Bread appears regularly on the table of most families and is one of the most popular products. Therefore, after the birth of the baby and the beginning of the introduction of complementary foods, each mother has questions about including it in the children's menu - when can I give, how much to offer to the baby and what kind of bread is most useful for babies?

Bread is one of the main sources of carbohydrates for the human body

How do they bake

The simplest bread recipe includes flour, water, yeast, and salt. It can be expanded with the addition of vegetable oil, milk, eggs, sugar, whole grains, butter, seeds and many other ingredients.

Flour is used not only wheat, but also rye, corn, buckwheat and others. Also, the modern food industry produces bread in which the content of certain components is reduced, for example, loaves with less starch, salt or protein.

Many kids are interested in how bread is made and they listen with enthusiasm to their mother's story about its baking. Pictures or videos can help children learn the details of making bread. For example, kids can watch a cartoon from the “A Secret to the Whole World” series below, in which a puppet wolf takes a tour of a factory where tons of bread are baked every day. From such a video, children can learn how to knead the dough, what yeast is and how it helps in baking, as well as how to make a sliced ​​loaf.

Benefit

• He has a balanced nutritional composition. It contains healthy plant proteins as well as complex carbohydrates. It also acts as a source of many vitamins (B1, PP, B3, E, B6 and others) and trace elements (Mg, K, Mn, Fe, Ca, P, etc.).
• In rye bread high in fiber and high in B vitamins.
• Pleasant smell activates the production of digestive juices, thanks to which the food is absorbed faster.
• Bread containing whole grains, bran, seaweed, flaxseed, sesame and other additives enriches the diet with minerals and fiber.

Potential harm

• Due to the content of oligosaccharides, enzymes for the digestion of which are absent in young children, it assimilation in the first years of life is difficult, therefore, Borodino bread cannot be included in the diet of a child under 1-1.5 years old.
• The product baked from wheat flour is a source of gluten, to which some children are allergic. Also, an allergic reaction is possible to baked goods containing eggs.
• A roll baked from white flour with the addition of butter and sugar brings little benefit to the child's body, because during production, pastry loses vitamins. In addition, such baked goods are high in calories. It is not advised to include it in the menu of children under 2-3 years of age.
• Freshly baked, it is not recommended for children under three years of age due to high gluten content.
• Giving bread to babies who do not chew well can be dangerous ( the baby will not chew it well and may choke).
• The child can snack on them, which is why his appetite will decrease by the time of the main meal. Because of this, children may refuse other healthy foods, such as vegetables.
• Excessive consumption of black bread can interfere with the absorption of iron and provoke anemia.

From how many months to introduce into complementary foods?

From 7 months of age toddlers can try products similar to bread - croutons and baby biscuits. White bread appears in the diet of infants with any type of feeding in 8 months in the amount of 3-5 grams per day. Same portion offered 9 months old, and from 10 months in up to a year, the wheat product begins to give 10 g per day.

From year to year, the amount of white bread in the child's diet is gradually increased. If, after including it in the children's menu, the toddler has colic, bloating, restless behavior or stool disturbances, you should contact your doctor. The doctor will help to find out the cause and prevent problems with the further addition of baked goods to the baby's diet.

The first bakery product that the baby will try is a cookie or a crouton

The inclusion in the children's menu of black bread and bakery products with various additives, for example, with bran, pediatricians, including Dr. Komarovsky, do not recommend until 1.5-2 years of age. You can acquaint a child with black bread at 1.5 years old, giving the crumbs a maximum of 10 g of this type of baking.

The release of Dr. Komarovsky's program dedicated to a variety of baby foods, see below:

Two year old child give up to 100 g of bread per day - up to 70 g of wheat and about 30 g of rye ... Daily portion for a child over three years old increases to 150-170 grams, including about 50-60 grams of rye bread. For schoolchildren give 200-300 g per day, offering black bread in the amount of 75-150 g.

Calculate Your Complementary Feeding Chart

When and how to give?

For the first time, a slice of bread should be offered to a baby in the morning so that a possible allergic reaction to such a new product can be tracked. It can be soaked in a liquid, such as a mixture, baby tea, or soup. Then it is served at lunchtime for soup, vegetable puree or meat dish. Increasing the daily portion, it is also offered for breakfast or during an afternoon snack.

