Help! My child is an anti-junk food vegetarian!

When your child is a health foodie

I never thought fostering good eating habits in my child would spell T-R-O-U-B-L-E  for me. My child is going to be four soon. I have been struggling since his toddlerhood to have him eat chips, fries, burgers, noodles, chivda, in fact, any ready-to-eat food. And let’s not even mention restaurants. Sigh! It means this. Since A started solids, I am pretty much cooking every meal for him at home, be it a snack or a square meal. Would you please excuse me a moment while I inject another shot of energy boosters into my very, very, and if you still didn’t get it, VERY tired self?

My paediatrician loves to wag a finger at me. What a wacko mum. Your child refuses to eat junk and you WANT him to? Birthday parties, doc. I tell her. And eating out. You see my problem areas?

My child is one of the less known tribe of anti-junk crusaders who feels completely out of place at McDonald’s. Can you imagine that? I mean, what about Happy Meals?  Sigh! Oh, and did I mention? He is vegetarian by choice since birth. He can smell eggs from a mile, mutton and chicken are “yucky” and fish are for Nigel the Pelican (from Nemo).

To sum it up, sonny eats anything that looks homemade. Like dal, rice, sabzi, chappatis, rotis, parathas, well, you get the picture.

I guess there are advantages of having a vegetarian non-junkie child at home. He makes sure we only go to healthy restaurants J.

Some useful links for mothers grappling with vegetarian babies :

Infancy first-foods:

 http://www.babycenter.in/baby/startingsolids/vegetarianbaby/

For children aged 1 to 5:

http://www.vegsoc.org/info/childre1.html