Healthy eating for
children should be treated as top priority by all
parents because as a parent we all have a responsibility to
give our children the best possible start in life.
Feeding them a healthy diet when young helps them to
grow into fit adults who suffer from fewer ailments and can
look forward to longevity. Is there any parent who doesn't
wish this for their children?
The obvious question now is what constitutes and good diet
for children? I will give a link to a very good website at
the end of this article that will deal with all the
technical aspects of a healthy diet. For now accept
that the food pyramid that was instigated by the US
Department of Agriculture is a very good starting point.
I know that everybody has a problem in persuading
children to eat what is healthy rather than what
is fun; the secret is to make healthy food fun too.
For instance I recently watched a British made TV program
that subjected an obese family to eight weeks under
the control of a dietician. Initially the children
claimed that they would only eat burgers – meaning
McDonalds. The dietician made 50 lentil burgers for the cost
of buying three Big Macs and presented three lentil burgers
to the three children for dinner, freezing the
remaining 47 for use later. The only thing she told them was
that she insisted that burger buns be replaced with whole
grain rolls. Result: The children ate the lentil
burgers without comment. Not only did they eat them they
asked for more. OK, more can be bad too but the point is
what they really wanted to eat was something that resembled
a Big Mac, what it tasted like wasn't that important.
Now here is the BIG point: When the dietician told the
mother what she was about to do to encourage her children
to eat healthy foods the mother's response was. ‘You
have no chance, my children will insist upon
eating McDonalds.' - I think this is a case of a mother
who thought she was being kind to her children by
giving them what they wanted; so much so that she actually
started believing it herself.
The family spent 80 pounds sterling each week on take
home food and their grocery bill was 140 pounds sterling
each week. When the healthy diet was started the
weekly grocery bill dropped to 85 pounds sterling each week
and zero on take-out food. A total weekly saving 135 pounds
sterling each week (That equates to around US$240 each
week.) just by cutting out unhealthy convenience foods.
At the end of eight weeks the mother had lost 21 pounds, the
father 18 pounds and each child 14 pounds. For the first
time in their young lives the children were playing
team sports at school and with friends after school.
We are what we eat and healthyeating for
children is the greatest gift you can give to your
offspring.
Try this link for more detailed information on childrens
diets:
About The Author:
David McCarthy is webmaster of
http://www.recipesmania.com a website dedicated to
freely sharing knowledge about health, food, recipes, diet
and even has a free weight control program.