How to choose and store?

When buying bread for a child, it is important to pay attention to its freshness and appearance. The loaf should be of the correct shape and level, without burnt areas or dents. Do not buy bran products or whole grain loaves for children under 3 years of age. Also, you should not purchase loaves for young children. The best choice would be a regular brick.

Storage times are short and amount to 24-36 hours. Store different varieties separately. If you keep a loaf in a bread bin, you need to ventilate it regularly and also treat it with vinegar.

How to bake?

For complete confidence in the safety and freshness of bread, many mothers decide to bake it for their baby on their own. The easiest way is to use a bread maker, because it is enough to put the ingredients in this apparatus and select the desired program. You can also knead the dough with your hands and bake a loaf in the oven.

For the first bread that can be given to a baby, take about 450 g of flour, 1.5 teaspoons of dry yeast, 1 teaspoon of salt and 2 tbsp. l. vegetable oil. If you want to use fresh yeast, they are first diluted with warm water, and for children over a year old - with warm milk.

"Bread is the head of everything", "Without salt, without bread - half of the dinner", "Without bread, everything will become boring", "It's not time for lunch, since there is no bread" ... Bread has been revered in Russian culture since ancient times, respect for it was brought up from early childhood ... But traditions and foundations are changing, the attitude towards bread has changed, and the bread itself has changed. Recently, many nutritionists have been recommending that children and adults give up this product. Let's try to understand whether modern bread is healthy for children, or is it better to exclude this product from the children's diet?

Why shouldn't you offer bread to young children?

At the beginning of the introduction of complementary foods, it is quite permissible to introduce wheat porridge or special baby cookies into the child's diet. However, white bread, which is dominated by the same wheat flour, is not recommended to be offered to a child until the age of one and a half to two years. Why? The answer is simple: the yeast, which makes bread fluffy, fluffy and soft, continues its work in the human body, causing fermentation processes. Bread included in the diet of a small child can cause indigestion, increased gas production and flatulence, and pain in the tummy. It is better to start by introducing white bread into the children's diet, not with fresh baked goods, but with crackers. Firstly, the yeast in dried bread is less active, and secondly, the crouton serves as a kind of "teether" for the child's first teeth.

If we talk about black (rye) bread for children, doctors do not recommend including it in the diet until the child reaches the age of three. This limitation is due to the high content of oligosaccharides and gluten in black bread, which the digestive system of babies cannot digest.

What are the beneficial substances in bread?

Benefit bread for children depends on the flour from which it is baked, more precisely, on its grade. Flour of the highest grade is made by fine grinding of refined grains. Bread made from such flour has a pleasant consistency and good taste, but practically does not contain vitamins, microelements and fiber. The only benefit of high-grade flour bread for a child is that it contains a large amount of carbohydrates, which allows you to quickly and efficiently restore energy.

Coarse flour (or "inferior" flour) is made from unrefined grains. In bread made from such flour, a lot of useful substances are stored, such as:

Vitamins of group B- help the child's body to grow and develop. With a lack of vitamin B, the metabolism may be disturbed, problems with the skin and digestion may occur, increased excitability, rapid fatigue, and irritability may appear.

Vitamin E- is important for the normal development of the gonads, and also "responsible" for the health of the baby's skin.

Vitamin PP necessary for full carbohydrate metabolism, helps to reduce blood cholesterol levels.

Zinc- contained in flour of lower grades, bran is distinguished by a very high content of this element. Zinc is essential for maintaining normal brain activity and proper metabolism.

Iron- it is necessary for the normal functioning of the immune system, participates in the process of hematopoiesis, helps the absorption of vitamins, especially of group B.

Magnesium- It is a natural tranquilizer, it stabilizes the processes of excitation and inhibition in the child's body, it is also necessary for the proper development of the musculoskeletal system.

Cellulose- coarse plant fibers, necessary for proper digestion, to cleanse the intestines of the child and prevent constipation.

Conclusion: bread useful for children, if you choose varieties from coarse flour or with the addition of bran. However, it should be borne in mind that such types of bread should not be offered to children under three years old in order to avoid digestive problems.

