Try new foods dinner

The tofu was in the fridge courtesy of the Dirty Jobs episode where my kids got to watch Mike Rowe make tofu. They all declared a burning desire to taste this amazing-looking food. So we bought some at the store, but since Howard and I have actually eaten tofu before, it sat untouched in the fridge. The caramel cheese was in the fridge because Howard sometimes buys new foods on a whim. It isn’t actually called caramel cheese, but that is exactly how it tastes. The real name of this food was lost with the original packaging. The block was sitting in a ziploc bag in the fridge for weeks. The edamame were in the fridge because Howard went out to eat with his brother and brought them home.

Then I went grocery shopping and discovered that the fridge is too full. This is how we came to serve tofu, caramel cheese, and edamame for dinner. We declared it a special “try new foods” dinner because putting the right spin on this kind of effort has a major effect on how the kids react. Their willingness to participate was also also affected by the fact that we offered bacon to any child who at least sampled all the new foods. In the end tofu got four thumbs down. The caramel cheese got two thumbs up and two thumbs quite emphatically down. The edamame got a grudging pass from three of the kids and an enthusiastic thumbs up from Patch who loves veggies. They all loved the bacon.

As experiments go, it was a positive one. Of course I’ll need to make sure that snack is hearty since not a one of them ate enough food at dinner to last all night.