Early Childhood Menu Planning Frequently Asked Questions

Coconut yoghurt is an occasional “leave off the menu” food that we are seeing more often on early childhood service menus. This may be because services are wanting to provide a non-cows milk based yoghurt alternative and coconut yoghurt has been marketed to fill this gap. Unfortunately, despite it’s marketing, coconut yoghurt is not a nourishing food. It is high in fat and kilojoules and does not contain the nutrients we would expect from yoghurt – protein and calcium. In fact coconut yoghurt provides a similar amount of protein to ice cream but less calcium!

If you want to provide a non-cows milk based yoghurt at your service soy milk yoghurt is your best choice.

Understanding why some baked items are occasional and some aren’t, can be confusing for early childhood service menu planners. One issue comes up a lot when we provide menu review feedback on occasional items. There is often a misconception that replacing sugar with a ‘natural’ sweetener automatically makes the baked item healthier, but that’s not the case. So are “natural” sweeteners such as raw sugar, coconut sugar, agave syrup, rice (malt) syrup, honey, molasses and maple syrup actually healthier than sugar? Sugar is the generic name for sucrose. To keep it simple, we will call it white sugar. In Australia, it comes from sugar cane. But the other types of sweeteners above are also sugars. Sugar, in all its forms, is empty kilojoules. This means it provides kilojoule energy but not much other nourishment. In comparison, fruit, milk and yoghurt are also sweet but provide fibre – in the case of fruit – and vitamins and minerals in useful amounts. Sometimes you will see information about sugars, such as maple syrup, having higher levels of minerals or antioxidants than white sugar. And some do. But you would need to eat large amounts, e.g. 1 cup, for it to be useful and they do not contain lots of other nutrients. Eating foods from the Five Food Groups is a more nourishing way to get vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. Sugar is important in baked items as it provides sweetness, helps with browning and keeps the food moist. You do need to use some type of sugar for successful baking. But to make your baked item healthier you can experiment with:

· reducing the amount of sugar you use

· replacing some of the sugar with fruit, milk or yoghurt

What sugar you use is up to you. Using local honey is a great way to cut down food miles, maple syrup has a lovely flavour, and raw sugar has a richer colour.

Did you know that cream is occasional and is best left off early childhood service menus?

And when we say cream, we also mean sour cream, light cream, coconut cream and the new plant creams.

Why? Well, cream is high in saturated fat and high in kilojoules and doesn’t provide a wide range of nutrients. In other words, it is “energy (kilojoule) dense and nutrient poor”.

We often see cream (in its many guises!) on menus and are always thinking… what can we swap it for that is more nutritious?

So, here are our top picks for more nutritious cream alternatives: evaporated milk, yoghurt, white (bechamel) sauce and pureed silken tofu (with or without milk). All of these options provide creaminess and also give the children extra nutrients, such as protein, carbohydrates, and calcium.

Just like at home, the simple answer is no. Providing alternative meals to children who refuse an offered meal might solve the problem on the day, but it doesn’t solve the problem in the long term. So keep your long game in sight!

A skipped meal or two will not harm a healthy child and they will eat when they are hungry. Wait until the next scheduled meal or snack before offering something new.*

You can reduce the chances of food refusal by:

• Providing at least one food that you know the child/ren likes and introducing one new food at a time, in a small portion.
• Acknowledging children’s independence and recognising children have genuine likes and dislikes.
• Establishing routines around when and where food is eaten.
• Offering realistic amounts of food.
• Limiting the length of mealtimes (about 30 minutes maximum).
• Establishing a positive eating environment by encouraging children to touch, smell and taste new foods and textures (without any expectation of them swallowing it).
• Having a consistent approach amongst carers.
• Leading by example through carers eating the same food at the same time with children, being enthusiastic and initiating positive discussions around healthy food.

*There may be some exceptions (e.g. children with type 1 diabetes or those with sensory or developmental issues) but even in these cases it is still best to follow the guidelines above. Discuss with the parents and health professionals who care for these children how best to manage food refusal considering their special needs.

The main nutrients that foods from the dairy food group provide are protein and calcium.* Dairy foods also contain lots of other nutrients, but these two are the main ones. So if you are needing to swap out cow’s milk products, you need to find a substitute that will provide similar amounts of protein and calcium to cow’s milk.

Soy milk is naturally high in protein and contains more protein than other plant-based milks. Check that the product you are buying is also calcium** fortified.

Nut milks (e.g. almond, cashew), oat and rice milks are lower in protein than cow and soy milk. They may also be lower in other important nutrients. They are not a great replacement for cow’s milk and are suitable only when you have a child that can’t have cow’s or soy milk. If you do need to use one of these milks make sure it has been fortified with both protein and calcium**. Rice milk is not a good choice for young children as it is very low in protein.

Coconut milk is higher in saturated (unhealthy) fat than other milks. It is also low in protein and low in calcium and lower in other important nutrients. It is not a good choice for children.

