These days we are so concerned about building strong immunity. For kids and babies, we obviously concern ourselves more when it comes to their food and help them to improve their immune system. Here are some healthy foods for your babies and kids to boost their immunity.
Leafy Vegetables
The leafy and seasonal vegetables are the best source of vitamin, iron, calcium, magnesium and potassium. Must include green vegetables in the diet of your little one as they are healthy and help your kid to make a strong immune system. Spinach, cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli are rich in Vitamin A, C, & K, iron, calcium, potassium, magnesium.
For infants you can make puree of vegetables or mix the green vegetables in Moong Dal Khichdi. Cook all together and then you can feed your baby in puree or semi-solid form as per the age of your baby. Vegetable soups are also a good option for small babies.
For older babies you can make dishes like palak paneer, cauliflower curry, like regular family food.
Find here: How To Boost Immunity In Babies?
Root Vegetables
Sweet potatoes, potatoes, carrot, beetroot are the root vegetables and are healthy to boost the gut bacteria, since they are rich in soluble and insoluble fibre. Root vegetables absorb tons of nutrients from the soil as they are grown under the ground level.
For infants, you can steam the vegetables and make the puree of sweet potatoes, carrot and beet. For older babies you can give them salad, vegetable pulav and regular curry as home food.
Pulses
The pulses are the rich source of protein and fibre, as well as they are loaded with vitamins and minerals such as zinc, magnesium, iron and folate.
Dal water, moong dal vegetable soup are good options for babies of 6 months and plus.
Green peas are also a very good source of protein as well as vitamin A, B1, B6 & C. They help in boosting your immunity and give you strength, as they are rich in antioxidants.
Dry Fruits
Dry fruits are the best source of protein, fibers, healthy fats and vitamin E. Commonly available nuts, almonds, cashews, walnuts, pistachios are good to munch on as these are healthy snacks.
If you are wondering how to give the healthy benefits of dry fruits to your baby, you can make dry fruit powder for your little one.
Dry roast all the nuts and dried fruits and grind to smooth powder. You can store the dry fruit powder up-to 1 months in an airtight container and whenever required you can use 1 or ½ tablespoon for baby food.
Sprouts
All the green vegetables have many nutrition but the sprouted food has increased levels of nutrients. Considering the health benefits and environmental changes we need to add the sprouts in our kids diet. Sprouts get easily digested and absorbed by body.
You can buy sprouted powder online for your infant which you need to simply cook for 5 min and it gets ready to serve your baby.
For older babies, you can give sprouts as mid morning food, or as a salad along with lunch. The sprouts of soyabean, nuts, green lentils (green moong dal) are loaded with proteins, when soaked proteins change to amino acid lysine improving its nutritional benefits.
Lysine is needed in body to prevent cold, cough and to boost immune system.
You can also buy sprout powder for your infant online, available on Amazon.
Turmeric
Turmeric has the properties which helps in improving a better immunity. Rich in antibacterial and anti-fungal properties which helps in fighting infections from cold, cough and flu. Turmeric helps in boosting immunity and also beneficial in respiratory issues.
Turmeric milk is often called golden milk because of its health benefits, it prevents common flu infections, cough and cold and many other health problems. Give a glass of turmeric milk to your baby every night for sure as it is not only good for immunity boosting but also helpful in improving brain function and boosting kids memory.
To make turmeric milk, you just need to take a glass of unsweetened milk, a tablespoon turmeric, some grated ginger and a pinch of black paper, cardamon (for flavor). Give it a boil to all the ingredients, cool it down, add some honey and serve it to your kid.
As we all know, breast milk is the best source of immunity building for babies below one year, therefore, try giving breastmilk to your baby as much as you can. Considering the current pandemic situation, it is advisable for new mothers to not wean the breastfeeding of your baby as today strong immunity is what we need to survive in this world. Two generations earlier, babies were breastfeed till 4 to 5 years to help babies in building a strong immune system and to fight infections. We recommend a combination of healthy solid foods and breastmilk as a must to feed your baby until one year of age (for babies above 6 months).
Along with the nutritional foods you must have to teach your baby a healthy habit as well for building a strong immunity. Like, taking proper sleep, maintaining hygiene, drinking lots of water, staying active, though it's tough as we all have to stay home but you can teach your kid some physical exercise to be active.
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