Vegetables Can Be Fun!

By: Amy E
Update: Congrats to winner Sarah who won the Rachel Ray Casserole Dish!

Cape Cod Mommies was invited to attend the "Day of Play" event which we told you about, hosted by Birds Eye, Stop & Shop and the Boston Children's Museum.  Birds Eye event sent us creative recipes for including vegetables in our meals as well as some fun Fred & Friends  plates and even vegetables packed in dry ice (I also now know how to properly dispose of dry ice!)!!!  They also sent us a Rachael Ray casserole dish and extra goodies to be used for a giveaway for our readers and fans!

Birds Eye also featured a local registered dietitian, Janel Funk, MS RD LDN, who spoke with attendees.  Janel is the college dietitian for The Boston Conservatory and a consultant for Berklee College of Music  Unfortunately for me I missed this portion of the event due to the awful traffic traveling to Boston that day.

I was able to speak with Janel a few days later via phone conference and get her nutrition philosophy and take on the event.

"My tagline is: helping you eat better one bite at a time because small changes can turn into big results."  She loved the Birds Eye event because it was "helping parents make small changes that can lead to life altering results." 

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I have finally started to show some signs of improvement, much to the glee of the Tiny One.  I find it easier to create the outline of the face using the carb portion of our meal and then create the face on top of it. (Check out our Mac & Cheese Veggie Version for a great recipe to use as the base) 

We use these plates all the time now, even for snacks!

It will take some serious practicing to do some of these faces or to create my own. Although with Halloween coming my faces may be more up to par.

We experimented using the neat plates they sent us.  The Tiny One's favorite seems to be the one that has blue hair.  You would think the world would end if I gave him the girl one ;)

I am not an artist so it definitely took me some time to figure out how to create faces on plates out of the meals we were having.  The Tiny One loved them all and happily decreed "Mama you are soooo funny!"  I'll take it.

I was also thrilled with the colorful and creative cards with ideas for recipes.  Honestly I think my favorite was the smoothie! I didn't realize that a combination of broccoli, cauliflower and carrots would be so good but it was! Janel also loved the idea of the vegetable smoothie!  Note to self-I should make one of these at least once a week! Below I have included the cards with recipes for you!   

Before you brainstorm some of those rules though, let me share with you our thoughts and experiences with the "Day of Play" and some of the fun things did!

The event was definitely a great idea and a fun way to get people, kids especially, excited about vegetables. I was impressed by the creative way Birds Eye engaged the audience with their displays.  All were interactive which is so important for kids as they learn by actually doing.  Dora was even on hand to show her support for the veggies!

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The displays at the event were broken up into three parts: a Sampling section (where of course I hung out and sampled everything); the Make a Veggie Face section, where they turned your creation into a button you could take home; and a stationary bike station, where kids could pick their favorite veggie and race! Check out one of the races!

While the Tiny One refused to sample anything, he was very happy with both the bike and face making stations.  Since the bikes were a little small, Mom had to lend a hand and help with the pedals.  While we didn't win any races, we did make it a point to check out all 4 veggie mobiles!

Once we were done with the racing, we checked out the plate table.  There were all kinds of just cooked veggies for the kids to decorate with.  While most of the other children were busy making happy and silly faces, my Tiny One, in typical demanding toddler fashion decided he wanted a "mad face".  He was quite proud that with a little assistant he got exactly what he wanted, which was then quickly turned into a button that is still hanging out in his special treasure box!

The samples were quite tasty especially after a long car ride.  I was famished and quickly sampled everything.  I appreciate the time saving measures that Birds Eye has taken in preparing easy meals.  This is definitely a plus for busy families.  While I am not a huge fan of ready made meals due to the usually high content of sodium that goes into them, I think these would still be great to use when you need it.  I definitely love the individual prepared vegetable bags, especially the broccoli.  Broccoli is a huge part of our diet and we try to have it multiple times a week! 

Overall I think this event was such a creative and great way to get kids excited about vegetables.  Most people do not get nearly enough vegetables into their daily diet, so to see companies trying to make it fun especially for kids was great!  I only wish that next time they do the event down here locally in our community so that more of you could attend!

To help encourage more fun with vegetables, we are hosting a giveaway sponsored by Birds Eye.

One lucky winner will receive this Rachael Ray Casserole Dish with some surprises included!  It would be perfect for the holidays coming up soon!

How to Enter:
Simply leave a comment on this blog post below telling us how you make veggies fun for your family.

Bonus Entry: Make a meaningful comment on ANY other blog post on our blog but you MUST come back and let us know which post you chose to comment on.

Rules: Giveaway opens on Sept. 18, 2013 and Ends on October 2, 2013 at 11:59pm.  Any entries received after that time will be considered void.  Winner must be a US residents 18+.  Winner will be contacted via the email provided.  If winner does not respond to the notification within 48 hours, a new winner will be chosen.  Due to the size of the prize, winner is responsible for pickup of the prize which is located in Falmouth, MA.

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