So, our advice would be to use soy milk as your preferred plant milk. If soy milk is not an option, then oat and almond milks are also okay, as long as they are calcium and protein fortified. Avoid coconut and rice milks.

*Cow’s milk has around 110 mg calcium and 3–4g protein per 100ml.
**Check the calcium level on the milk package nutrition information panel. You want the milk to provide more than 100mg calcium per 100ml.

Your service needs to provide a menu that meets the nutrition guidelines as well as being acceptable to the children in your care and their families. But sometimes parents and educators may not be aware of the nutrition guidelines for menus and are confused as to why your menu offers some foods frequently (e.g. wholegrain/wholemeal breads and cereals) and others rarely or not at all (e.g. sausages or crumbed fish).

Depending on how you display your menu to families and educators, why not display a completed copy of the Caring for Children Nutrition Checklist alongside it?

If you received a Central Coast Local Health District Healthy Menu Award, make sure this is well promoted too!

Milo does contain iron and is often recommended as a way to provide extra iron to those who need it.

However, Milo by itself is an occasional food. It scores 1.5 stars on the Australian Health Star Rating system. And when associated with Milo, milk goes from having a 5-star rating to 4.5 stars.

So, yes, Milo does contain iron, but there are more nutritious foods that can be used to provide additional iron for children when at childcare such as wholegrain breads and cereals, legumes and green leafy vegetables.

These are just some of the questions we receive about cakes. The short (cake) answer on cakes for early childhood services is that they are always occasional.

· If they are made with healthier ingredients (wholemeal flour, less added sugar, fruit and/or vegetables) then they are ok to include on the menu as one of your “limit” occasional foods. We don’t count occasional foods towards food groups on your menu.

If they aren’t made with healthier ingredients then they are a “leave off” occasional item.

A small amount of jam, honey, maple syrup or golden syrup is fine to use. Just remember that these toppings don’t provide any nourishment to the children. More nourishing sweet spreads and toppings for pikelets, scones and English muffins include:

• ricotta, cottage cheese or yoghurt blended with soft fruit
• mashed banana
• reduced-fat cream cheese with a dollop of fruit puree (or just spread it thinly over the cream cheese)

Pork has a similar amount of iron to white meats like chicken and fish. Beef, lamb and kangaroo have 2-3 times more iron than pork. So although pork is included as a red meat in the Australian Dietary Guidelines, for early childhood service nutrition guidelines it is not included as a red meat due to it’s lower iron content. Making sure early childhood service menus offer enough iron-rich foods is important for our kids’ health. Iron deficiency is common in young children. They need more iron because of their rapid growth. They may find iron-rich foods (e.g. meat) challenging to eat. They may also be drinking more milk than they need which can decrease iron absorption and take the place of iron-rich foods. Iron deficiency can result in anaemia, poor growth and problems with brain development.

We are hearing of more and more services who have children enrolled with dietary restrictions. Managing children with dietary restrictions can increase food costs and requires cooks and early childcare staff to make extra effort to keep children safe. Children on restricted diets may also miss out on important nutrients and the opportunity to explore a variety of foods.

However, it is important to keep our children safe and comfortable and we should make every effort to ensure the food we provide in childcare does this. It is also a legal requirement under the Education and Care National Regulations to ensure that food provided by a service “is chosen having regard to the dietary requirements of individual children taking into account … any specific cultural, religious or health requirements.”

But what do you do when it appears that the dietary restrictions that you are strictly following at childcare are not adhered to at home?

The first step is always communication with the family. It may help to flag with all families that you will be doing a regular dietary restriction check to find out if children’s requirements have changed. This provides an opportunity to start the conversation. Another helpful strategy is to let parents know that, in your efforts to ensure children are provided with adequate nutrition, it is a requirement for your service to have medical documentation on the need for health-related dietary restrictions.

Of course, if a child has a dietary restriction based on their culture or religion, this needs to be respected. You can still check in on a regular basis to find out if the family is wanting to continue with this requirement at childcare.

We know that Nachos are a crowd pleaser for your kids. But skip the corn chips and use oven-baked pita bread instead.

Corn chips are high in kilojoule energy, saturated fat and salt. Replacing with oven-baked pita bread will provide children with more fibre, iron and B vitamins.

Corn chips are an occasional food and are best left off early childhood service menus.

Pita bread is part of the breads and cereal food group. A great option to increase the variety of foods you offer from this food group.

Mexican tacos are a fun way to offer a wide range of foods in one meal, especially vegetables. We recommend you serve taco fillings in a tortilla wrap instead of hard taco shells. Tortilla wraps fit in the bread and cereals food group and are available in wholegrain varieties to help provide some extra fibre. They can still be a fun way to include Mexican flavour, allowing children to add their own fillings when appropriate.

Taco shells are not recommended for inclusion on a healthy childcare menu. They are considered an occasional food because they are much higher in fat, similar to corn chips.