Your pregnancy diet affects baby’s future tastes

Here’s how to make sure your little one will like the healthy stuff.

by Kate Geagan, M.S., R.D.

“Mommy, more please.” Those magic words play like music to a mother’s ears, especially if the dish is something that qualifies as “healthy.” And although this scenario might seem far off while you’re still stuck in what could be The World’s Largest Pants, it appears that a budding eater’s “food road map” actually begins to develop while she’s still floating in that bag of waters.

That’s right—a growing body of evidence suggests your personal cuisine routine influences your baby long before his first taste of solid food. All sorts of flavors from your diet are transmitted through amniotic fluid, and later via breast milk, to your little one, helping shape the trajectory of his palate even before he’s actually eaten any solid food himself. A study in Pediatrics, for example, found that infants whose mothers drank carrot juice during pregnancy or nursing reacted more positively to carrots than those whose mothers had abstained. Other studies from around the world have found similar results: In France, babies of mothers who consumed anise-flavored beverages more readily accepted the taste than babies of mothers who skipped such drinks, and research in Ireland found similar results with garlic.

Far from a reason to panic— “Oh great, one more thing I’m not doing right!”—consider these findings as yet another testament to the deep power of your own diet during this critical time. It’s OK if you don’t love every single veggie under the sun, but do stretch yourself. Try to shop different parts of the produce section each week. Or stick with what’s in season, a natural way to migrate through different foods and flavors. Serving a variety of colors is another easy way to sneak in more options; make sure there are always three or more hues on your plate.

Above all, savor this time when you actually have control over every food choice that crosses your baby’s palate, and start stacking the odds for when she finally reaches the dinner table herself. Another plus: In the process, you’ll add even more key nutrients to your own diet, and maybe the good stuff will become habit for you, too.

Have you overhauled your diet during your pregnancy? What’s that experience been like for you? Tell us all about it in the comments below!