How to choose the right bread for your child

As stated earlier, for children up to three years old we choose white bread made from premium flour (but we offer it in moderation). After three years, it is more useful to give the child bread made from wholemeal flour or bread with the addition of bran.

In addition, we pay attention to the following factors:

• as part of a safe for children bread the presence of dyes, preservatives, flavors, taste improvers, ethyl alcohol is not allowed;
• bread must be sealed. The label must indicate the composition of the product, baking date and shelf life (the latter should not exceed 48 hours, since a longer shelf life indicates the use of preservatives);
• the crust color of high-quality wheat bread is golden yellow, rye bread is dark brown. A reddish or whitish crust indicates a violation of the production technology or the low quality of the flour used. Cracks, air bubbles, tears and swelling on the bread crust are also unacceptable;
• the presence of any extraneous inclusions on the surface of the bread is unacceptable, dark brown or black specks are especially dangerous. Most likely, it is scale or carbon deposits, which contain a large amount of carcinogens.

But it's best to bake bread for children on your own, choosing only those products that you are sure of the benefits and safety of. Here, an extremely useful device comes to the aid of mom - a bread maker. It is enough to place all the necessary products in the tank and select the desired program - the device will mix the ingredients on its own, select the heating mode and cooking time.

If there is no bread machine on the farm, the easiest way to make homemade bread is to bake flat cakes. Since yeast is not very good for a child's digestion, it is better to stick with unleavened cakes. Their composition is very simple: flour, water, salt and a little vegetable oil. Usually, homemade tortillas are not baked in the oven, but fried in a pan. If the dish is intended for children, it is better to use a non-stick frying pan, and do not add fat when frying.

What about buns, buns and other muffins?

“They don’t get fat from pies,” said Carlson and was, in part, right. Most children who consume flour sweets, even in large quantities, do not experience problems with being overweight, since the metabolism of a healthy, mobile child is much more intense than that of an adult.

However, doctors strongly advise against giving sweet pastries to children under three years of age. In a young child, the use of sweet cookies and buns, firstly, contributes to the formation of improper eating habits, and secondly, leads to sharp jumps in glucose in the baby's blood, and this can disrupt the normal metabolism.

If we talk about an older age, baking, like white bread, useful for children the fact that it contains a large amount of easily digestible carbohydrates. Such foods quickly satisfy the child's hunger (however, the feeling of fullness from them passes just as quickly) and restore energy. Sweet baked goods will not harm your child if given in moderation. For example, you might offer your baby a small bun, a cake, or a cookie for an afternoon snack. Most of the sweets eaten by a child should be more useful and valuable products: fresh berries and fruits, dried fruits, homemade marmalade, candied fruits, jelly and jelly.

"Correct" bread made from wholemeal flour is useful for children over three years old, as it contains a large amount of vitamins and valuable microelements. As for white bread, buns and cookies, these products are not very valuable for the child's body, but they will not do much harm either, the main thing here is a sense of proportion. We wish your little ones health and bon appetite!

Many mothers are worried that teaching a child to bake, sandwiches and an invariable piece of bread for the first and second courses will turn out to be overweight.

The first slice of bread is given to a child at seven months, and by the year he receives it twice a day - at lunch and dinner. Also, a one-year-old child can already be introduced to a bun. And this is just the beginning! The minimum set of flour products, which is provided for by the standards for kids aged two to five years, includes, in addition to ordinary bread, pies, cookies, crackers, croutons. But often mothers, in an effort to maintain their figure, refuse bakery products themselves and do not give them to their children: after all, these are pure carbohydrates!

How much bread can a child have?

Indeed, white bread consists of 40–55% carbohydrates (mainly starch), so an excess of starchy foods threatens children with excess weight. But we must not forget about one important point: carbohydrates are vital for the body of a small child, because they supply him with energy. This means that their lack is no less dangerous for children: it leads not only to a lack of body weight, but also to a delay in growth and development.

It's just that you need to observe the measure in everything. You will not feed your baby with sugar from morning to evening! In the same way, you cannot increase the share of bread for a child to the detriment of dairy food and meat.

A child from one to three years old should receive 60-80 g of wheat bread and bakery products per day, and at four-five years old - 100-120 g of both, plus 50 g of rye bread, which is permissible to give to children only after three years.

