Better Daycare Food: What types of food should your kids eat while in childcare?

childcare foodMaybe the better question is, what type of daycare food does the daycare center feed the kids at particular ages?

So you’re at home preparing trying to decide if you should prepare food your self to be fed to your child when while they spend the day at day care, or maybe you’d consider enrolling in the day care center’s childcare food programs. Let’s look at some of the options

Home made baby food – Preparing food for your child at home

Depending on the age, this can range anywhere from:

Breast milk and Organic Foods

So you’re baby’s at the tender, soft age where they don’t eat solids yet, or, you can at least make nursery style purees of organic fruits and vegetables. That’s sound like a good idea and it really is, but it’s all about the preparation of the baby food. We know some mothers who prefer to make the food from scratch – driving 50 miles to find organic foods at some local farmers market to make sure that baby gets the best.

Then once you get the core ingredients, you have to make it and pack it up. Machines like the baby bullet can make puree out of carrots, cucumbers, sweet potatoes and bananas (we call’em nanners). Dr. Brown’s has very nice, near air tight containers for storage of the baby food.

Combine that with good old-fashioned breast milk, and your baby has a power packed breakfast, lunch, multiple snacks, and partial dinner! With a healthy meal like that, baby shouldn’t be hungry and the stools should be sheer perfection!

Definitely check out the day care facility; the environment, the kitchen, the refrigerator. And properly mark your baby jars and formula bottles. It’s likely the fridge will be packed with other parents food and the daycare center’s provisions. so labeling is of the essence!

Organic Baby Food Brands

If you cannot make the baby food from scratch or provide breast milk, it’s ok! There are some excellent alternatives:

Childcare Food Programs

If you are considering utilizing the care center’s childcare food programs, start off by reviewing these direct tips:

  • The day care center should be updated! They should have a valid, current license to practice childcare and scheduled daycare feeding. Children should clearly be enrolled
  • Meals need to be those that meet USDA requirements and standards. Never accept anything less.
  • Any childcare center program worth its weight in gold will have immaculate attendance and scheduling of the meals (see childcare nutrition program example. Accuracy of these food records in imperative, especially if you know you child is allergic to certain things, or simply doesn’t like particular foods. This can be in the form of a paper chart, excel sheet, or any on site computer program
  • You should be able to meet the staff of the Family Daycare Food Program. There representatives should be clean, professional, and knowledgeable about their food programs and should be able to clearly elaborate on the science behind the food and how it helps your child develop
  • Some daycare providers get monthly credit reimbursements if they are USDA approved foods. Ask them if they know about that
  • The staff should clearly indicate that they have meal and menu planning and menu service training
  • They should be able to give you recent and accurate information & assistance about meal planning, nutrition  and any additional program requirements
  • What about nutritional workshops? Do they have any to teach both the parent and children what these foods are?

We’ve found some very interesting information regarding a particular daycare center poll -

Fresh fruit is in; Canned fruit is out.

For snacks nearly a quater of people want to eat more fresh fruit on the menu. Around 10% of parents eliminate or at least cut back on the amount of canned fruits being consumed. But right around lunch,  parents interested in cutting back on canned fruit increases to 19%.

Parents are highly typically satisfied with daycare food programs.

Approval ratings to keep the same food in the program is around 90%. The reality is, lots of the daycare food is quite ‘junk food’. Some of the sncaks they give out  either as a whole snack or part of a meal we’d consider to be very junky – yet and still, the majority of parents seem no to mind.

Ice cream make it again!

Nearly 90% of parents conceded that ice cream should be kept as is. While ice cream is a delight, if day care centers are feeding this as much as parent are saying the like it, kids will grow up to either want more ice cream as they get older, or ice cream may not be such a treat since they’re getting so much of it at the child care provider.

Sodium packed chicken nuggets and chicken soup made the cut!

Why even bother? Again, any of this stuff is probably fine if made from scratch, but 7% of parents want the store-brought chicken soup while another 8% say yes to non 100% chicken nuggets (you know they’re not 100% unless they tell you its ‘all white 100% meat’. If the daycare enter can make these from scratch then more power to them! Otherwise, get ready to feed your kids appetite!

Tags: