【First-time parents question: Can babies eat snacks?】

08/10/2021

Babies generally have small appetites and cannot eat much at one meal, so they sometimes need extra calories between meals to cope with the daily activities. In fact, you can let your baby take snacks between meals. You may be shocked by hearing this as snacks generally high calories, high sodium and high sugar, and fatty snacks are definitely something that parents have always avoided letting their children eat.

In fact, snacks can be divided into two types. One as mentioned earlier are the high-calorie snacks, no nutrients, purely stimulate the taste buds and no good for body's development, which will become the burden of the body. Frequent intake of such snacks will make your children lose interest in lighter foods in the future as they already got used to sweetness. This type of processed food is full of coloring, sweeteners, chemical additives, etc., regular intake will cause obesity and elevated blood lipids. It is generally not recommended to allow children to eat too much.

The other type of snack is a supplemental snack, as a supplement to energy and nutrition outside the main meal. Usually, supplemental snack is made by natural ingredients and is produced without oil, salt and sugar, food additives, food dye and so on, which is made for baby and they have a positive impact on their health development. Between meals, these snacks can be provided for babies to absorb additional nutrients.

Parents can pay attention to the snack's nutrition label to see if the first few items contain unhealthy ingredients. So, what kind of supplemental snacks are suitable for babies to eat?

1. Grains

Grains are rich in carbohydrates, with dietary fiber to help digestion, and protein to help body development and stabilize blood sugar levels. Small amounts of vitamins B1 and B6 can help the body use the calories generated by carbohydrates and help the production of red blood cells respectively. Common whole grains include brown rice, oats, barley, wheat and barley.

Some baby snack products can be made from a variety of pesticide-free grains. They can provide a variety of nutritional intake, but also does not contain food dye, sweeteners, etc., eaten with safe.

2. Dairy products

Dairy products, such as yogurt, can help regulate your baby's intestinal flora, making your baby's digestive system better, and also contains calcium. Cheese also contains protein, calcium, vitamins, etc., higher nutrient density than cheese, but there is added salt in cheese, therefore, you have to control to the amount of cheese for baby to eat.

Fresh milk, rich in protein, calcium and vitamin B2, is arguably the most popular milk product for babies over one year old. In order for your baby to absorb the full range of nutrients, choose whole fresh milk. However, fresh milk is not suitable for babies under one year of age whose intestines are not yet well developed.

3. Fruits

Fresh fruit contains vitamin C, trace elements, etc., which is beneficial to promote the growth and development of the baby and strengthen the immune system. You can start your baby with fruit juice, then fruit puree, and finally fruit pulp, so that your baby doesn't lose interest in lighter by-products by eating sweeter fruits too early.

In addition, dried fruit has some nutritional value, as it concentrates the dietary fiber and minerals of a fruit, and because children have small appetites, eating dried fruit is not as filling as fresh fruit, so they can eat small amounts in exchange for similar nutritional value. Parents can choose products that do not contain added sugar, trans fat, preservatives, additives and other ingredients to ensure that snacks do not affect the health of children.

Some of the Digital Steam Sterilizer Dryer on the market has the function of making dried fruit which can be used not only for sterilizing the bottle but also making dried fruit to your baby as a healthy snack. You can control the ingredients to ensure that no additives. It is really a very convenient tool.

Some parents give their children snacks as rewards in order to limit their children's access to snacks, while not exposing them to snacks on normal days. In fact, this approach may have the opposite effect, making children crave snacks even more.

In fact, by snacking on their own, children will have a good impression of "eating". If the child keeps eating healthy but unpalatable things, he or she will not learn to enjoy the process of "eating" and may become anorexic in the future. Of course, snacks should not be consumed in excess, so as not to cause children to lose their appetite when eating regular meals.

Parents should be the gatekeeper of their children's diet, so that the baby can eat snacks to eat healthy and grow strong.