Speaker 1Therapy's biggest impact doesn't show up in some dramatic breakthrough. It shows up in the smallest moments. You bite your tongue instead of escalating. You put your phone down instead of firing off that text. You say what you actually mean instead of what would hurt someone else the most. Nobody applauds those moments, but they quietly change your life. That's what growing feels like. And that's exactly what Grow Therapy is here for. Grow is therapy that works, covered by insurance. Sessions average $21 with insurance, and some pay as little as $0 depending on their plan. There are no subscriptions, no long-term commitments. You just pay per session. Grow connects you with thousands of high-quality, licensed therapists across the U.S., offering both virtual and in-person sessions, nights and weekends. You can search by what matters, like insurance, specialty, identity, or availability. And you can book a therapy session in minutes and begin in as little as two days, not the national 48-day average. See if you could pay as little as $0 for therapy in seconds at growtherapy.com slash ACAST. That's growtherapy.com slash ACAST. Growtherapy.com slash ACAST. Availability and coverage vary by state and insurance plan. At Harmony Bank, we
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Speaker 3How Not to Screw Up Your Kids podcast. So, pour yourself a cuppa, find a comfy seat, and enjoy the conversation. This is episode 130, and today's episode, Nutrition and Children's Wellbeing, I am talking to our go-to expert on nutrition, Lucinda Miller, nutritional therapist and founder of NatureDoc. We hear a lot about nutrition and children's well-being, and we're going to talk about nutrition and children's well-being. We hear so much now about the importance of food and nutrition, not only for our children's physical health, but also for their emotional health too. So, I asked Lucinda her top tips and to explain why gut health is as important for our children as it is for us as adults. You really, genuinely are in for a treat. Lucinda is all about practical, easy ways to implement these top tips and ideas, which we can all do. Now, the give this week is. Give this week will give you the link directly to Lucinda's blog, filled, I mean, literally packed with lots of really helpful information and tips about all things nutrition and children's well-being, as well as her website. So, as usual, all you need to do is head over to the free resource library, drmaryhan.com forward slash library, where you'll find the link to download the resource. All you need to do is pop in your email address, and you'll get instant access, not only to this week's resource, but all the other free resources. resources across all my podcast episodes as ever if you enjoy this episode i would love it if you could follow and review this podcast so that others can find us and we can spread the love so until next time here's lucinda i am delighted to welcome back um i think i should just call you our resident expert on all things nutrition which is the wonderful lucinda miller welcome welcome
Speaker 4welcome oh marianne it's so lovely to be back we've done so many lovely workshops together in the in the past and it's just great to be on one of your podcasts again
Speaker 3amazing well you are my go-to when it comes to giving any advice when it comes to nutrition i always will sort of signpost people and i thought it would be a really really good exercise to have a conversation with you about secondary school children so our tweens and our teens in terms of food so can i kick off by asking you a lot in this space certainly in the adult space about gut and how important our gut health is is it as important for our teens and our tweens and if so why okie
Speaker 4dokes so um just in case someone hasn't heard of gut health and why it's so important it's basically inside our bellies we've got billions and billions of bacteria and we thought oh is that a bit icky we shouldn't have that should we but actually these bacteria can be beneficial and these bacteria play a lot of roles in human health so they help to build a strong immune system they help to build something called neurotransmitters which are brain hormones which help with teenage and tween age mental health they help to make b vitamins they help to dial down something called inflammation which can cause exacerbations of things like eczema and asthma and so forth so it's really really important to get really good gut health and gut health can be nourished through a really healthy diet so these are things like eating lots of fruits and vegetables nuts seeds but also things like pulses but also herbs and spices and things like olive oil and even dark chocolate so there are lots of really great healthy foods that most people associate with being very nutrient dense so the ones they think oh they're full of iron they're full of zinc they're full of vitamins you know rather than say the white which is probably a carbohydrate without the extra nutrients and these all can help to nourish that gut microbiome which is this ecosystem of bacteria in the gut and they all play a role in sort of enhancing that and this is something that's been researched for over a hundred years but has become really really big in the last sort of 15 years in terms of research so i think in 2019 i don't know the current numbers but 2019 there was something like 16 000 papers published