The Complete Idiot's Guide to Vegan Eating for Kids - M.s.j., Dana Villamagna [1]
The American Dietetic Association has reported that not only are plant-based diets acceptable for children; these diets provide real advantages. They report that, “Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes …. [A] vegetarian diet is associated with a lower risk of death from ischemic heart disease. Vegetarians also appear to have lower low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels, lower blood pressure, and lower rates of hypertension and type 2 diabetes than nonvegetarians. Furthermore, vegetarians tend to have a lower body mass index and lower overall cancer rates.”
Serving healthful vegan meals is easy. After all, think how simple it is to cook a batch of oatmeal in the morning, or zap some veggie sausage links. How easy it is to pack a sandwich with veggie bologna slices that look and taste just like regular bologna, cook veggie dogs instead of regular hotdogs, or heat up baked beans without that hunk of pork. Whether you’re cooking from scratch or using convenience foods, the vegan choices have the edge when it comes to health and are quick and easy enough for even the busiest parents.
Although you will learn much more about healthful nutrition in the pages that follow, let me say a word here about complete nutrition. A healthful menu is drawn from what are sometimes called the New Four Food Groups—vegetables, fruits, whole grains, and legumes. These staples translate into a bowl of hearty breakfast oatmeal or cold cereal with soy milk or rice milk. Lunch might be bean chili, a veggie hot dog with baked beans, or pasta salad with a green salad. Dinner could be a vegetable soup, spaghetti with tomato sauce, and steamed veggies, or one of a thousand other possibilities. These foods provide plenty of protein, even without careful combining (or “complementing”) of food groups. Any normal variety of plant foods, consumed over the course of a day, provides the complete protein a growing child needs. You’ll find plenty of calcium and iron in green vegetables and beans, as well as in fortified foods, for those who want them.
It is essential to provide a reliable source of vitamin B12, which should generally mean providing a multivitamin daily, although vitamin B12 is also found in fortified foods, such as vitamin-fortified soy milk and cereals. I recommend a daily multivitamin for all children, not only vegans.
To all parents who have chosen to provide vegan foods at home, let me say that your children are lucky to have you as their parents. Not every parent yet realizes what a difference it makes. When health authorities first recommended smoke-free environments for children, some parents were a bit slow to take the advice. When child-safety car seats became mandatory, it took some time before their benefits were widely appreciated. Ditto for bicycle helmets and athletic safety gear. But the data are now in, and we now know that taking a bit of extra care of our children can really pay off. Nowhere are the benefits more immediate or more powerful than in the contents of their plates.
Providing vegan meals for children is a huge favor. Your children will thank you, and so do I.
Dr. Neal Barnard
President of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
Introduction
Raising vegan kids in a world full of cheeseburgers, ice cream, and pizza can seem like an impossibly daunting task. You can sometimes feel like you’re fighting a losing battle. But take heart! We’re here to tell you that it’s not only possible, it’s admirable.
Eating a vegan diet is a healthful choice for ourselves, for our children, and for the planet. According to Pediatrics in Review—widely viewed as the gold standard journal in up-to-date