2025, Family, Food, Gatherings, Kids, Uncategorized

Positive Peer Pressure

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The Baby Sprinkle held at our Son and Dil’s home on Saturday was a lot of fun. It was attended by us, Dil’s mother, and six couples and their children, the couples being family friends. Their children are all the same age, between Grades 1 and 4. .

The women spent the Sprinkle coloring funny pictures on diapers and onesies, while the guys were in the downstairs playing a new, baby-oriented Dungeons and Dragons game Son had developed. Many of the families have children who attend the same Boys and Girls Club daycare as our grandson.

It was really funny to hear the moms talk about their amazement at the vegetables their children eat at Club and not at home. The children have been coming home asking for “those crescent-moon shaped green beans” (lima beans) and the little cabbages (Brussels Sprouts) that they get at Club. Grandson declares he loves romaine lettuce as long as it has French dressing on it. He is a very picky eater, and the lettuce is a real surprise. He has never eaten lettuce at home prior to this.

These kids are eating vegetables because they see their friends eating vegetables! How wonderful! No amount of parental pressure could accomplish this at home.

What were your favorite and least favorite vegetables as a child? How were you positively influenced by your peers? Ever play Dungeons and Dragons?

33 thoughts on “Positive Peer Pressure”

  1. I detested chewy, over-coooked meats like pork chops or steak. I also hated watery, cooked spinach and limp, over-cooked asparagus. Now that I cook for myself I leave out the red meats, and I can cook the veggies the way I want to or not at all, and they’re among my favorites.

    If peer pressure had any impact on me at all, I would have refused everything but peanut butter and jelly on Wonder bread with the crusts torn off. I wasn’t allowed the luxury of wanting what others had, though. I had to eat my lunch and not complain. There were frequently sandwiches with processed luncheon meat and thick Velveeta cheese. I really didn’t like these at all. I couldn’t swallow it without a lot of milk to wash it down. I often removed the luncheon meat. It disgusted me, and that hasn’t changed.

    I’ve never played Dungeons and Dragons. I’ve been curious though. It seems to be the origin of many similar role playing games.

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  2. I didn’t eat a wide variety vegetables as a child because my mother‘s never served a wide variety of vegetables as a child. Almost any vegetable eaten at our house came out of a can. Lima beans out of a can and served soloare nasty. The rule at our house was that you had to eat everything on your plate, but if it was something that was known to be hateful to you, you only had to have a spoonful of it. Even in a spoonful, the only way I could swallow canned lima beans as a kid was covered in ketchup. The beans. Not me.

    No problem with peas and carrots out of a can. Those were probably my favorites. Or creamed corn. I still do still occasionally purchase a can of peas and carrots.

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  3. No D&D for me. I do have some friends who are really into it, including one girlfriend who plays every Thursday night, no matter what. The learning curve is just too steep of an on-ramp for me.

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  4. I have a vivid memory of standing along side the kitchen table. barely able to see over it, and making a vow that I would never eat cooked carrots again. I was really young, perhaps 4.

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  5. Rise and Shine, Baboons,

    No DnD here, but my son played it for years. I will also tell you that as a therapist, I heard many stories of people violating the DnD group norms with various boorish behaviors. As a social activity those groups bred all kinds of conflict. (Not washing hands after going to the bathroom, grabbing game pieces, showing up late, not calling in for an absence. They were all things.)

    I loved fresh garden vegetables as a child. Carrots, kohlrabi, beets, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, peas, and green beans were all things I enjoyed eating. If they were fresh out of the garden, pulled by me, and if they had a little dirt on them, they were even better. I still enjoy most of those items if they are cooked well or served raw. We also canned veggies for the winter, especially green beans which we then cooked with bacon which I still love. We froze bushels of corn, as well. The sugar content of corn is so high that it is dangerous to can it because the jars would explode due to fermentation.

    I don’t remember peers influencing my food choices as a young child unless we were at Grandma’s house for a holiday. Then the competition for the good treats (flat bread, tapioca salad, gravy, pie) was intense.

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  6. Sister and I would take carrots and turnips from the garden and wash them at the pump. The skin of the turnips we would peel back but not off and pretend they were ice cream cones. We would sit outside and eat them. That was odd for me. I would eat raw carrots, creamed peas. Potatoes of coarse. But that was it. I would force down regular peas or green beans in all their forms but never beets. Rutabaga made me gag. It was a constant battle for my mother.
    I was on the whole immune to peer pressure. Is it peer pressure if one friend talks you into good things? Friend Annie would do that.
    Clyde

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    2. Vegetables were limited by what the climate of the North Shore would grow with cultivars of the time. Cabbage grew very well. I would eat a wedge of it with salt on it. The rest of the family ate it cooked.
      My mother would buy tomatoes by the crate, stew, and can them. I would eat them raw but still can’t stand stewed. Most of the vegetables which are part of my daily diet were not on the table in my childhood. Lettuce for instance.

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      1. I cut it into slices about a half inch to an inch thick, slather it with olive oil and grill it hot until it’s scorched, then flip it and treat the other side the same. So good!

