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The Most Important Food Rule of All
Voici mon petit jardin!
(Here is my little garden!)
Adult holds child’s hand, palm up
J’y ai semé des graines
(Here I sowed my seeds)
Taps index finger in child’s palm
Je les recouvre de terre noire
(I cover them with soil)
Closes child’s hand
Voici la bonne et douce pluie!
(Here is the gentle rain!)
Gently taps child’s hand with fingers
Le soleil brille dans le ciel!
(The sun shines in the sky!)
Makes a large, sweeping gesture
Et voici une, deux, trois,
(And here are one, two, three,)
Unfolds child’s fingers one by one
quatre, cinq petites fleurs!
(four, five little flowers!)
—Traditional French nursery rhyme
So, what have been the results of our ongoing experiment with French food education?
Sophie is now seven, and Claire is nearly four. Tonight’s dinner was sole, quinoa, and steamed broccoli, followed by mousse au chocolat. They ate it all, happily. The girls now eat a whole host of things they wouldn’t touch a few years ago, from grapefruit to granola, tofu to tomatoes. Sophie will even eat cauliflower (although we’re still working on Claire). The other day, a neighbor brought over a handful of sweet pea pods from her garden. Claire’s face lit up when she tasted them. “They taste as good as chocolate!” she said wonderingly. (No, I am not making this up.)
My daughters have remained more open-minded about food than I had ever expected, given where we were before we moved to France. In fact, we’ve passed the ultimate hurdle: I’m no longer anxious about bringing our girls to a restaurant with their French relatives.
This has attracted some interest from friends of ours, like the parents of three-year-old Theo, who were worried by his refusal to eat vegetables. After a conversation about the French approach, they tried cutting out his late-afternoon snack, and serving a small bowl of carrot soup as the first course at dinner, which resulted in… Theo loving carrot soup. He’s now on to spinach soup. Eureka!
As for our family, we’re managing to observe most of the food rules, most of the time. The most important rule of all is the one about eating together—every day, at least once a day. In the midst of our hectic schedules, our family meal is a haven. We tell stories about our respective days, talk about the future, ask each other questions, wonder out loud. Eating together has allowed us to have conversations we might never otherwise have had. It has helped us to be a happier family.
Most of what we eat is real food. Preparing it takes more time. But I have my personal shortcuts: frozen homemade soups, and the quick versions of French dishes that I learned in France. To my great satisfaction, I can now whip up a delicious quiche in less than five minutes. This is our family’s version of “fast food.” As this suggests, I still haven’t completely managed the “slow food” thing. I still sometimes succumb to the urge to cook as quickly as I can. But I am eating more slowly. I can usually sit through an entire meal (although my husband still sometimes needs to remind me to sit still). I’ve even found a new favorite restaurant: just down the street is a tiny hole-in-the-wall oasis called the Dharma Kitchen, which “serves the food of mindfulness” (a motto that would have had me steering well clear before our year in France, but that now has me hooked).
Our family has also, more or less, succeeded in removing emotional attachments from food. I no longer use food as a toy, a pacifier, a bribe, a punishment, or a reward (although I admit, from time to time, to using it as a distraction. But only if I really, really need to). We rarely get into power struggles about food with our children. Eating healthily has become part of our routine, just like brushing our teeth. Like the French parents I met, I try to be nonchalant but cheerful about the food I serve my children. I don’t hover. I don’t prepare special meals. I never substitute. I still coax, but I give it only a few tries. If either Sophie or Claire refuses to eat, I simply remove the food without too much fuss. But I rarely have to do this anymore.
We have also settled into a routine of four square meals per day. Sophie and Claire have accepted that they have to wait for dinner even if they feel a little hungry. And they are usually calm about waiting because they know dinner will be satisfying when it is time to eat. I admire how patient they have become. There is, however, one (big) exception. Because we’ve found it impossible (and, from a child’s point of view, highly unfair) to prevent the girls from snacking at school and day care, we still let them snack like other children during the week. But we don’t snack outside of mealtimes on the weekends. In fact, the kids don’t ask, except for the inevitable Halloween, Easter, and Christmas candy frenzy. I’m not happy about it, but I tell them that they will eventually outgrow it (and I think they believe me).
What do they snack on? Despite our periodic lessons in terroir, the girls have remained predictably focused on the prepackaged, tasty treats that North American society serves up. So we have struck a balancing act. Mostly they go to school with fruits and vegetables for snacks, but once in a while I pop some chocolate-covered Petit Lu cookies into their lunch bags. We’ve restricted fast food to “days that start with F,” but once in a while we have girls-only pizza pajama parties (Philippe, who can cope with only so much girl power, gets a night off).