on the gut microbiome and how it can influence things like skin health mood sleep immunity you know neurodiversity i mean the full monty so it really does matter what's going in your gut and if you think logically you're feeding your gut at least three times a day and teens and tweens are probably snacking all day too so they're probably feeding their gut a lot during the day these are all opportunities to nourish that gut microbiome there are things that can reduce that diversity of the gut microbiome so it doesn't do such a good job and these are things like antibiotics and some medications like anti-acids sort of things like omeprazole etc so if a child's been on lots of rounds of antibiotics maybe they get lots of ear infections or tonsillitis or something like that or chest infections or whatever then they may have a more depleted gut microbiome and this may mean that they are less likely to be building this good immune system so they might be more susceptible to more infections because they haven't got this immune system in their gut it can also mean that they might become more moody they might become more down very often there could be some rise of anxiety if the gut microbiome is not nourished that well and equally you know with teenagers they're obsessed with their skin and the things like eczema and acne can get much worse thank you
Speaker 3for sharing that lucinda that that really clarifies that sort of whole thing around the gut microbiome but as a parent how would i know what are the first early warning signs that might that i could pick up on that would tell me that my child or my teen or tweens gut microbiome is out of whack well first of
Speaker 4all you probably look for more obvious issues before you look at the greater picture so it would be things like bad breath even if they brush their teeth quite well it could be some reflux so the food is regurgitated or they're just complaining of food and feeling very uncomfortable in their tummy there could be sort of more significant gut pain there could be rushing to the loo too quickly so a bit of loose bowel or more frequently we see constipation and i think people think that constipation has to be if it's if you're in serious pain or if you're maybe only going maybe once a week or something but actually going every day is actually quite important and obviously producing a relatively good quality brown sausage each day so if it's splatty if it's more yellow you know etc then or incredibly rock hard like conkers then there may be something going on now i appreciate by the time a child gets to secondary school age you're probably not seeing what's going into the lavatory however you can sometimes pick up on smell so if you go in and it's absolutely stinky you'll probably think something's a bit more going on than if you didn't notice that they're gone or not and equally you may not necessarily have to know about the poo sometimes you can see in their tummy whether they get very bloated over the day so i would say that most teens don't have to know about the poo they don't have to know about the poo they don't have to know about the poo they don't have to know about the poo they don't have to know about the poo and tweens and tweens will wake up with a relatively flat belly and then by the end of the day obviously we all naturally our tummies get a little bit bigger to go over the day, but it's when it becomes incredibly bloated. So it looks a bit more like a balloon. And there's a lot of gas. So there's a lot of whiffy farts going around. Then again, you'd know that the gut was a bit out of sync. I think you'd also think, what about if they've just been on antibiotics? I don't know, they often look like they've got a little bit of a white tongue, it always looks like a bit of thrush on the tongue, or there could be thrush down below. And so sometimes that's quite a good indicator of things are slightly out of whack. But generally, I'd say it's more, you're going to notice the gut more than anything else. The other things are slightly more what I would call chronic, as in they develop over time. So it's very, just occasionally someone would say, you know what, whenever they get a virus, their eczema really flares, or, you know, whenever they're constipated, their acne gets worse, or whatever that might be. So they notice. The difference is, sometimes people will notice, parents will notice a child's behavior might change having eaten different foods. But generally, you're not going to see that gut microbiome manifest straight away. It's all about building up. So it takes time to build these neurotransmitters. So for instance, to just give an example, most people have heard of a bug, a bacteria called lactobacillus. It's in most yogurts, it's in most keffirs, which are cousins of yogurt. It's the sort of more kind of abundant bacterial form of yogurt that people can buy in supermarkets now very easily. And that lactobacillus helps to digest milk. So very often, kids that can't digest milk, in fact, have low lactobacillus. And once you get the probiotics in, then guess what, they're able to digest dairy, and then they can eat more, and therefore they tolerate more, and therefore it builds the microbiome, which is great. But lactobacillus is a really key one. It's super important. For the immune system. So if your child is always getting colds and coughs, COVID's going around, you know, they're always off school with