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  7. my mom was a wonderful person but not a wonderful cook. hamburgers, spaghetti, sloppy joes,fish sticks, salsibury steak, chicken in the oven, occasional odd balls like liver and onions, sukiyaki, ribs or meatloaf. corn with pepper, peas and side of potatos either mashed or baked at every meal along with bread and butter. if we got fancy it was usually from the side of the soup can. crean of mushroon made several unsuccessful attempts at entering or life. cream of anything else was doomed before it started. green beans asperagus that combo of corn carrots and beans that come out of the frozen food bag. all memories but not too often. chips and hot dogs and ketchup or peanut butter with raspberry jam and chips were every day lunches. we didnt need no stinkin vegetables.
    an occasional salad of icberg lettuce with a tomato was moms attempt at introducing healthy choices. chow mein, mac and cheese, tuna casserole frozen beef strogonoff. ahhh the boil in a bag masterpieces
    as i progressed into hippydom and quit meat the veggie cookbooks taught me enchiladas soups dutch ovens full of potatos rice onions and whatever else was around, although discovering veggies by throwing them into a stew quick before they turn bad may not be the perfect intro it worked

    lentils rice and veggies with a choice to go tomato or go cream or soy sauce began the experiments

    most recent was potato onion apple with garlic with a couple poached eggs and some quac. i had to grab all our veggies and fruit as we left the house. cookin at daughters apt with what we brought

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  8. D&D: did play it some. My son was a dedicated player starting in middle school. Still plays some. In the 80s I had about 20 kids who would play after school in my room. The assistant principal ordered me to stop because of all the nonsense that was around then about it. He insisted it was played by weirdos and mentally unstable kids. I told him to come up and see who was playing. They were among the smartest kids in school, many athletes, kids in band and choir, etc. He still ordered me to stop. I refused. He let it drop. I learned later he went to the principal, who told him to drop it.
    Clyde

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  9. I remember liking most of what was put in front of me. There was one time I didn’t want to eat the carrots, and having to sit there a while, and then my dad saying to eat them or I’d get the belt. (He never did hit me with the belt, but sometimes used it for “emphasis”.) I imagine I finally ate them, but really don’t remember. Also don’t recall what my friends ate for vegetables.

    I do remember the first time I had pizza, however, in a small restaurant in Storm Lake, IA – they called it Pizza Pie, so I was of course expecting dessert, and was not impressed.

    I do not remember playing D & D, but son Joel was pretty into it, and I read some of the cards…

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  10. How is a Baby Sprinkle distinct from a Baby Shower? I’ve never been to either one and am not familiar with the sprinkle designation.

    If none of the kids eat vegetables at home, where is the peer pressure to eat them at day care coming from? You would expect the pressure would be in the other direction.

    I don’t remember much detail about what I was served 65 to 75 years ago except I don’t remember refusing to eat any of it. Except for frozen corn and peas and corn on the cob, almost all the vegetables we ate came out of cans.The frozen corn and peas were reserved for company.

    Some canned vegetables were travesties, like canned asparagus. I didn’t think I liked asparagus until I had fresh once I left home. In the suburbs in the ’50s, people seldom had gardens other than a tomato plant or two. A neighbor who had five boys had a large garden and I got the impression they were considered throw-backs to another time and place by their neighbors.

    I’ve never played Dungeons and Dragons. I’m not am enthusiastic game player in general and D & D didn’t come along until I was well into my adulthood.

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      1. I think you mentioned this Sprinkle before. I commented then, and I will again, that the term brings me a mental image of a new father diapering his baby boy for the first time… sorry… I can’t help it!

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  11. My family always had a large garden. Most everybody we knew, did. I suppose, post-war rationing was a great motivator for being as self-sufficient as possible.

    First and foremost, we grew lots of potatoes; all the same kind. I wasn’t aware at the time that there were different kinds. Tomatoes, lettuces, radishes, carrots, peas, cucumbers, leeks, onions, Brussels sprouts, kale, parsnips, celeriac, rutabaga, horseradish, and white cabbage. My family didn’t grow green beans or spinach because mom didn’t like them, but they were common in most gardens. We also had a small patch of strawberries, a couple of rhubarb plants, and herbs such as parsley, chives, and mint. At the time – late forties through the fifties – such exotic vegetables as corn, eggplant, zucchini, celery, and broccoli were virtually unknown, at least to us. We did know cauliflower, but for some reason didn’t grow it ourselves.

    I was not a picky eater as a child, and we were expected to eat what was on our plate. I can recall only two things that I was served and really didn’t care for. Three if you count spoonfuls of cod liver oil, which I hated. Ugh! I didn’t care for blood sausage or cottage cheese, especially not if that’s all you’re served.

    I’ve never played D & D, and I have no idea what I’ve missed.

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      1. I think you’re right. I grew up with celeriac; it’s my favorite root vegetable. I was unfamiliar with the tall green stalks that most Americans think of as celery. I’m not sure why, but celeriac apparently doesn’t grow well here. I’ve seen it at farmer’s markets, introduced by Hmong farmers, and it’s usually pretty small and expensive. I’ll pick one up at the co-op whenever I spot a “good” one.

        Also, I had never encountered the green asparagus until I came here.

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  12. I never even knew broccoli and cauliflower existed till I was an adult, out in California… We had peas, corn, carrots, and green beans, occasionally beets – mostly from cans, and later frozen. Potatoes, and tomatoes; no squash of any season.

    My dad wanted nothing to do with a garden, having had weeding as a chore in his youth.

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  13. I have always loved a lot of canned vegetables, including things like lima beans that most people don’t care for. I used to adore canned rutabaga, but I can no longer get it anywhere, so I have to buy the whole rutabaga and cut it up. I love asparagus, both canned and fresh. Green peas, canned or fresh or frozen. Carrots, any way they are on offer. Boiled cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli. Roasted beets, or a nice beet salad.

    My favorite vegetable, though, is probably an artichoke with a emon and butter dipping sauce. You can’t get any better than that.

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