How to Combat Fussy Eaters with Hello Fresh

Did you know that 45 percent of parents make more than one evening meal to appease fussy eaters?

Hello Fresh UK ran a survey of 2,000 parents of kids aged 4 – 16 years and found that 3 in 5 consider their child to be a fussy eater. Fussy kids will refuse to eat two meals a week, while two more are thrown away practically untouched. And 60 per cent long for the day when they can cook one meal which everyone in the family is happy to eat.

Here’s what they found:

• When it comes to the foods parents find most difficult to get their kids to eat, mushrooms, leeks, onions and cauliflower prove the hardest to slip into their meals.

• A third think their child would turn their nose up at anything spicy

• One in four believe their child is resistant to anything on their plate which is green.

• One in six kids refuse to eat bread unless the crusts have been cut off

• 16 per cent demand their food is separated on the plate so each element doesn’t touch.

• Picking out ingredients that kids don’t like is a common occurrence with one in five kids doing this on a regular basis.

• Three in ten kids will send a meal back to their parent if it looks a bit burnt.

How to get the Kids to try New Foods.

Andre Dupin, Head Chef at HelloFresh UK, which commissioned the study, said:

“Creating a meal that everyone will enjoy is really important to parents. “From our study we see that parents are spending hours making multiple meals in order to feed the whole family and are still met with resistance from fussy eaters.”

To get to the bottom of why we (and especially children) have different taste preferences, Hello Fresh have been working with Flavour Expert and Food Scientist, Dr Rachel Edwards-Stuart, who consulted who was able to shed some light that so many parents face everyday:

“How we perceive flavour involves all of the five senses, and taste, look, texture, smell and even the sound food makes when eating it can all affect whether or not we like a certain food. But our food likes and dislikes are also influenced by many other factors, many of which relate to the environment in which we live and grew up in.”

Top 20 foods that fussy eaters dislike were:

1. Mushrooms

2. Marmite

3. Leeks

4. Onions

5. Cauliflower

6. Pesto

7. Peppers

8. Tomatoes

9. Peanut butter

10. Broccoli

11. Lettuce

12. Lamb

13. Pork mince

14. Fish

15. Eggs

16. Peaches

17. Cucumber

18. Beef mince

19. Beef

20. Sandwich meat such as ham

So how can we change this?

Dr Rachel Edwards-Stuart added: “Getting children involved in meal selection and helping in the kitchen so they have a positive and creative association with food is a beneficial way to counteract fussy eating and create good eating habits.”

Andre Dupin, added: “Dinner time should be an opportunity to expand our kids’ food horizons, helping them to discover new foods they love, rather than feeding them the same meals night in, night out. We listen to both parents and kids who use HelloFresh to understand what the whole family want from their evening meal and develop recipes that both adults and kids enjoy so everyone can share and enjoy the one meal.”

Hello Fresh’s family-friendly recipes have big sticky thumbs up from little food experts and are guaranteed dinner-winners for the whole family. Why not try Hello Fresh for yourself?
Save up to £15 off your first THREE boxes with our LittleBird offer and make family dinners stress free. One recipe that everyone can enjoy? Dinner is solved.