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Can a video game featuring a water hose to scare away critters and a truck driving around obstacles to get to market (your typical shooting and dodging video game) actually encourage a child to eat veggies? Well, no probably not, but it intrigued me because ranch drip is the one thing that actually does encourage my youngest son.
Hidden Valley says that the game is based on a study that showed that kids "consumed more vegetables when paired with a moderate amount of ranch dressing." Personally, I believe them, although I would change the phrase to kids consumed more vegetables when drowned in gallons of ranch dressing. At least that's how it works in our house.
My theory of the moment is that having our own garden will help my kids learn to eat their veggies. The garden is not exactly thriving--I'm learning it really is all about location--but my kids have chomped on fresh basil, lettuce, cherries, and a day lily in the past few days. The last one was prompted by a gardener who told them that particular flower was edible. (Don't take my word for it though as some lilies are poisonous. If you want more info, here's an edible flower list to check out.)
The funny thing was that the carrot had so much yummy flavor compared to the typical store-bought carrots that they really noticed the taste difference. One of my kids loved it, while the other wasn't so sure, but I still view it as progress. Besides, he's the one that usually drowns his veggies in ranch dip!
By the way, Stephen and I played the video game together. He'll still probably pick Webkinz over Hidden Valley next time he's on the computer, but he did manage to grow 43 veggies in a minute. I played the next level and managed to spill 27 of those veggies out of the truck, but ah well, I never claimed to be a gamer.
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