4 - 14 Years
From when you child turns 4 years old it should and is able to eat like adults. However, you must pay special attention to the amount of calcium, vitamin D and iron of the diet, and also limit the child’s intake of fat and sugar.
It is important that your child has calcium every day to ensure that its bones grow healthy and strong. Children’s bones are built until they reach the age of 25. Dairy products are the best source of calcium. Therefore you must make sure that milk, cheese, junket, yogurt or other dairy products are a part of your child’s diet. Remember to choose light versions of dairy products to avoid giving your child unnecessary high intake of saturated fat. A large glass of milk, a slice of cheese and a serving of yogurt every day will be enough to cover you child’s needs. However, calcium is also found other places, so if your child does not like dairy products you can instead give it spinach, curly kale or cereals.
Vitamin D is equally important when it comes to building children’s bones. Vitamin D increases the absorption of calcium in the body from the food. You child can have vitamin D in two ways – either when the skin is exposed to sunlight or through the diet where vitamin D is found especially in fat fish. Therefore you must make sure that your child does not sit inside the whole day, but gets to go outside and have fresh air and sunlight. Put fish on the menu once a week and choose fish without bones, since this is often the reason why children do not want to eat fish.
Children also need iron for growing and developing. Teenage girls have a higher need for iron because they lose iron during their menstruation. Meat, offal, green vegetables, leguminous fruit and dried fruit contain a lot of iron. Pay attention to the fact that what your child drinks affects its absorption of iron. Fresh fruit, juice and vegetables increase the absorption of iron, while milk, coffee and tea decreases it. For example, the absorption of iron is doubled if you drink a glass of orange juice to your meal while drinking a glass of milk halves it.
The diet should not contain any more than 30% fat. It is important to cut down on the saturated fats found in meat, cheese and milk. There are many grams of fat to be saved from buying light products. Offer the child skimmed or semi-skimmed milk, choose cheese with 10 or 20 % and do not buy meat with more than 10 % fat. Even though you should cut back on the fat there is no reason to become a fanatic. The body needs fat to function. Choose the good fat – the unsaturated – found in nuts, avocado, olives, oils and fish.
Children should not eat more sugar than what corresponds to 10% of a whole day’s energy intake (calories). For a 3 year old child this means 30 grams of sugar a day, for a 6 year old child 40 grams and for a 13 year old 50 grams. For comparison, your child gets 50 grams of sugar if it drinks half a litre of soda. It is therefore a good idea to establish certain rules about when to eat or drink sweets.