Making innovative Meals For your Preschooler
25-08-2017 | Posted By: Rajni Joshi | 1779 View(s)
The preschool age is a period of rapid growth and development, and thus, the nutritional needs are high per unit body weight, as compared to the older child. For satisfactory growth and development, giving proper nutrition to the children is highly important. Nutrients should be well balanced between the meals, and there should be adequate energy and good quality protein in the daily diet. Make sure you give sufficient importance to some particular nutrients like vitamin A, vitamin C, Calcium, Iron and iodine. You can plan accordingly, make a calcium-rich snack for dinner and you can prepare some vitamin A-rich snack in the evening. Confused with what should your preschooler eat?
Well, firstly make sure you are giving them small and frequent meals at regular intervals as your preschooler has a small appetite and short attention span for eating.Select nutrient-dense foods and make sure the food you pack for lunch is handy so that your child can eat it quickly. Try to introduce new foods into your child’s diet gradually so that your child gets used to a variety of foods. A surprising trick to share is, give new foods when the child is hungry because if they aren’t hungry, they’ll give you so many excuses to refuse to eat and you know what all they can do to refuse! They’ll start playing with toys; they’ll start talking to you, they’ll run away from you. Here we present some tips to make interesting Meals For your Preschooler:
Making Innovative Meals For your Preschooler :
Make sure you avoid excessive use of salt, spices and condiments and prefer bland flavours. Avoid excessive use of oils and sugar as these can irritate the gastrointestinal tract, and the latter predispose to dental caries. Read On to Explore how much and what should your preschooler eat!
Energy: 1350 kcal/day
Protein:20.1g/day
Important nutrient:Vitamin A, 400 mg/day
Meal Plan:
Morning: Chocolate milk and Cheela
1.Chocolate Milk
Ingredients: Sugar, Milk
2.Cheela
Ingredients: Besan, Suji, Potato-, Tomato and Oil
Breakfast is considered the most important meal of the day, so make sure you inculcate a habit of eating breakfast in them. They’ll have many excuses; they won’t eat until and unless the food is tempting enough to grab their attention. Do not rely on a glass of milk, try preparing different shakes or their favourite ones? You can also serve them idli, poha, upma, sandwiches in breakfast. Try giving a different breakfast meal so that they don’t find it boring. Avoid using oil and sugar in excess.
Mid-Morning: Sandwich
Ingredients: Brown bread, cucumber, tomato, cheese and oil
As we just discussed small and frequent meals should be given to your child, so the mid-morning meal is just going to be a part of that. Try making the food more nutritious and healthy by adding more veggies to it.
Lunch: Palak-paneer parantha Roll
Ingredients: Paneer, Spinach, oil, and wheat flour
As you have to pack the lunch for the child, try giving something handy and dry. On weekends, you can also serve them raita with parantha.
Evening: Mango Shake and bread roll
1)Mango shake
Ingredients: Mango, Milk, Sugar
2)Bread roll: Bread, carrot, potato, pea and oil
You can give shake or buttermilk in the evening. Use oil in limited quantity, add lots of veggies, the aim here is to make the child eat the vegetables which he might not eat if served with chapati. So add more and more vegetables, make the rolls crispy and serve them with sauce.
Dinner: Rajma Rice, potato-cauliflower vegetable
1)Rajma
Ingredients: Rajma, onion, Tomato, Oil
2)Rice
Ingredients: Rice
3)Potato-cauliflower vegetable
Ingredients: Cauliflower, potato, onion, tomato
Avoid using lots of spices while cooking for your preschooler, when you serve them rice in lunch, try serving chapati in dinner or vice-versa. Avoid giving the same dinner every day as your child might not like this.
Desert: Oat-Jaggery Modak
Ingredients: Oats, Jaggery, almonds, cashew nuts
Now, this becomes optional sometimes, if you are already giving something like this in any of the meal or during the day.
So, this is a day’s plan for your preschooler; we completely understand your child likes to eat junk foods, but what you can do is, try making these at home! For example, if they want to eat a burger; you can use a whole wheat bun, prepare a bathua or spinach Tikki, add more veggies in the Tikki, and serve them with cucumber, onion and tomato and your iron-rich snack is here!
You can also make rolls at home, try making paneer rolls, veg. Rolls, just be a bit innovative and your child is going to love everything you prepare. And do not forget to present the food nicely, as it is going to help you make your child eat quickly and effortlessly.
Do you want to hear your kid saying” my mother cooks the best food”? Of course, you would love to! So, just try to add more innovations to your recipes by making delicious Meals For your Preschooler and your hard work will eventually pay off! All the best!
