Tag Archives: Jostein Gaarder

Chocolate Chips?

My two-year old, Sophie, and I just returned home from enjoying a lunch date together at a local Tex-Mex restaurant. Whenever we eat there, she usually shares a burrito with my husband. But the hubby is out of town, and I don’t like burritos. So I ordered a rice, beans and cheese platter for her off of the kids’ menu. She loves her rice, beans and cheese (see photo of her above, enjoying the dish at home a few months ago). Until today, Sophie’s gusto for this dish was a mystery to me – especially since her older sister, Chloe, won’t go near such a concoction, and Sophie’s modus operandi is to emulate everything Chloe does. The serving was about three times too large for a two-year old’s tummy, but no mind. Sophie attacked it with all of the fervor of a child who hasn’t eaten in days. As she was nearing the end of the beans, she repeatedly said, “More chocolate chips.” In Sophie’s World (not the novel by Jostein Gaarder, but in my Sophie’s world), anything brown and mushy is a chocolate chip. What this says about her lack of taste buds is another story and perhaps worth a call to her pediatrician. But in the meantime, eureka! Forget about buying Jessica Seinfeld’s new cookbook, Deceptively Delicious. All I need to do when I want Sophie to eat some brown, healthy stuff is to tell her that the mush on her plate is chocolate chips. Do they come in green, too?