My child, the science experiment

I've been using my 13 month old as a way to better understand our natural proclivities towards food and diet and I'm not ashamed to admit it

Everyone makes assumptions don’t they? I know they famously ‘make an ass of you and me’ but without them we simply wouldn’t be able to function. One of mine is that I have always have had a fundamental commitment to the idea that society teaches us to dislike greens. Or vegetables more generally I suppose. I have never understood why kids say ‘eww’ to sweetcorn but happily munch on a Mars bar.

I have this theory that it’s all to do with schooling. That kids in early educational settings just want to fit in with their mates and not have their food described as eww so they end up preferring the lowest common denominator of food types. They learn that vegetables are disgusting because their friends show them and they learn that highly packaged commercial sweets are their preference because that’s what their friends eat.*

So with Flo I decided to wipe the slate clean. He’s not at nursery yet so he’s at the mercy of my choices as regards food. I planned to give him every food on an equal footing and not treat some foods as a treat or whatever. I reckoned that this, alongside avoiding refined sugar for the first two years in line with WHO advice would give him the best chance of avoiding all the chronics, complexes and compulsions almost all of us face to a greater or lesser extent. Ok, so my second rule immediately beaks my first but I figure that since refined sugar presents no nutritional quality whatsoever but is addictive, the other options need a leg up.

Unfortunately, he does seem to be developing tendencies broadly in line with a child who would live on McDonald’s chicken nuggets were he allowed. From around two weeks after he started weaning at 6 months, he could identify and zero in on the protein on his plate at a distance of 200 metres. I don’t know how, since a piece of mackerel looks nothing like a sausage but he does seem to do it. He also has a habit of delicately picking up each leaf of lovingly grown salad and depositing it off the side of his highchair. Mushrooms received a waft onto the floor and even a boiled egg, my spirit food, can invite a haughty stare.

I am of course being completely unfair when I call i’m a McDonald’s baby. We all have our preferences for taste and he broadly munches through everything on his tray. But it’s interesting to note that even without any external encouragement, meat is favourite and vegetables make up a sorry second.

What he has started to be able to deal with much better than both Matt and I is distinctive flavours. Offal is one of his favourite foods, he’ll happily put away a pickled something or other and although ferments aren’t always his fave he won’t say no. He doesn’t seem to be learning to dislike things based on what those around him consider to be disgusting.

I really think it can only be peer pressure that causes kids to make these decisions. Peas are just as sweet as candy but cleaner on the palette. Aubergines present a pleasing mushiness without being quite as cloying as a bar of chocolate. King prawns offer a mineral tang which reminds me of a sherbet infused fizzy drink without gouging saccharin craters in my tongue. Yet it is generally accepted that children don’t see this. And as a result as I’ve grown into adulthood I’ve been astounded by how many of the grown ups around me are just going through the motions of enjoying fresh produce in order to come across in a certain way. It just feels like many people are blinkered by food ‘types’ and find comfort in eating only the most familiar items.

For me, food should be seen primarily as fuel. Sure, its greater heights can be escalated in the name of feast and ritual but on a day to day basis it should be more about giving your body what it needs to thrive throughout the day. This is actually quite far from my own understanding of food (believe it or not given the preceding paragraph) but surely I’m supposed to be bringing my baby up to be stronger, cleverer and happier than me. Push the boundaries of the ideal life, not just tread the boards I have stamped upon. For me, food comes before form at all times. I crave it, eulogise it and define experience around it. It brings me great joy as a result but also means I don’t always make the best decisions. I think that fetishisation which I equally see in others results in an unhappy dependancy which is ultimately harmful to health.

Flo is still only 13 months and the picky years are supposed to hit at 2 so we shall see. I only hope his salad scattering remains the height of his aversion to food.

*I am of course ignoring the elephant in the room in all of this. The advertising industry.