What to feed your kids is a constant topic of conversation these days with more and more people making conscious decisions to avoid certain foods and scrutinise what they put into their bodies. This leaves many of us feeling confused and often it’s easier to cut out a type of food or drink to avoid making the wrong decision.

Parenting on Female First

Parenting on Female First

Head teachers are now being urged to clamp down in school and ban lunch boxes in an effort to encourage children to eat more healthily. This comes after a ban on fruit juice in the class room too. But should we be placing trust in our children to make the right choice when it comes to lunch time and should we stop giving our children fruit juice?

We caught up with Dr Christian Jessen, who’s working on the Be Simply Great campaign, to get his take on the debate.

  • Parents should have a say over what their children eat, and that shouldn’t stop at the school gates.
  • Starting with an energy boosting breakfast, toast, cereal, eggs, whatever is on the menu getting a good start to the day is important and this is the meal I recommend giving your child a fruit juice with. And yes, fruit juice is good to have as part of healthy balanced diet. We recommend one glass a day 100mls for children, 150mls for adults and for under 5s dilute 50/50 with water, this also removes the issue of taking drinks into school. Simply Great contains only natural sugar found in the super fruits in the drinks. They contain lots of antioxidants and are packed full of goodness.
  • Drinking fruit juice with a protein meal such as cereal with milk aids absorption of iron.
  • It’s important from an early age that we instil the value of having a good and varied diet to create a healthy attitude towards food. Getting a balanced diet can be a battle for parents as children’s taste buds don’t naturally gravitate towards broccoli!
  • School dinners or lunch boxes both work for me. It’s about fuelling the body after all.
  • Extreme routines and regimes when it comes to anyone’s diet don’t work and most certainly shouldn’t be put upon children. By banning fruit juice in schools and not allowing lunch boxes we are sending our future generation the wrong message about eating. Consuming certain foods to excess isn’t good for you or your child, having an ‘everything in moderation’ approach to food is a far better route. Segregating foods into good and bad can make those not-so-healthy foods appear more desirable.

 

Dr Christian is working with Simply Great Drinks on its Be Simply Great lifestyle campaign, a simple, sensible approach to keeping fit, happy and healthy. For more details visit: www.simplygreatdrinks.co


by for www.femalefirst.co.uk