Your child’s diet should include a variety of foods because each food item has different nutrients that your child needs to grow well. A healthy, balanced diet means eating five portions of fruit and vegetables a day. A portion is roughly the size of your child’s fist.
The foods can be categorised in groups to help you know how much of each food group your toddler needs.
Each day, offer a variety of foods from the main 5 food groups:
Cereals and Starchy foods (carbohydrates)
Offer starchy food at every meal and some snack times. Starchy foods include breakfast cereals, pasta, rice, sooji or semolina preparations, potatoes (aloo), sweet potatoes (shakarkandi), yam, sticky potatoes/colocasia (arvi), plantain or raw banana (kachha kela) and any foods made from flour such as chapattis, paranthas, pooris, bread, biscuits, crackers, baked puffs or mathris, and dosas (not just rice but also rava dosas). Offer a mix of wholegrain starchy foods and non-wholegrains. You don’t want your little one to fill up on fibre to the detriment of other nutrients.
Fruit and vegetables
Toddlers may take some time to learn to eat a variety of these, particularly vegetables. Include greens like spinach (paalak) in dry curries, dals and soups. Use vegetables like cauliflower (phool gobhi), radish (moolie) or greens like fenugreek leaves (methi) to stuff paranthas or pooris. Keep offering fruit and vegetables at each meal so your toddler learns that they are always part of a normal meal. Your toddler may prefer fruit to vegetables at first. Cut fruit into slices to make it easier to eat, and always include fruit as part of the sweet course.
High iron and high protein foods
Offer high-iron and high-protein foods at two meals each day. This food group includes meat, fish, eggs, nuts and pulses. Pulses are foods like kidney beans (rajma), chickpeas (kabuli chana), cow peas (lobia/karamani), hummus (chickpea paste), lentils (dals), soya bean products like tofu and nuts and seeds like almonds (badaam), walnuts (akhrot), sesame (til) and flax (alsi) seeds. Avoid using processed foods as they might contain preservatives, excess oil and salt. If your toddler is vegetarian give pulses, eggs, nuts or beans at two or three meals each day. This will ensure he gets enough iron and protein. Here is how to ensure your child is getting enough iron.
Dairy Products
Dairy products are a good source of calcium and other vitamins and minerals. Calcium is important in the growth of bones and teeth. So aim to give your child milk or dairy products two to three times a day. Dairy products provide plenty of calcium for growing bones, but are low in iron. Toddlers one year and above, can drink whole (full-fat or full-cream) milk. They do not need as much milk as babies. In total, your toddler should have about 350ml a day, and no more than 400ml of milk a day. Large drinks of milk will reduce your toddler’s appetite for other foods, especially those higher in iron.
Fats, oil and sugar
These should be in much smaller portions than the previous four groups. Use the required amount of oils in cooking but avoid fried foods. Keep sweets to a minimum.
