Take advantage of nutritious and delicious soy foods to enhance your child’s diet and health as they grow.
Promoting your children’s diet is very powerful. The foods they eat when they are young form the basis of the foods they will choose as they grow. This means that the dietary habits we teach our children right now not only have an immediate effect, but can also improve their health in the future by helping reduce their risk of chronic disease later on as they become adults. It’s never too late to start. You can make a difference starting today! Research has shown Healthy diets may help reduce many of the heart metabolic risks that affect the health of even young children. Introducing your kids to nutrient-rich and delicious soy foods, such as soy milk, tofu, tempeh, and soybeans, is an excellent starting point. Just half a cup of cooked soybeans provides fiber, vitamin K, calcium, manganese, thiamine, riboflavin, vitamin B6, folate, magnesium and copper. Soy foods even contain plant-based omega-3s! Soy foods also contain protein to help promote children’s growth and performance in school and sports. Unlike some plants, soybeans are one of the few plant proteins that are considered a high-quality protein because they contain good amounts of all nine essential amino acids, which the body cannot make on its own, so they must come from the diet. Sure, soy foods tick the boxes for nutrition and health, but what about taste? Don’t worry there! Imagine your children’s smiles when you serve a delicious roll with tofu, peanuts, crunchy carrots or Soy Yogurt Berry Pops. Therefore, I am sharing top tips on how to include nutritious and delicious soy foods in your children’s diet to promote good health this season.
Top Tips for Introducing Soy Foods – Kids Style!
1. Soybean / Soybean
Ripe whole soybeans are available as dried soybeans, roasted nuts, and canned soybeans. Use them just as you would any dried or canned beans in kid-friendly dishes, such as chili or tacos. They won’t know the difference, and kids may just prefer the new version! Soy is a surefire hit for kids, too. Crunchy and nutty and perfect to add to your favorite yogurt, granola, and relish mix. You can also have the kids help roast soybeans, prepared with their favorite seasoning, savory (nutritional yeast, seasoning) or sweet (cinnamon, brown sugar), or make their own soy butter for a fun twist on a PB&J or Soy butter and banana parfait.
2. Edamame
These are whole, immature soybeans harvested when fresh and green, and available in capsule or hulled in the frozen foods or produce section of grocery stores. Talk about a snack with the entertainment included in it! Kids love coming up with clever ways to get the edamame out of their capsules. Pack cooked and chilled edamame as a snack in lunch boxes, or make it edamame spaghetti or edamame hummus.
3. Soy milk
A nutrient-rich, plant-based milk fortified (usually with calcium and vitamin D) that has nutritional properties similar to cow’s milk. Fortified soy milk without lactose and milk protein is the only alternative to plant-based dairy products Accredited by major health professional organizations For children from one to five years old. Use it just as you would any milk, in cereals, smoothies, pancakes, and baked goods.
4. Tofu
Tofu made with soy milk is a versatile toy. Its pleasant taste luckily takes on other flavors and comes in varying degrees of hardness. Tofu crumbs and firm tofu are great additional ingredients for meat and eggs in a kid-friendly stir-fry. tofu fingersand tacos and sloppy joe and scramble. Silken Tofu is your nutrient booster to get juices, dipsand sweets and sweets.
5. Tempeh
This protein-rich fermented soybean cake has a mild, nutty taste and a firm, tender, chewy texture, making it ideal for slicing, dicing, and dicing your kids’ favorite dishes as a meat substitute. Which kid doesn’t like bacon? Slice thinly, sprinkle with marinade, and roast until golden brown for a version lower in saturated fat. what about BLT . sandwich? Tempeh is also a star in french fries. tacosAnd it pairs perfectly with pasta dishes.
Written by Sharon Palmer, MSFS, RDN
This blog is sponsored by soy connection.
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