illness, then you may want to think about boosting them up with some lactobacillus. As I said, it also dials down inflammation. So people would say, yes, the acne is worse, the eczema is worse, the asthma is worse, their mood swings are worse. And again, that can be linked with something called inflammation, chronic inflammation. And again, that can help with that. But the main things with lactobacillus, which are so important, I think, personally, because I'm always thinking about child mental health and child performance at school and so forth, is that lactobacillus plays a role in making two very important neurotransmitters, which are these brain hormones that really turn on learning, memory, et cetera. And one of them is super important. It's called, it's basically the lactobacillus builds these in the gut, and then they kind of filtrate up to the brain to do their good stuff. And so lactobacillus helps to make acetylcholine. Acetylcholine is a key neurotransmitter that helps with the following: memory, learning, so things like working memory, processing, something called executive function, so organization skills, essentially, but also it helps with self-regulation and emotional regulation. So we see an awful lot of kids who are very kind of, you know, they've got some dyslexia, some dyspraxia, some ADHD, maybe some autism, but maybe not just that. They're just a bit scatty and they find it very difficult to focus, et cetera. And it may be that they're low, low in this, this important bacteria called lactobacillus. And it makes another neurotransmitter, another brain hormone called GABA, G-A-B-A. And GABA is our sort of cool calming neurotransmitters. It's that feeling having had a nice cup of tea, having had a yoga practice, maybe had a meditation or done some, you know, had a massage or whatever. It's that OM sort of feeling afterwards. It's that calm feeling. And we're always seeking that. Now, teenagers, because their brains are still developing, find it very difficult to get enough GABA. And when you don't have enough GABA, you find it very hard to sleep. You can become very anxious and you can be a big risk taker. And it's one of those big things that these are some of the big things that parents tear their hair out during the teenage years is because their kids are all over the shop. And basically these neurotransmitters are so important for regulating that. So I'm not saying they'll do, you know, they'll tick every single box and suddenly they'll be sort of perfect Peter having been horrid Henry prior to that. But they will, it will help over time. So obviously building in foods such as yogurt and kefir and fermented foods. So it could be miso soup. It could be some soy sauce. It could be some apple cider vinegar into foods as well as, you know, more sort of, you can get things like kombuchas and things like that, which are great and sauerkraut, but I find that they're not necessary. I find that they're not necessary. But they're not necessary a child's best friend straight away. They don't, you know, they're not particularly drawn to them. Some love kimchi. If they've been to Wagamama's, they often will like kimchi. They go, oh yeah, I get that one. I like that one. So over time you can build that lactobacillus in. If they've had antibiotics then, or quite regularly anyway, then, or just, you know, you feel that they've dipped since being on antibiotics, then I would give them some live bacteria supplement, like a probiotic that contains lactobacillus just to give them a bit of a boost up because sometimes you know, we all know teenagers particularly are very selective for their food and therefore they find it difficult to be able to eat those foods regularly. You know, often they leave home in the morning before going to school without eating anything. Then, you know, they'll have a rubbish lunch of pizza and biscuits and then, you know, they'll be starving when they come home and again, you know, raid the cupboard and you, you know, you'll get one good meal in them if you're lucky. So I totally know that sometimes, you know, supplements are, are more helpful actually than, than to try and push them to be having these foods they may not even like very much, for instance. But this is just an example of where the gut microbiome is so important and research is emerging all the time in terms of links, as I said, with, with, with the teenage brain and things like risk-taking behaviours and mood and, you know, things like, you know, depression, low mood, sort of suicidal ideation, self-harm, all those big things, as well as just helping your kids just to tick along and be happy and, and well and, and thrive and do better with their homework and schoolwork and so forth.
Speaker 3Yeah. I mean, it's, it's so important, as you say, there's so much research that's being done and so much coming out that is reinforcing how crucial it is to so many aspects. And of course, teens and their brains are developing anyway. We know that they don't, our brains don't fully mature until sort of 23, 24, and they naturally are going to be more impulsive. They'll take more risks. So it, it, I sort of get a feeling, Lucinda, that what we should be doing is almost assuming that their gut health is never optimal and really working on that assumption by trying, by kind of encouraging us to kind of introduce those foods where we can, and if not, then use it through supplements. Is that right?
