Our daughter is on the verge of losing her first tooth. Of course, she is impatient for it to come out since many of her friends have already lost several, but I just realized that I haven’t talked to her about what happens afterwards.

I remember losing my first tooth (I was already in California) like it was yesterday. My mother instructed me that I needed to stick my head out of the window of our apartment, which had the roof of the parking garage directly underneath, and tell “the rat” that I was sending it a beautiful tooth. In return, I wanted “the rat” to send me an ugly tooth. I have to admit that this made no sense to me at the time, but she explained that by asking for an ugly tooth in return for my beautiful tooth, “the rat” would really give me a shiny white tooth. As convoluted as this tradition sounds, this was most likely my first lesson in humility.

So, now the question is: Do I engage my daughter in the Haitian tradition of “the rat“, or do I simply use the American tradition of the tooth fairy (which is what the majority of her friends have described to her)? By the way, I don’t think it is effective to use both because I think that each teach very different values.

Do you have any cultural traditions that you have bypassed for the American equivalent?

Now, for some this may be a non-issue, but a big part of my culture is the cuisine. As a matter of fact, some Haitian immigrants never become accustomed to eating non-Haitian dishes regardless of the time spent abroad.

I, for one, do not have this problem . I enjoy trying new foods and am always trying to introduce my family to different dishes. My husband will humour me to some extent and I think he has actually come to really appreciate dishes from other cultures. However, I have found that fast foods are really hard to compete with, especially with a five year-old, as children are constantly bombarded with commercials, etc.

Although I remember my mom making an effort to be somewhat flexible with what we ate, it feels like I spent the majority of my childhood eating rice, beans and chicken. I am now convinced that this kept me “healthy” and hope to include these staples in my children’s diets as much as possible. For now, my daughter’s favorite dish is bean sauce (sauce pois), rice and chicken. Our ten month old has yet to decide .

Is it important for your children to be familiar with foods traditional to your family? If so, how do you ensure this (i.e. how often do you prepare these foods, how strongly do you push them to eat them)? How do you handle the stiff competition?

Most importantly, feel free to share any recipes for dishes that are popular with kids.