Babies, Parenting, Child Health, Infant Nutrition

Child Nutrition – 6 Immune Boosting Kid Friendly Foods

06.02.2009 | 12:46:22 pm | Posted by admin

By Colleen Hurley, RD, Certified Kid’s Nutrition Specialist

The peak of cold and flu season is upon us, and as recently explained antibiotics are not always helpful for getting rid colds. The best option is to focus on prevention and keep kids’ baby development, parenting immune systems strong to enhance their own ability to fight off infections. This will be the first of several posts taking an in depth look at immunity.

Kids eating habit are fickle and can be even more so when they are feeling under the weather. There are some foods that pack a great deal of nutrients in small amounts which is perfect for little ones. Here are 6 immune boosting foods for kids:

1. Berries: blue berries, black berries, or strawberries provide a concentrated amount of the much needed vitamin C during winter months. Vitamin C helps increase the production of infection fighting white blood cells. In addition, berries contain a wealth of tissue protecting antioxidants.
Try: mixing frozen berries with your choice of milk or yogurt into a smoothie

2. Almonds: almonds provide an excellent source of vitamin E; a nutrient not a popular as vitamin C but equally important to the immune system. Vitamin E also enhances the production of a variety of immune cells that help the body seek and destroy cold producing baby development, parenting bugs.
Try: Swapping peanut butter for almond butter instead

3. Carrots: the bright orange color of carrots indicates the wealth of beta carotene, another super nutrient for increasing your body’s army against invaders. Beta carotene, a precursor to vitamin A, is only one member of the large family of carotenoids, which is why the body best uses beta carotene from food sources because natures’ immune fighting combination is already there.
Try: Baby carrots sticks dipped in salad dressing for a snack

5. Pumpkin seeds: the highest vegetarian source of zinc, pumpkin seeds pack a lot of nutrients into such a small food. Zinc also helps the body fight infections as well as reducing the duration of a cold. It is best to get from food, especially for kids, and if you do eat meat try lean turkey or steak in addition to fortified cereals.
Try: adding pumpkin seeds to homemade trail mix or granola

Permalink

Email this article

Printer-friendly version

About this Blog:

The Baby Mum-Mum blog discusses everything to do with babies and parenting with a focus on child health and child development. Baby Mum-Mum is a healthy, easy to digest baby rice snack that is enjoyed by babies and mothers around the world for its portability, gluten free ingredients and great taste.

Announcement:

We are planning to make some improvements to this blog and we would like to hear from you about how we can provide more helpful information and a better service. Please contact us to let us know your thoughts.

We regret that the News Feeds are currently unavailable. This feature will be back shortly. We hope that any other inconveniences are limited, but please let us know if we anything doesn't work as you were expecting.

Syndicate this Blog: