the lack of attack on their senses from this fast food stuff has helped them to appreciate the taste of vegetables.

Initiation to solid foods

One of the girls migrated to Cerelac prior to starting her actual solid food. Her sister went directly from milk to solid foods and she was the one who ate all the vegetables. The girl who was having Cerelac did not have a liking for vegetables till she turned two. I suppose it was seeing her sister having all the vegetables helped to begin her liking for vegetables.

My wife suspects that Cerelac has some amount of sugary taste across all the flavours and this made her reluctant to take vegetables. We feel that sugar and salt can follow vegetables, but not the other way round.

No exotic vegetables or dishes

The girls are comfortable with all the kinds of gourds, leafies and the local vegetables sold in the vegetable market. Having stopped going to the supermarket has ensured that we do not have any broccoli or lettuce or coloured capsicum in the house.

The girls love their white sauce pasta as a sure-shot once a week dinner dish. Apart from this, their mother has stayed away from making dishes specifically to introduce the vegetables. She wants the taste of vegetables to stand out and not the seasonings or the salt or the sugar. I suppose this has helped immensely.

To repeat, we do not know for sure what has actually led to both the girls having all the vegetables. The above-mentioned reasons are what we have come up in hindsight – may be true or completely off the mark.

I hope if any of the above points can be of help to you. Do share your experiences and views.