Negotiating Dessert with the Kids

The holiday season seems to burst with sugary treats. It is pure heaven for our kids, but can often lead to stress for us, as parents. Lots of my friends struggle with the issue of dessert – if to give it, and how often. Does this sound familiar: “How much more do I have to eat before I can have dessert?” If so, you are not alone. In fact, we started hearing this so often at our table that we decided to stop serving dessert every night. Dessert was becoming such a powerful incentive to eat their “growing food” that our kids were no longer listening to their bodies. Instead of considering how full they were, they were completely focused on the prize at the end. Now, we only offer dessert randomly, as an unexpected treat or as part of an afterschool snack.

The holiday season seems to burst with sugary treats. It is pure heaven for our kids, but can often lead to stress for us, as parents. Lots of my friends struggle with the issue of dessert – if to give it, and how often. Does this sound familiar: “How much more do I have to eat before I can have dessert?” If so, you are not alone. In fact, we started hearing this so often at our table that we decided to stop serving dessert every night. Dessert was becoming such a powerful incentive to eat their “growing food” that our kids were no longer listening to their bodies. Instead of considering how full they were, they were completely focused on the prize at the end. Now, we only offer dessert randomly, as an unexpected treat or as part of an afterschool snack.

Continue reading for a few things to consider when entering into Dessert Negotiations with your children…

Michelle Stern, DooF’s Community Outreach Director, owns What’s Cooking, a certified green company that offers cooking classes for children in the San Francisco Bay Area. When she isn’t in the kitchen or at the computer, she’s the head chauffeur for her two children, dog walker to her two mutts, and chicken feeder for her backyard flock.