8 Healthier Food Alternatives for Kids' Favourite Food

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It is really a challenging task for parents to balance both the desire of your kid’s food choice and the healthy food. The healthy food diet in your child reflects the way they act, play, schooling and the rate of falling sickness.  One more fact is that the food including vegetables, fruits, dairy products available today do not contain the required nutrient value. They are grown and packed along with high amounts of pesticides and preservatives. Along with these unavoidable situations if we too encourage the poor foods then it is sure that your child has an unhealthy start.

By little alteration of few ingredients, swapping them here and there by replacing healthier stuffs you can make your child’s meal interesting and happy. Here are some healthy alternatives for your kid’s favorite food.

Oats for Fast Food Breakfast:

The busy schedule of today’s life has made millions of people to switch to easy available fast food breakfast to cut down the preparation time. Grabbing a sandwich, burger or any cheesy breakfasts which heavily fills your stomach and gives you an assumption that you have consumed a healthy good breakfast.  These fast foods are high cholesterol, high fat and high calorie agents with less nutrient value and have negative impacts in both kids and adults when consumed as a daily breakfast. In case of children it leads to obesity and severe diabetic risks at a young age. 

Make a choice of oats for the morning breakfast. It is ready made and requires just a boiling time.  They are rich in energy and provide strength which is a perfect start for the day. This is a right option for bachelors, office going, schooling kids, and people on weight loss.

Raisins, Dates and Nuts for chocolates: 

Have you ever found a toddler or a kid who hates chocolates? Leave them alone I am sure they will make a breakfast of chocolates. These chocolates have very high calories consisting of fat , caffeine and sugar levels which leads to obesity in young age.  Also the tooth decay increases with the consumption of chocolates.

For a small kid (below 2 years of age) you can bluff them by providing raisins , dates and fried nuts instead of chocolates. These dry fruits are healthier and tasty. They will enjoy chewing these nuts. For an elder child make more collection of dry fruits, roast them, and add honey and cherries. Serve this bowl as a replacement for chocolates. Your child will love it.

Popcorns for Chips:

Your kid will enjoy the handful of chips but the body will not take it worth wise. Chips consist of high fat, low nutrition and weight gain and obesity.  They are high salted which results in water retention in the body.

So better discard them from your kids diet chart and instead provide the hot popcorns. Your child will enjoy tossing the popcorns.

Whole Wheat Rusk for Cream Cookies:

The cream of tartar mostly used in cakes, cookies and sugary foods contains very high potassium levels. The amount of potassium in just one table spoon of cream exceeds the daily required potassium in our body which has high health risks. An aged healthy adult can consume a little more but kids and unhealthy person result in digestive problems, kidney diseases, stimulation of neurons in the brain when consumed regularly.

Provide whole wheat rusk for snacks which is rich in fibre and low fat. Not only for kids, but also a healthy diet food for weight loss and diabetics. Rusk with many aromatic flavors including cardamom is very tasty and crisp where your kid will enjoy the fullest.

You can even go for multi grain crackers and Gluten free crackers.

Honey for Sugar:

Sweetened food is not good for kids especially for toddlers. But sweets are always your child’s favorite.  The sweet stuffs included in your toddlers diet is mainly either sugar or honey. Honey is slightly more nutrient and contains vitamins and minerals which are not found in sugar. Also honey being less processed than sugar it is considered to be beneficial over sugar. But both should be consumed in limited amounts.  You can only replace sugar with honey without exceeding the amount.

It is cautioned not to provide honey for children below one year.

Fruit/vegetable drinks for canned soups:

You might feel easy to drink and serve the ready canned soups available with labels “high nutrient” or “fat free” or “natural” and many more false statements. They are usually filled with preservatives and chemicals from not being spoilt. Also the food stuffs under went so many processing are always low nutrient or zero nutrient.  Instead provide homemade vegetable smoothie/soups or any fresh fruit drinks.

Tender coconut water for soft drinks:

It is true once you step out your house your kid will point his fingers towards the soft drinks, sodas or any artificial sweetener drinks for craving his thirst. Make strict rule for your kid and yourself to stay away from these drinks. They are carbonated drinks which when consumed regularly has health risks for both kids and adults like obesity, diabetes, heart attacks and other linked chronic. Offer tenderwater instead as a coolant which is an excellent nutrient supply.

Fruit bowl for Noodles:

The instant salted and spicy noodles have become today’s lunch box or at brunch/ snack time. A big “NO” for this stuff. Noodles usually have high sodium content and have negative effects on the digestive process. Noodles have a wax coating of chemicals which develops heart diseases, kidney stones and higher blood pressure levels. So just imagine can these instant noodles be a part of your school going kid's lunch box?  The pastas too belong to the same family.

Prepare a fresh fruit bowl, make it colorful and decorate with cherries. You can find your child licking the entire lunch box :).

It is always good to think twice before serving your family and yourself. Include the alternatives in the diet for good health.

In simple words any processed packed food which is designed to be addictive is harmful encouraging health risks. Consuming them once in a while for the change of taste is considerable. But making them a regular meal especially for growing child should be avoided.

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