This means that the baby can eat a slice of bread for the first and second lunch and dinner, plus a bun or pie for an afternoon snack. And on some days, the child is allowed to have breakfast and have an afternoon with two or three cookies or a couple of sandwiches with milk or tea.

What are the healthiest sandwiches for a child?

Children really like sandwiches. There is nothing wrong with that, if the “filling” of such a dish is correct.

Let it be thin slices of low-fat cheese, boiled meat (veal, beef, beef tongue, turkey or chicken breast), doctor's sausage (up to 2-3 years old - a special nursery), hard-boiled eggs, as well as pasta made from fresh cottage cheese or unsalted feta cheese with dill.

Sprinkle the baby's sandwich with finely chopped herbs on top and put slices of thinly sliced ​​tomato, cucumber, apple, radish, put a leaf of green lettuce. The more greens and vegetables there are, the healthier the sandwich!

Vegetable fiber will slow down the absorption of carbohydrates in white bread, preventing the blood sugar level from rising sharply and then falling rapidly, as is usually the case when a child eats just bread and butter. But some parents also sprinkle it with sugar at the request of a little sweet tooth. Never do that!

And it is better to postpone sandwiches with caviar for up to three years: after all, for all its usefulness, it is, firstly, too salty for the baby, and secondly, very allergenic.

The child does not want bread. What to do?

It happens that children are happy to eat bread separately, but at the same time they are obviously reluctant to eat their soup and main courses. Meanwhile, adults insist that bread should not be forgotten, although this is not necessary!

If the baby does not suffer from excessive thinness and perfectly eats the first and second courses without bread (we give it mainly to create a feeling of satiety), let him eat the way he likes best. And the 2-3 pieces per day put to him can be partially turned into croutons and added to the soup (again, if the child does not mind) or put on sandwiches.

It is not scary if the kid does without bread at all: one way or another, he will receive his dose of "flour" carbohydrates at the expense of pancakes, pies and other pastries.

A dislike for bread and flour products can be the result of an allergy to the protein gluten contained in wheat grains, which is manifested by skin rashes and indigestion. In some children, gluten intolerance occurs even in utero and leads to a chronic disease of the small intestine - gluten enteropathy (celiac disease). It is characterized by abdominal pain and swelling, frequent grayish stools, lagging behind the child in weight and height, and allergic manifestations.

Any healthy child, even an inveterate capricious child, can arouse an interest in food if it is served with imagination. For example, babies are usually delighted with tiny canapé sandwiches, which are made from lightly toasted bread crumb, cut in the form of different figures - stars, diamonds, squares, circles, triangles, ovals ... You can melt cheese on them, or you can grease their liver pate, crushed yolk with a teaspoon of sour cream and sprinkle with dill.

Black or white? Choosing bread for a child

Children under three years old should not eat rye bread, although it is healthier than wheat bread. The fact is that black bread (unlike white) contains indigestible oligosaccharides - raffinose and stachyose. Oligosaccharides are the same carbohydrates, only more complex than glucose with sucrose, but simpler than starch.

And in young children, as well as in every tenth older child (like an adult), there are no enzymes in the intestines that can break down raffinose with stachyose. And no matter how you tell such people, both big and small, about the benefits of black bread, the result will be unchanged - food intolerance with increased gas formation and abdominal pain.

Many parents have heard about the benefits of bran or whole grain bread. It is definitely better than white, which is made from grain, peeled from the shell, and it is in it, as you know, that vitamins and fiber are beneficial to health. But do not forget that fiber acts on the gastrointestinal mucosa like a hard brush.

Not every adult will calmly endure such an effect, therefore, bran is categorically not recommended for people with sensitive stomach and intestines. And in a child, the mucous membrane is much more delicate than in adults. As a result, bran can provoke gastritis with enteritis or accelerate intestinal peristalsis so much that the crumbs will have a stomach ache, as with appendicitis, and diarrhea will begin.

Never insist that your baby eat something that he does not like (including bread). After all, he resists, as a rule, not because of an empty whim, but because his body does not accept this or that food. And the task of the parents is to understand, together with the pediatrician, why this is happening.

For example, temporary gluten intolerance often develops against the background of a viral infection, therefore flour products are excluded at such a moment, and the baby is offered only white, dried bread, observing the reaction. If the bread "did not go", then it is not necessary - give the digestive system a week or two to recover.

