NUTRITION ||| "My 2-year-old dislikes fruits and vegetables, but I want her to get these important nutrients. How can I help her develop her taste for them?"

[Question] ||| "My 2-year-old dislikes fruits and vegetables, but I want her to get these important nutrients. How can I help her develop her taste for them?"

[Answer] ||| "Only two percent of all children eat the recommended number of servings from all of the food groups. It is common for children to have strong food preferences so it can be a challenge -- just don't make it a battle.

Here are ten practical tips:

1. Relax. Having a positive, low-key attitude about eating makes meal time more pleasant, and therefore feeding, more successful.
2. Follow the leader. Make family meals a high priority and be a great role model by serving and eating a variety of fruits and veggies.
3. Don't be a short order cook. Fix one balanced meal for everyone in the family. Remember, it is your responsibility to decide what you will offer but it is up to them whether they will eat it.
4. Make it fun. When my kids were small, we played "Guess the Color." They closed their eyes and tried to guess the color of the food I put in their mouth. They were having too much fun to realize that the most colorful foods happen to be vegetables.
5. Serve the vegetables first. They are more likely to eat them when they are hungry.
6. Don't bribe or reward children for eating certain foods. They quickly realize that those foods must be yucky if you have to bribe them to eat them. They also learn to hold out until the reward is offered.
7. Involve your child in shopping for, preparing and serving food. They are more likely to eat it because they participated in the process. At two, my son's job was to tear up the lettuce and drop it in the bowl. The first time he helped, we made the mistake of telling him to tear it into "bite-sized pieces." You guessed it...he bit off pieces of the lettuce and spit them into the bowl!
8. Be creative. Add carrots to spaghetti sauce, spinach to meat loaf, tomatoes to toasted cheese and bananas to peanut butter sandwiches. Keep fresh fruit and cut up vegetables handy for snack time and offer fruit based desserts.
9. Easy on the juice and "fruit drinks." They don't pack much of a nutritional punch and may just add unnecessary sugar to your child's diet.
10.  Don't give up! It can take up to ten exposures to a particular food before a child will accept it. Maybe she doesn't like steamed broccoli and cauliflower but will have fun dipping fresh "trees and clouds" into a little ranch dressing."

[ABOUT THE EXPERT] ||| Dr. Michelle May, M.D.

Michelle May, M.D. is the founder of the award-winning Am I Hungry? Mindful Eating Workshops (www.AmIHungry.com) and the author of about Eat What You Love, Love What You Eat: How to Break Your Eat-Repent-Repeat Cycle.

ADDRESS: P.O. Box 93686
                  Phoenix, Ariz. 85070
E-MAIL: info@AmIHungry.com
LOCAL PHONE: (480) 704-7811
ONLINE: http://www.amihungry.com or http://michellemaymd.com

• Click here to sign up for Dr. May's Am I Hungry?® E-newsletter!

[NOTE] ||| The Ahwatukee Foothills News and ahwatukee.com present "Ask the Ahwatukee Area Expert" as a promotional featured intended to serve both our readers and our loyal network of advertisers, through the assistance of the local business community. "Answers" and other information presented by the "experts" are those of the contributor, and do not represent the views or opinions of the Ahwatukee Foothills News (inlcuding ahwatukee.com) or its editorial staff.