vegetable

'Seductive names' make vegetables more appealing

A team at Stanford tried it out on students in the university cafeteria and found veggie sales went up by 25% when indulgent labels were used.

"Sizzlin' beans", "dynamite beets" and "twisted citrus-glazed carrots" tempted diners to fill their plates.

Healthy labels, such as "wholesome", were a turn-off, even though the dishes were identical in every other way.

Seductive carrot... 

The experiment took place over the whole of the autumn academic term. Each day, a vegetable dish was labelled up in one of four ways:

Helping kids build relationship with food is better than bribery

Some take to hiding morsels in more delicious parts of meals, while others adopt a stricter approach, refusing to let little ones leave the table until plates are clear.

One "alternative" idea touted recently is for parents to essentially bribe their children, depositing money into a child's bank account as a reward when they eat vegetables -- an idea actually backed up by research.