Speaker 4Yes, absolutely. Obviously food first, if possible. So, you know, lots of different fruits and vegetables. So you, a lot of people heard the saying, eat the rainbow and they're not quite sure why. And the reason for eating the rainbow or eating your five a day or seven a day or 10 a day, or whatever you're aiming towards is because all those different fruits and vegetables have different colours, different pigments. So for instance, a range of berries will have purples and reds and pinks and so forth. And all of those will have slightly different, what they call polyphenols. And those polyphenols help to feed the gut microbiome. So if your child will only eat carrots, get the heritage carrots. So you can get purple ones, yellow ones, orange ones, and they taste the same. You can make a joke out of it. They're still carrots, but they're getting more benefit for their gut microbiome than just having the orange ones on their own. The same with peppers, you know, red, yellow, orange, green. So, you know, you can, and so it's quite good to shape things up a bit and try and get different fruits in each week. So rather than getting bananas every week, try and get peaches one week or blueberries the next week or whatever, and try and, you know, change things around. That's why smoothies can be so helpful because you can get lots of different ones all together, smushed up. So they do, they're a bit suspicious of something new, then they might prefer it in smushed up in a smoothie rather than seeing it whole going, heck, how the heck am I going to have
Speaker 3that? Yeah, no, that's really good. And actually goodness knows the amount of stuff that I managed to kind of blitz into my children's food as they were growing up. They've, they're only just finding out what I used to give them. Can I ask you Cinda, because you touched upon something that I think will really resonate with a lot of parents listening to this. And it is the challenge around breakfast. Cinda: Yeah. Should we just let go of it? Should we not be worrying about our teeth? So many children start school with no breakfast and often complain that they can't stomach, just don't want anything. Is it something that we should just let go of or are there some top tips that we can get some nutrients inside them?
Speaker 4So as adults, it's very easy to have breakfast later. We have a lot of time, we have more flexibility over when we do eat. The trouble is the school day is very structured and very often, well at secondary school, it's slightly different. Often they do bring in their own snacks, but you know, there's less opportunity to eat during the morning when you're ready to. And so, and you do most of your academic work in the morning. So actually fueling that brain first thing in the morning makes a lot of sense. I do appreciate there are kids whose guts do not wake up till a little bit later in the morning. And there's sort of two angles you can take to this. One is to send them off, maybe with a smoothie, with some protein powder or something. So it's really packed with nutrition or just something simple like a sandwich, you know, with ham and cheese or egg and cress, or, you know, know, tuna and cucumber or whatever it might be. So they've actually got something decent, half decent to eat at break time rather than just some sort of ultra processed little snack and think, well, that's their breakfast time. It'll be 10, 20 or whenever they have their break. And so that can really work for some who just aren't quite ready to eat so early in the morning. I often, if especially lots of secondary school kids are leaving very early in the morning to go to school, they've got a very long, maybe an hour long bus journey to get to school. And so that's again where you pack them with a sort of almost like a lunchbox, but a little bit more of a grown up lunchbox, but like a snack box that they can have so they can eat a little bit later on when they're a bit bored on the bus. So actually it's quite a good time for them to graze. So you can put some good things in there. But what is important to think about, especially say the kids who don't really have a very good lunch either because school lunch is pretty awful or there's only a corner shop or, you know what I mean? It's just, they're just very busy over lunchtime because they're very sporty and doing extra stuff is if they don't have breakfast and they're not having lunch, what are they going to do when they get back from school? They're just going to be a mess. They're going to be completely and utterly empty and they're going to be moody and difficult and unfocused. And also, as I said, raid all the rubbish straight out of your store cupboard rather than to eat something decent, because when you are that low in your blood sugars, it's literally, you're looking for that high cal big, sugar hit quickly to make you feel a bit better. So to work out why they may not be hungry in the morning. And one of my biggest tips in terms of sort of nutrition and supplements, et cetera.
