Do Kids Avoid Eating Dinner if They Know a Bedtime Snack Is Coming?
Bedtime snacks can help keep kids feeling full and satisfied until morning, but they can also keep some children from feeling motivated to eat their evening meal. Ellyn Satter, a registered dietitian and therapist, notes that parents are responsible only for offering healthy food at regular intervals and that parents should not force children to eat what the parents offer. Instead, the parents should trust the children to know their own bodies. As such, if you'd like to offer a bedtime snack but still want your children to eat their dinner, you must plan your meals and snacks wisely.
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Snack Choice
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If you are concerned about the promise of a bedtime snack luring away your children from dinner, offer nutritious snacks that the children enjoy but that are not their favorite food. Bedtime snacks should not include ice cream, cookies, or other sweets. Satter recommends snacks that include protein, carbohydrates and fats, such as nuts or nut butter, yogurt, cheese or hummus. Offer fruit on the side for a sweet, if desired, or blend a quick smoothie of yogurt and fruit, and hide some spinach inside to make up for any veggies they missed during dinner.
Snack Schedule
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Take some of the mystique out of bedtime snacks by planning to have a bedtime snack every day. Children will be less likely to leave food on their plates and then beg for snacks if they know that a bedtime snack is part of their routine. Schedule the snack, but insist that the kids sit at the table to eat the snack. If you allow the children to munch during story time or even in their rooms, they may be more likely to skip dinner just for the fun of having a snack outside of the dining room.
Meal Choice
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You are not a short-order cook and your kids shouldn̵7;t treat you like one, but you should try to make sure that you offer at least one food at dinnertime that your children enjoy, if you expect them to eat. Satter recommends keeping mealtimes pleasant, but continue to offer new foods and less favored foods, along with their favorites, so that kids can learn to eat a variety. Ask your children for input about meals, or even allow them to take turns planning the meals. Take them grocery shopping with you and include them in the food prep. Even young children can help with smaller mealtime prep tasks. Keep the bedtime snack less appealing than the evening meal by choosing meals that your children actually enjoy eating.
Meal Schedule
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If your children know a bedtime snack is coming very soon after dinner, they may be willing to stave off hunger pangs until it arrives while leaving their dinner untouched. However, if you are able to schedule a meal earlier in the evening so that they know the snack will not be arriving quickly, they are more likely to eat their dinner even if they know a bedtime snack is coming later. Work and school schedules and extracurricular activities can make evenings rushed already, making it difficult to spread out dinner and snacks enough. If this is the case for your family, consider dinner and the snack part of one larger meal except that you serve it in two parts, making it especially important for your child to choose your snack with health in mind.
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