Can a good workout cure a picky eater?

Coconut shrimp

My kid eats…shrimp! Finally. Do your kids ever fall in and out of love with certain foods? That’s how it’s been with my youngest. She used to be a shrimp fiend. Then, notta. Wouldn’t even take a bite, and that’s a no-no around our house. I’m not sure when she stopped liking shrimp but I wasn’t about to let her give up on this fast-cooking seafood marvel that I serve about once a week.

Among picky eater experts there’s a saying that it can take over 10 tries to introduce your child to a new food. But there’s nothing about how many tries it takes to re-introduce a food to a child who has decided she doesn’t like it.

And that’s where I got creative: yes, I’ve continued to make shrimp. Here’s some of our favorites:

• Shrimp ‘po boys
• Shrimp spaghetti
• Shrimp tacos

But just having shrimp on the table didn’t guarantee that my normally not-to-finicky eater would take a bite. Enter basketball camp. Five hours of it. My youngest came home exhausted, and hungry. I made a dish I didn’t figure she would like, but it’s one I’ve been craving, shrimp etouffe (I would pass along my recipe but it’s different every time). It’s spicy, packed with peppers and onions and I thought my kiddo would fill up on the wild rice and corn. Nope. She polished off her shrimp then asked for seconds, and thirds (I’d only given her three to start). By the end of the meal, my hungry kiddo was a shrimp eater. It might not work all the time, but if you have a once-adventurous eater that’s nudging toward pickiness you might take her outside for a nice long workout then inside for a good meal.