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Speaker 2We believe that better happens together. No big bank bureaucracy, just a custom approach to help you thrive from business loans to mortgages and everyday banking needs. Harmony bank provides a secure modern experience with a touch of Texas hospitality. We're harmony bank. We're better happens together. Is an important mineral called zinc.
Speaker 4Now zinc is, you get in lots of different foods. It's in dairy, it's a meat, it's in shellfish, it's in nuts and seeds, et cetera, but they're often not the foods that kids will eat three times a day. They might eat once a day, maybe at a main meal, but not that much. And you need an awful lot of zinc for the teenage brain. So basically when you're going through puberty, you use up a lot of zinc to grow from being a young girl into a woman and a young boy into a man. And so all of those processes eat up a lot of zinc and your body will steal them to do that over and above other things like healing your skin. So the acne gets worse or fueling your appetite. So you can feel quite nauseous in the morning. So the kids that feel really nauseous in the morning are often very low in zinc. Now what's really interesting is zinc is helps you grow. So often kids that are a bit slow at going through puberty. So especially the boys, so girls often a bit faster, but boys are getting a bit slower, but later. And often they're looking like the little boy that then they just feel small. They feel like they they'll never ever grow up. And often it's because of a lack of zinc. Also zinc is super important for fueling your taste buds. So it's things that like sense of smell and taste. It revs up all your gastric juices. So it makes you hungry and a lot of very selective eaters. So a lot of teenagers, become highly selective eaters. So sometimes there's a moralistic side of things, you know, it's like, I don't want to harm animals. So we're going to cut out meat or dairy or whatever. That's what they've read. That's what other people are doing. However, those are the zinc rich foods. So what happens is then they get less. And so then their skin gets worse. Their mood goes down. Their performance goes down at school because zinc is really important for the brain. And so there's a sort of, you know, this, this sort of chicken and egg situation where they spiral down and down and down, and it can lead to disordered eating and sort of narrow eating because, you know, they just are not interested in food anymore because of course their sense of smell and taste is very narrow. Zinc is the second most abundant mineral in your nervous system. So without enough zinc, you can become very dysregulated. So it's very important for things like working memory, processing, emotional regulation. It helps to stimulate the same parts of the brain that this acetylcholine does. So it's very, very key to get right. And I just have found that unless you're a family that really, really focuses on eating lots of really good quality red meat, lots of eggs, lots of fish, lots of nuts and seeds, really focuses on those nutrient dense foods, then your child will probably be more susceptible to being low in zinc. And this is where sometimes what I'm going to call a car crash happens as in, you know, there's a category of nutrients that can occur with a child that's not getting enough zinc. So I do think it's probably one of the most important nutrients to supplement as a teen is growing, especially going through puberty. And if it's a tweenager who's going through puberty early, maybe it's a girl who's starting their periods a little bit early, like 9, 10, 11, rather than 13, 14, then they may need the zinc earlier. And so that's sort of such an important one. And also any child who's on ADHD because, you know, they're an awful lot now these days, again, that can suppress the appetite. So they're eating less during the day. And again, zinc can help to ameliorate those side effects of the medication. So it's sort of super duper. So I just think that's a key message to get across to parents who are a little bit worried. Well, one of the biggest problems they have with the teenagers these days is actually not eating enough or eating too much junk and not enough nutritious food. Oh,
Speaker 3my God, that's, that's unbelievable. I had no idea. And that's such a easy thing to try and implement with the zinc. And I'm guessing Lucinda, if we suspect that our child is like that, both of my children were never massive fans of breakfast, but they were good at they, I would always send them off with something, but they were never really, really big fans of it. But I'm guessing as a parent, if you suspect that it could be now that you've armed with that knowledge of zinc, you could do a bit of a test to try them on zinc for a few weeks, see what that does. If that brings their appetite back, and they're able to tolerate something in the morning, then it probably is because they're zinc deficient. And then you can kind of keep supplementing.
