Green Baby Green: Organic Food For Your Little One
One pediatrician is calling for a delicious revolution. " It's time," says Dr. Alan Greene, "to feed kids from the start, in a green healthy and organic way."
Dr. Greene has written a book, " Feeding Baby Green" and shared his research with us.
" We've learned that babies early exposure to foods have a lasting influence.
"They imprint on food, the food exposures they get early in life they come to think of as normal and they'll chase after those for the rest of their lives.
"Unfortunately what we've done over the last couple of generations is allowed kids to get tricked and imprint on the wrong stuff. I'm talking about the processed flavors and the white flours and the high sugars and of course they go chasing after that.
"It turns out it's easy to expose them to the right things so they get imprinted on that.
"They love fruits and vegetables and whole grains and fresh wonderful foods that build strong bodies.
"And it's OK to start their exposure to them very early on.
"For a long time there was this misconception that you should only do one new food at a time, you should wait 3-5 days in between, and you need to wait at least a year for milk, 2 years for eggs and three years for fish. But it turns out the latest research says we were mistaken about that.
"The American Academy of Pediatrics in 2008 came out with a new policy statement. It says there is no evidence we should withhold ANY FOOD beyond six months for the purpose of preventing allergies. And, getting an early exposure sometimes decreases allergies, instead of increasing them.
"In fact it's in the first year of life that our immune system begins to recognize what's normal.
"So yes, nuts are OK and fish and eggs, too. I do have some concerns. Number one is choking, it has to be in a form they're not going to choke on. It really needs to be something they can swallow and it's not going to get stuck.
"Another concern I have is the chemicals in the food.
"Plus many of the plastics we've been using to store food in, heat food in, serve food in, have estrogen like chemicals in them, pba, pthalates. Chemicals proven to be cancer-causing.
"If you're using plastics, especially in a microwave, use bpa-free, pthalates-free, estrogen-free plastics, like the Born Free bottles.
"Another big concern I have is infections, which people don't tend to think about.
"But the same things I would avoid as a pregnant mom, like raw fish, or under cooked eggs, or under cooked meat, or luncheon meats, those are the things I would avoid for a baby because of the chance of getting bacteria.
"Anything else goes. It's amazing that kids can learn to like these mixtures of foods, and exotic things. Spices are good for kids. It helps them learn the spice of life early on, it's like a language.
"So what we've learned is that between 6 mos and 13 months old it takes, on average, trying a new flavor 6-10 times to imprint on it.
"That's actually good. You wouldn't want them to imprint on something the first time they tried it, they might pick up a rock or something.
"But they did a study. They took foods that kids hated. Foods their moms said their child found disgusting. Like vegetables. The moms made it the child's first bite of food every day. If the baby protested or made a face, she stopped. At the end of 7-8 days, 85% enjoyed that food. For 70% of the children is was now their favorite food.
"That happened just by giving it that many tries.
"So just by using that one tool with one vegetable, you can surpass what most toddlers in the U.S. eat today.
"Most toddlers get zero servings of whole grains. If they do eat a vegetable, french fries are the most common, about a third get zero servings of fruit. If they do get fruit, it's that canned stuff, fruit cocktail, canned peaches or applesauce.
"So just this one tool if you can do it. And those kids liked it at 7 mos and a year later they still liked it.
"I'm not opposed to ever using baby food, you just want to get as many great flavors in as you can during this window. One great way to do it is to take pretty much whatever you're eating for dinner or lunch; you can take a portable little food mill with you, a hand-cranked one, and put a little in there with a little bit of breast milk and turn the crank a few times and you've got baby food.
"Making some of your own baby food is simpler than you would ever imagine.
"Say you cooked some baked sweet potato. You just cut a little piece of it, drop it into the baby food mill add some breast milk or formula or yogurt, crank it a few times and out comes baby food. It's that easy. You could use a little bit of cinammon, it's fine to sprinkle a little bit of spice on your baby food.
"It doesn't take more time, it doesn't take more money, it's an inexpensive, great way to introduce your baby to the flavors you love.
"Also, if you're going to choose organic ever in your life it's during pregnancy and the first couple years of your child's life. Then also if you're going to get rid of the chemicals in the food also get rid of the chemicals in the bottles, bowls and teething things.
"Also, if you're pregnant, that whole imprinting thing can happen even before birth. Babies have more taste buds before they're born than any time later in life. They also have a very strong sense of smell. Another thing, they're swallowing early on. They're swallowing amniotic fluid, the equivalent of three, 8 oz bottles a day. They get 10-20% of their protein and calories from what they drink, not just from the umbilical cord. What they're doing is they're tasting what mom eats and they're memorizing it. They're remembering it and forming their imprinting on it , what she really likes. They're getting to know the real you and that's really cool.
"All of us tend to eat a little better when someone is watching and if we just sort of notice that our baby is watching as closely as anybody ever will and remembering everything you eat, you might just choose healthier on your own.
Dr. Alan Greene's book is called " Feeding Baby Green".
For more information about buying organic food:
www.ebaby.com
www.naturesone.com
www.organicbabyformula.com
vermontorganicsformula.com
