Share your tips on the ways you get fruit into your kids' diet and encourage them to eat more fruit

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Fruit is a key component of a healthy diet, and making sure your kids eat enough of it can be a challenge. It can take countless attempts to convince your child to eat some, and getting to a point where your kids don’t dismiss the idea is no mean feat. With this in mind, Nice by Nature would love to know all the different ways you get fruit into your kids’ diet, and how you encourage them to eat more of it.

Here is what Nice By Nature have to say:
“At Nice By Nature we’ve created a new range of delicious fruit ice lollies! They are made from 100% fruit and absolutely nothing else! In fact our lollies always contain:
- 4 ingredients or less
- No added sugar
- 22-24 calories
- Contributes to your five-a-day

Your kids might call them a snack or even a treat, but you can think of them as a fruit bowl in your freezer!

From talking with mums and dads, we know that it is not always easy getting the food we want into our kids' hands, let alone their tummies! We simply believe that nature has its own store cupboard, a world of wonderful ingredients in the fields, forests and orchards. The good news is that Mother Nature is happy to share!

Visit our website and follow us @nicebynatureuk to find out more!"

Have you come up with a crafty way to get your kids to eat more fruit? Have you managed to persuade your kids to see fruit as a treat? If so, do you have any techniques you could share? Or maybe this isn’t necessary and your children are already very good at eating lots of fruit?

Whatever your ways of getting your kids to eat more fruit, share them on the thread below, and feel free to add a picture or video to accompany your post - we’d love to see these!

Everyone who does will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £300 voucher of their choice (from a list).

Thanks and good luck
MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

I don't really consider eating fruit (or anything healthy) as a chore. It's part of your diet, no ifs or buts. My child doesn't get to choose whether she eats healthily or not and I don't think it should be presented as an option

Both my boys eat lots of fruit, and I am always keen to let them try new fruits, grapes are just like sweets for us, and there is always a washed bowl on the dining room table.
Overripe bananas are one of my bugbears, they won't touch them, so it's banana bread or banana smoothies (often with another fruit - pineapple is our favourite as it takes of some of the sweetness).
My tips would be to offer at weaning, in small quantities, mashed or pureed, and leave the sourer fruits for later in their progress.

We love strawberries, grapes, bananas and apples, but raspberries and kiwi are not as easy to persuade DS1 and 2 to eat. I will make a fruit salad with very small quantities of kiwi and raspberry to help them clear the plate. Kiwi 'eyes' on a fruit smiley face with a banana mouth and a strawberry nose always goes down a treat.
My tip would be don't make a battle over eating a food item, just say put it to your lips and if you really don't like it, try it another day and eat the rest.

we all know bananas make the best weaning food, mixed weaning food, other fruits have not been as successful for us, it's all about textures and strong tastes I think, we have had moderate success with strawberries, nectarines were a 'no go' as were satsumas.
I have tried smaller quantities of each, and mixed a little fromage frais which has has some success.
I am just trying with fromage frais with peach, banana, kiwi, and halved stoned cherries (pineapple is a little too hard and sour to try yet - but we've had this poached with honey and it was lovely).

My 9 year old daughter loves fruit & eats vegetables. Sometimes we have smoothie wars & make a fruit smoothie each & get someone to judge the best. Over-ripe bananas are a no-no, until mixed with nutella on a sandwich. Fruit kebabs are fun to make & eat too.

We have just always offered fruit from weaning and they remain the first source of a snack if the children want one. We model eating healthily too.

Sometimes we will make fruit a little more fun as a treat, so 3 chocolate chips make a banana a ghost or we make fruit faces but generally both of my children have always liked their fruit.

Try going to a 'pick your own fruit' farm. A sneaky way to get them to hunt for blueberries and other fruit that they might otherwise not eat! We love going blackberrying too.

My little one has always enjoyed fruit. We give him it often as a 'pudding' so he thinks it's a treat

Never had any problem getting mine to eat fruit.

It was a regular part of their diet from weaning. It's the standard offering for snacks and it's something their dad and I also frequently eat.