Note to mom

Even types of bread that are useful for a small child cannot always be included in a child's diet.

- In any case, it is not recommended to give freshly baked bread to the crumbs for two reasons. Firstly, it is too soft, does not require chewing, and it is very important to load children's teeth with work.

- And secondly, causing strong fermentation in the intestines, such bread, according to nutritionists, turns the digestive system into a distillation apparatus. It is not for nothing that experts equate it with alcohol-containing products. And the baby's body does not need alcohol, which is formed during the fermentation process, for sure!

- That is why it is recommended to dry fresh bread a little - not until it hardens, of course, but so that each slice dries a little on both sides, but remains soft inside. You can leave it open for an hour or two, or keep it in a preheated oven for a while.

- But it is dangerous to offer a baby too dry, crumbling bread slices: what if he inhales small particles?

- “Old” bread, produced more than three days ago, is also not suitable for children, because mold has already grown in full in it. And the fact that you do not see it yet does not mean that the loaf retains its original freshness.

Having once tasted bread, children rarely remain indifferent to this product ... I will never forget how my daughter, having pulled her first piece of bread off the table, began to smack it with pleasure. And noticing the approaching adults and realizing that now the prey would be taken away from her, she put a piece in her mouth, squeezed her teeth like an animal, and crawled, flashing her booty, running away. And the son of our acquaintances will not exchange a piece of bread for candy. friends does not recognize any other breakfast than buttered rolls. And take a closer look at the mothers who are in a hurry on business, hastily pushing the stroller in front of them - so that the children sit quietly in the stroller and do not try to get out "to freedom", they are sometimes bribed with whole loaves of bread ... So, bread - benefit and harm.

Stop Granny!

Most often grandmothers teach children to eat a bite of bread. Because of this, whole family scandals often arise. So, a child comes to visit his grandmother, she makes him sit down to regale, pours soup, the child readily nods, mother and grandmother will not stop looking at the child with a good appetite, and then the grandmother says her catchphrase: “And give you bread? Will you have a bite to eat with bread? " The child, of course, nods. Mom is in a semi-faint state. The grandmother does not understand how she angered her daughter / daughter-in-law. And the child eats bread, sometimes he has a bite of it with a couple of spoons of soup - and is happy. Feeding the baby smoothly flows into debriefing. "More satisfying so!" - the grandmother defends herself, who is used to eating a watermelon with a bite of bread. "Appetite interrupts, now he will not eat normal food!" - the mother is indignant, who has her own views on is it possible to give the child bread... But neither one nor the other dares to take away the child's bread. To avoid such situations, agree with all relatives in advance about what principles you adhere to in food, and that bread in your child's diet is a separate dish, dessert, if you like. Gustatory habits and a commitment to healthy eating are formed from childhood. And there is no need to teach a child to consume large quantities of bread.

Little ones and good ones

If you teach a child to eat everything with bread, depending on the nature of the child, such development scenarios are possible - the little one will eat even less and switch to solid dry water, will snack more on bread and eat even less from a portion of the main dish. All this will certainly affect the health of the child - over time, problems such as vitamin deficiency will add. Children with a good appetite will eat the entire serving and bread, and possibly ask for supplements, as expected, but as a result, they will be more likely to gain excess weight and the habit of overeating for life.

Both quantity and quality

Having talked about whether it is possible to give bread to a child, about its benefits and harms, having decided that it is not necessary to overfeed the child with bread and try to give bread after the main course (for example, as a basis for a sandwich), it is also necessary to decide the question of whether which bread is healthier... This is a very important issue for a child's health. White bread, although tasty, not only may not be useful (after all sorts of treatments in white flour there may no longer be a trace of the same vitamins, but only gluten and starch), but it is also dangerous because the child very quickly gets used to sweets products - and flour for white bread is always refined. While the child's taste has not yet been formed, you should not teach him to sweet. Deciding which bread is healthier, it is better to make a choice in favor of rye bread, bran bread, etc.

And, limiting children in bread, do not worry that the baby will not receive some necessary nutrients and some principles of healthy eating will be violated. Porridge is not inferior to bread in terms of nutritional value and content of nutrients.