Lauren Cheney - The Smart Baby Cookbook: Boost your babys immunity and brain development

FOREWORD

We all want the absolute best for our children. From the moment they are born we strive to provide them with the best care and comfort in the hope that they will grow up to be healthy, loving, well-adjusted adults who make the most of their unique talents and abilities. We want them to reach their full potential.

As a paediatrician and mother of two, I know the pathway to health, optimal brain function and a robust immune system lies in consuming a nutritious diet that supplies all the valuable nutrients, right from the first baby foods. What your child is fed in the first three years of life has an enormous impact. While nature and genes are certainly the basis for some of your childs development, nurture is most definitely responsible for a significant portion. It is crucial for parents to understand that they can dramatically influence their childs cognitive function and health by simply getting diet right in those important first three years.

This is where the Smart Baby Cookbook can help. It provides parents with the information they need to make informed decisions when weaning their babies. In my line of work I often come across parents who are nervous about the weaning process or do not have the appropriate knowledge to make the best food choices. In many cases they are using outdated information that has been gleaned from relatives or other parents.

Educating parents about the best way to feed their children should be given high priority in prenatal visits and definitely be first on the agenda during postnatal visits. This book fills a gap by providing dietary advice and recipes that are aimed at giving children the best chance to reach their potential.

I regularly witness the benefits of proper nutrition, seeing children who have fewer allergies, fewer behavioural problems, fewer chronic illnesses and fewer digestive issues. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is invested in helping their child towards a healthy life.

Dr Natalia Vollrath-Hale
Paediatrician, MD, FRACP

CONTENTS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

I dedicate this book to the love of my life: my son, Oscar.

I am a mum on a mission, stay-at-home chef, domestically challenged housewife and functioning coffee addict, determined to better the health outcomes of the next generation, one aeroplane spoon at a time.

Most days you will find me in the kitchen, wrestling the last of the eggs from my toddler, who loves to get his hands dirty cooking up a storm but has not yet mastered the art of keeping a clean kitchen.

My love of cooking comes from evenings spent as a child, watching my father turn our dinners into a magical experience. His love of creating Mediterranean meals and serving them with matching music was a delight for the whole family. It started a passion in me that was to fuel my love of cooking for years to come.

Fast forward to the day I became a mother and what followed was the catalyst to creating the Smart Baby Cookbook . Oscar was born with an extremely rare, life-threatening and lifelong immune disorder called Pulmonary Lymphangiectasia. By the time of his birth, five weeks early, Oscar had already undergone three lung operations in utero. I was advised that he had a very vulnerable immune system and might be developmentally affected.

I was determined to give Oscar the best chance of leading a healthy and happy life, especially as he had fought so hard for it. I made it my mission to talk to as many health professionals as possible. I also put my nutritional knowledge and chef experience to use, researching ingredients and developing meals that would naturally boost his immunity and development.

My purpose was twofold: I wanted to cook foods that not only turned Oscar into the next super-healthy Einstein, but also encouraged him to be a little foodie who would enjoy family meals. Like so many parents of small children, I simply didnt have the energy or brain power to cook food that was suitable for him and then create an entirely new meal for my husband and me. I knew there had to be a better way.

With evidence-based science proving that good digestive health is linked to overall health, from the gut to the brain, we have the potential to optimise immunity and brain development right from our childs very first foods. The search for nutritious recipes led me to research smart foods ingredients that benefit and promote gut health. I was particularly interested in the field of neuroscience and how specific foods support and boost brain function and development. Society is becoming more health conscious: it only makes sense that we try our hardest to feed our children the best foods. We have the potential to write a blueprint that could help prevent certain diseases and even maximise intelligence.

I was urged to share my recipes and research when the doctors were amazed at Oscars increased immunity levels and cognitive development. I spent two years researching and collaborating with child health experts to help other families set their children on the path to good health from their earliest years.

It is my hope that the Smart Baby Cookbook will be used as a resource by time-poor parents, who want to ensure that their family receives all the benefits of a super-nutritious, flavoursome meal without having to cook separately for adults and children, or serve dulled-down baby food.

For me, food means family. I believe that shared meals not only empower our children to develop a love of healthy food and help to create adventurous eaters, but also deliver a wonderful bonding moment and a little meal-time magic. Happy cooking everyone.

smartlittlefoodie.com.au

INTRODUCTION

Take away the rose-tinted glasses of early parenthood, the in-laws whose children have been perfect eaters since day one, the friends with strategically posed Facebook photos of baby Archie/Amber enjoying Purea di pollo e verdure (aka pured chicken and vegetables) and you will find a little-mentioned truth, the seedy underbelly of starting solids.