We always have in a variety with more of their favorites. We introduce new stuff from time to time, it normally doesn't go down well the first few times but we wait a bit and then get it again. So far they've liked everything except kiwi within a couple of years. One thing they loved as toddlers (still do at 10) is bowl of lots of different fruits cut up as a fruit salad (no syrup or dressing) and that's been a great way to get them to eat more of the fruit they don't automatically grab from the fruit bowl. And foraging for blackberries and the like is a favourite late summer day out.

It's quite expensive, though, to provide a wide variety of fresh fruit, especially introducing them to new stuff when they're toddlers.

We all eat fruit together - they always want whatever mummy and daddy have! And it's given as pudding like a treat because they love fruit anyway. Especially bananas, grapes and strawberries!

Sometimes bananas are mixed with peanut butter on toast and other times fruit has a little yoghurt on if it's a little sour.

My tip: During these warm summer months especially, whizz up various fruits and freeze in ice lolly moulds. The kids absolutely love them. Full of goodness. All kids like ice lollies.

Ham and pineapple pizza!
Freeze grapes - they taste just like sweets.
Go to a pick your own strawberry/soft fruit farm - difficult to resist trying some.
Make sure the fruit you give them is ripe - for my DD, a hard peach or nectarine was very underwhelming, but once fully ripe she loved them.
Try tinned fruit if they won't eat fresh. Goes well in jelly too.

Make it fun.
We like to make smoothies or fruit kebabs.
& we like to try new ones when possible.
Dragon fruit was an interesting one (I thought bleurgh but my dd loved it)

Fruit chopped up with yogurt is a big favourite here. Different varieties keep it interesting, plus being allowed to pick what you fancy in the greengrocers.

They get to choose their own fruit in the supermarket (that they have in addition to the basics) and I try to make sure they have fruit with every meal.

I’m also growing blueberries so they help me pick and eat them!

I let them walk about the supermarket and pick fruits they want to try or like the look of and if they like them I get them weekly, mine are quite good with fruit but I do struggle with veg I have to hide a lot of it in meals, my daughter hates tomato's, onions, peppers but eats them when they are hidden into spaghetti

The easiest way to eat more fruit is to have homemade smoothies. You can also add veg eg spinach, kale, cucumber etc. So getting much more nutrients in one go.

Providing a selection of fruit cut up into small pieces is always popular

any complaints of hunger between meals are met with help yourself to some fruit.
i also do a plate of chopped fruit/veg i leave ojt whi'st cooking dinner

My DC love fruit and veg. I've always given it to them so they just see it as food - and they don't have much junk food / unhealthy stuff.

They're getting older now but I used to cut it up for them, make faces or patterns on.the plate.

Another trick is to say they're not allowed to eat it or put it on your own plate - then they will!!

Puree and make into ice lollies - my kids cannot get enough of them this summer, banana and mango (mashed banana and pureed mango), I have also made pineapple and strawberry ice cream, mixed with some fromage frais makes a lovely dessert.
I cannot get my children to drink fruit smoothies due to the consistency, but the fruit pops are both cheap and fun to make and eat so that's fine.
In winter I make orange juice from the large oranges which come into season, and if its a little sour add a little agave or honey to sweeten.
Finally - my healthy pineapple upside down cake goes down a treat with my kids in winter - does that count ?

I think that getting enthusiastic about fruit is a good way to encourage your children to like it. Giving them a choice of fresh, colourful, chopped up fruit is a good way to encourage them to eat it. Occasionally dipping strawberries in melted chocolate and putting them in the fridge also helps.

Thankfully he loves fruit so it's not a problem - he loves it if I prepare it all and make a fruit salad but he is just as happy with a banana which is easy to eat.

We always have plenty of fruit in the house and encourage the children to eat it. They are all pretty good at eating it, if they are having an off day I will make a fruit salad and add a bit of ice cream with it.

My 4yo isn't particularly motivated to eat anything; like her Dad she could happily miss meals and not notice! Her mum sadly doesn't have the same affliction 😂. I will often offer little ramekins of cut up fruit and veg while she is reading or playing; eating them in a 'grazing' way seems to work better for her.

Also, thanks to a birthday party this summer, we've discovered fruit kebabs! Fruit she strongly dislikes in their natural state (strawberries, melon, and peach, for example) are apparently delicious if you line them up on a skewer 😂.