When my husband saw me reading this book he was like, “Why do you need a whole book? Can’t you basically feed babies what adults eat, only less?” Well, yes, more or less, except that what passes for food now (adult food and baby food) is so hugely different from what kids should actually be eating, that I think yes, we do need this book! Everyone needs this book! Check out these super scary statistics.
- One in five children have allergies.
- One in twelve have food allergies.
- One in ten have asthma.
- One in three have either ADHD, allergies, asthma or autism.
- Almost one in ten show signs of depression.
- More than one in a hudred are diagnosed with autism.
- One in thirty-eight have autistic traits.
- Nearly one in two will become obese or overweight.
- One in three will eventually suffer with diabetes.
Whoa!!! Are you shocked? I mean, I knew some of that, but seeing it there in black and white just kind of blew my mind. What I’ve found really helpful is the reality check this book offers. The authors of Super Nutrition for Babies break foods down into categories of CRAP, OKAY, PURE and POWER (they’re acronyms, i.e. Chemical, Removes nutrients, Addictive, Processed) and I was quite surprised at where some of our food choices fell in those categories.
The thing is, without educating (and re-educating) yourself and being very proactive, even protective in your food choices, you will simply fall into the habit of eating CRAP because it’s everywhere and it’s EASY! Without reading (and interpreting, decoding and analyzing!) labels it becomes very difficult to know what it is that you’re actually putting into your mouth. This is a great reason to cook at home as much as possible. Of course, that isn’t always possible. But you can still do a lot to take your family’s health into your own hands. And there are quiet a few recipes in this book would be really simple to incorporate into your routine and that rely on batch cooking and freezing. Sure, it’s not as easy as pre-packaged dinners, but it’s so much more rewarding, and so much safer!
The authors have sprinkled old baby food ads from the 40s and 50s throughout the book and I love them. What’s really wild is that what passed for normal baby food then seems downright extreme now: liver, beef heart and vegetables, cod liver oil etc. And what’s really interesting is that this forgotten knowledge of what’s important in children’s health is used in the old advertisements to sell baby food, like the importance of sunshine and vitamin D, the importance of organ meats, of offering a variety of vegetables for trace minerals and nutrients etc.
I really can’t get into all the amazing things this book covers, in a short post. It teaches about protective feeding, immune boosting, and the four pillars of super nutrition. The book is broken down into stages and gives all sorts of great food and recipe recommendations. There are even some recipes for homemade formula if you need it. The resource list at the back is wonderful, full of books and documentaries to check out, sources for food and supplies. It makes feeding your children extremely well seem very do-able. Sometimes it can all get so very overwhelming, but by breaking it down into stages and offering plenty of recipes for each stage it allows you to just take it one step at a time. Seriously, the book is amazing. I wholeheartedly recommend it!
