When I first heard about the new book French Kids Eat Everything, I rolled my eyes. Yet another book about how French children eat better, sleep better, perform better, are better behaved… But I decided to read it anyway, desperate to get my sons (ages 2 and 5 years) to eat better.
Author Karen Le Billon details the culture shock she and her daughters faced after they moved to her husband’s family village in France for a year. One of the biggest adjustments: learning to eat the French way. It seems that the French take their food very seriously and, as a result, their kids eat healthier, have better table manners, and actually enjoy mealtimes.
The tips found throughout the book are cost-effective and easy. So simple, in fact, you might say, “Why didn’t I think of this myself?!” My personal favorite is No short-order cooking! In other words, the kids must eat what the adults eat. I grew up watching my mom make three separate dinners each night for me and my sisters and so I’ve been careful to avoid this as much as I can. Still, it’s a tempting rule to break when you so desperately want your child to eat something—anything—without an ensuing battle.
I was fortunate to garner an interview with Le Billon so that I could find out, first-hand, how to get my kids to say Oui-Oui to my homecooking.
bgr: You write that you were pretty set in your ways when it came to eating habits after your family first moved to France. What ultimately helped you to see that the French way was the right way for your family?
KLB: It was really spending time with other French families and with our relatives. When I saw how happily the kids ate a wide variety of foods, I was convinced!
bgr: You write about how your own eating habits left a lot to be desired before your family moved to France. How important is it for parents to set a good example when it comes to eating for their kids? I know some adults who won’t touch a vegetable, but expect their kids to eat them. Is it possible to enforce good eating habits without changing your own?
KLB: Scientific studies have repeatedly shown that the best way to encourage a child to eat something, or try a new food, is to have a parent or trusted caregiver eat the food in front of the child (with obvious pleasure)! As with so many aspects of parenting, kids “do what we do rather than what we say.”
bgr: How can parents in the U.S. cut down on snacking when there is so much emphasis placed on it in child care centers and schools?
KLB: Scheduling snack time is a great way to start. The French have three meals per day and one snack, usually around 4:30 p.m. just after the end of the school day. The French believe that waiting between mealtimes allows kids to build up an appetite and eat more of the healthy foods offered to them.
bgr: Last year, my son’s teacher loved to give the kids cookies at snack time. This bothered me, but I never said anything because I didn’t want to be seen as a “problem parent.” What is your advice for parents who are hesitant to say anything about the quality of their child’s snacks or school lunches?
KLB: In providing cookies or treats, people often feel that they are demonstrating love; food has many emotional associations. Suggesting changes in the daycare or school snack regime is a great idea, but I personally feel there’s nothing wrong with eating cookies! The French believe that “everything in moderation”—even cookies—is the best approach to healthy eating. So perhaps you can suggest that cookies be limited to once a week or one cookie per child to avoid reducing their appetite for dinner. French kids have fresh fruit four days a week, and a sweet treat the fifth day—something to look forward to.
bgr: Whenever your family returns to the U.S., is it hard not to revert back to the old way of eating, especially when those old habits are the standard here?
KLB: My kids no longer snack—or even ask for snacks—which is one of the most significant changes for our family. At mealtimes, we found it easier to retain the French approach to dinnertime and on weekends. At lunchtime, we’ve adapted he French approach to the reality of North American lunchrooms, which is often very rushed. So we’ve had to compromise a bit, but we’ve retained the core habits I believe to be most important.
bgr: Finally, if a reader could only follow one of your tips, which one do you think is the most important?
KLB: If they could only follow one tip, it would definitely be no random snacking. Once kids are eating proper meals—and not snacking in between—they are more likely to eat healthier foods served at mealtimes. And snacks are responsible for most of the high-calorie, low-nutrition foods that our kids are eating today.
When Le Billon’s oldest daughter started school in France, the family had to adjust to a new set of “food rules.” The hardest one was the lack of morning and afternoon snacks that preschoolers and many kindergartners are accustomed to in the U.S. “Snacking is forbidden at school—no vending machines, and no fast food either,” says Le Billon. The rule in France is, you eat your lunch and that’s it. And if you don’t like what’s served in the cantine, then you go hungry until you go home. “Children are hungrier at mealtimes, and tend to eat better,” explains Le Billon.
In addition to the no-snacking or scheduled-snacking rule, here are two more tips I found in Le Billon’s book that will be must-follows for our family:
1. Avoid emotional eating (no food rewards, bribes). My husband and I are really guilty of this one. We use food to entice our kids to finish dinner (“One more bite of chicken and you can have dessert.”) and also as a form of punishment (“If you don’t listen to Mommy, you can’t have dessert tonight.”) According to Le Billon, “French parents, as a rule, don’t punish (or reward) with food, believing that this imbues food with emotional baggage—and that their children will, later on, attempt to deal with (or bury) their emotions through eating.”
2. Eat family meals together with no distractions. “Parents wouldn’t dream of putting their kids in activities during the dinner hour (9 out of 10 French families eat a sit-down dinner together every night),” she says. Make dinnertime an important time of the day to sit together, talk together, and learn about each other’s day. Don’t rush the meal, encourage your children to eat healthy by enjoying the healthy food options on your plate, and try not to talk about “what’s for dessert.” But if you do offer dessert at the end of a good meal, don’t be scared of the cookie jar—as Le Billon says, “there’s nothing wrong with a cookie”—once in a while.