What we eat says a lot about our culture. Kids’ favorite foods range from injera in Ethiopia to arepas in Colombia, from pupusas in El Salvador to adobo in the Philippines. A food that feels ordinary in one country might be completely new to a child in another.
In the United States, children often ask for things like pizza, cheeseburgers, chicken nuggets, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or macaroni and cheese. Family traditions, cultural diversity and even the cost and availability of food all shape what kids enjoy most around the world.
To see what that looks like, we asked children in Compassion’s Child Sponsorship Program, “What are your favorite foods to eat?” Here’s what they had to share:
Jane in Kenya: Mchicha
Jane in Kenya helps her family grow mchicha (also called amaranth) in their garden. The relatively new spinach-like leafy green is considered a superfood and is now harvested abundantly in Kenya and Tanzania. “It is good food for my body and very easy to plant,” Jane explains.
Josué in El Salvador: Pupusas
Compassion child development centers encourage children to eat healthy vegetables by incorporating them into their favorite traditional meals. In El Salvador, children like 6-year-old Josué enjoy pupusas (corn masa flour pockets) stuffed with shredded carrots, squash and other green leaves that contain iron.
Family Favorite Recipe: Bean and Cheese Pupusas
Angel in the Philippines: Buchi
Angel in the Philippines holds a plate of buchi, which is a rice snack. Her mother cooks and sells buchi to help provide for her children, but it’s also one of Angel’s favorite foods.
Yomel in Peru: Salad and Potatoes
In Peru, Yomel eats a plate of salad and potatoes. His family grew the food at their home with vegetable seeds they received from Yomel’s child development center.
Theresa in Sri Lanka: Dosai
Children registered in our program typically get a healthy meal or snack each time they attend activities at their child development centers. Theresa in Sri Lanka sits down at her local center to one of her favorite meals: dosai (a thin pancake made from a fermented batter of lentils and rice), lentil curry and coconut chutney.
Marcos in Colombia: Spaghetti
Sometimes a child’s favorite meal isn’t necessarily traditional to their country. Marcos in Colombia eats spaghetti at his child development center. The center director, Martha, says that it’s one of the children’s favorite foods. “They always want another portion,” she explains.
“Some of them come to my office to ask for another serving of food, and I always say yes.”
Axel in Honduras: Red Beans with Sour Cream
Axel eats a bowl of red beans with sour cream in front of his home in Honduras. It’s one of his favorite foods. “I also like my mother’s spaghetti and the center’s stewed chicken and rice,” he says.
Nutrition: Why It’s Important
Despite the importance of a balanced diet, stunting still affects nearly 23 percent of children under age 5, putting their growth and development at serious risk. Meanwhile, over 673 million people experienced hunger in 2024, and around 2.3 billion people faced moderate or severe food insecurity, highlighting the worsening global crisis.
Conflict, climate extremes and economic shocks have fueled the most severe food crisis in decades — and children living in poverty are the hardest hit. Our church partners see every day how hunger is harming children, stunting their development and keeping them from their full potential.
Feeding nutritious foods to children in our program is more important now than ever. The cooks at our child development centers around the world work hard to ensure children are eating nutrient-dense foods. Meals at child development centers often include fresh veggies, such as leafy greens, sweet potatoes and whole grains.
