Rainbows in the Kitchen
What’s for breakfast, lunch and dinner at your house?
Are you spending more time in the kitchen at the moment?
Are your kids helping?
Need some new food ideas, or to be re-inspired by old ones?
You could have a play with rainbow food. It can be an easily-accessible way to shop, prepare and eat a wide variety of healthy food.
Shopping a rainbow
Start with the shopping part - actually look for different colours to add to your basket or trolley. It’s not only pretty, but healthy too.
Pick something new
Ask your child/ren what they would like to try. (this might be tricky at the moment, during COVID-19 restrictions as you may be leaving your kids at home to shop, so they don’t touch everything!)
Pancakes for breakfast can be made colourful with berries and herbs
Meal time Rainbows
Have a look at your platter or plate or meal. Can you add any more colours?
For little ones learning colours, go through what they know, or speak the colours as you go.
When they’re confident with their colours, ask them which colour is missing from the meal
When they choose a colour, ask them which fruit or vegetable you could add for that colour.
Rainbow Food Art Project
Sometimes the eating aspect of the food is just too overwhelming. For kids who are reluctant healthy-eaters or for families where eating lots of different vegetables is a newer experience, feeling pressure to eat all these new things can get in the way of a fun time! If this is the case in your family, then start where you are. Getting to a healthier place will take time. Along the way, it’s important to play around and find your own measure of success.
A safe way to start with rainbow food is to view it as an art project instead of a meal.
Make faces with the food
Make a rainbow on a clean bench and leave it there for a bit of time. The kids might come and try things when they’re hungry, if they don’t feel pressure to do so.
Start in the garden, plant some seeds or some seedlings. Pick a rainbow variety of herbs/vegetables, edible flowers and fruit to plant.
As always, have fun, play around and be sure take some cool photos of your adventures.
