Spaghetti and Meatballs & Kid-Friendly Food

What is your definition of kid-friendly food? This may seemingly seem like an easy question but the answer is more complicated than you may think. When it comes to the politics of food the issue of kid-friendly food can be a loaded question with parents on all sides of the spectrum. For some parents preparing meals for kids has become a dumb-downed process catering to children's palates, which is heavily influenced by fast food chains and marketing campaigns for pre-packaged meals on television. For others, it means more of a simplified approach to food preparation such as plain pasta with butter, grilled chicken with rice, or rearranging the way food is plated to look more appealing and appetizing. In my own family, my daughters are greatly influenced by what their peers are eating and not eating. This has been both positive and negative. My older daughter wouldn't eat hummus until she discovered her best friend loved hummus. On the downside, my daughters are always asking me to buy gummy fruit snacks for their lunches because everyone else has them. 

When it comes to those charming character-molded gummy snacks, we decided last year we would no longer bring them into our home. Peer pressure is just one channel of influence. When our family dines out, the concept of kid-friendly food is reinforced by the children's menus. I've noticed kids' menus in most restaurants are all suspiciously similar: deep-fried chicken strips, cheeseburgers, corn dogs, mac and cheese, PB & J, and cheese or pepperoni pizza.  No wonder kids prefer these same dishes when eating at home. Because my kids love eating all of the above-mentioned foods, it has become an ongoing battle between what they would like to eat at home and what I actually serve. The battle isn't the food themselves, it comes from my kids only wanting to eat these types of food. I end up being the bad parent for not being a short-order cook and caving in to their requests. My sister has a saying that I implemented in our home, "You get what you get and you don't throw a fit."

When I asked for a definition of kid-friendly food on Savory Sweet Life's Facebook page, I loved this answer from Jill Harris Springer, "Anything you can get your kids to eat willingly." I invite you to share your thoughts in the comment section below to discuss this because I, as a parent, would love to know. Here's a recipe for one of our favorite kid-friendly meals we eat on a regular basis.  Enjoy!