Speaker 4Yeah, so I think what you can do is you can think about supplementing throughout the teen, I would definitely supplement for three or four months to begin with, and just see if there's a difference in them. Because then you'll know whether it's helping or not, particularly if the child has any kind of neurodivergent skew. So there's been really masses of research on kids with dyslexia, dyspraxia, ADHD, and autism, sensory processing, that they often are quite low in zinc as a baseline anyway. They're often kids that have these, what's known as comorbidities, which means that what goes alongside are things like immune issues, allergies, eczema, gut issues, etc. So and often a very narrow diet sense, you know, because of their sensory side of things, and often zinc can really help to stabilize that. But obviously, this is for all this is a message for all parents is lots of kids are doing really well. But one thing they can look for if they want to think is my child does my child? Needs zinc. And this happened to all three of my children. So you know, and it was my barometer to have an understanding of what to look out for. And there were two things to look for. The first thing was when they were a little bit younger than secondary school, but it's still I think it's really important here is that when you're low in zinc, and sometimes when you're low in something called iron, which is another key mineral, is kids tend to chew on their collars, or on their hoodies, and you know, they tend to chew on their food, or tend to put lots of things that are non food items in their mouth. This is known as PICA, P-I-C-A. And it can indicate a need for zinc and iron. So if they've got soggy, holey t shirts and hoodies all the time, and collars and cuffs or soggy, then that might be an indicator that they need more zinc, and maybe some more iron. So that's quite a good one. And I just it happened every time I literally put the zinc and iron in for like three or four days, and it will all stop each time. It's like, no, that could not happen. And it just did and no more soggy t shirts. And the second thing is, fingernails, this is not just a zinc sign it can mean low minerals generally like magnesium low calcium but zinc is a big one especially when it's going through puberty is you see lots of white flecks or speckles on the nails and it most people will have one maybe two on one you know on one or one or say two of their 10 fingernails but actually when there's more than that then you know that that is a thing for them so it's something to spot it doesn't happen with every child and sometimes it's purely that sort of you know lack of appetite in the morning and quite an a diet that's narrowing and they're not growing too well um is is is a bit is a big indicator or very sort of emotionally labile very sort of all over the shop is another a key one but i would say in terms of actually practically observing them because sometimes it's easier just to watch them and go oh look at your you know look at the nails because you can see them whilst they're eating or you know look at their chewed collars and that will give you an idea of where they've they just need topping up and sometimes it's topping up just for a week or two and then and it's often when they've just had a cold so their immune system's low because zinc is stolen is used up a lot when you'll have you've got an infection so zinc's one of the key ones for viruses for instance um or they're just having a growth spurt or they're just doing a lot more they're very sporty or whatever thank you lucinda
Speaker 3that's so helpful and actually i love those kind of early warning signs of you know in terms of sucking on collars and other things it's just and the neck figure out what you're doing and it's a really good way to get rid of all that stuff and it's a really good way to get rid of all that stuff and it's a really good way to get rid of all that stuff and it's a really good way to get rid of all that stuff it's just and the neck fingernails it's such an easy way to spot you touched earlier on about snacks and we know there's been a lot being talked about about ultra processed foods teens seem to be in my experience personal experience with my own children drawn to all of the stuff that we spend so much of our time and effort trying for them to avoid they seem to be drawn to that and particularly when we're looking at tweens and teens that are then getting buses who've then got a bit of cash who are then buying their own lunches or at least have got access to shops to buy things how do we encourage them to make better choices without being that lectury parent i think it's
Speaker 4really hard to get it right and what i try and do is to say every meal and snack they're having at home make it a real winner make it really really great you know so a really fantastic breakfast maybe some eggs maybe some porridge with lots of peanut butter and seeds and berries or you know overnight oats with yogurt and apple and nuts and seeds and so forth so trying to pack in a really good breakfast that they're going to love and then again supper make sure that that's fantastic there's lots of vegetables lots of lovely fish maybe some meat if you're vegetarian lots of lovely pulses and beans and so forth so make every single meal at home incredibly nutritious send them off with as many good quality snacks as possible and that could be some you know berries um some seeds um maybe some you know cottage cheese or some cheddar cheese you know just bits and pieces that they can have throughout the day or so we're talking about earlier a smoothie so try and get as much as you can control in again send them off with a full water bottle so that they've actually got something to drink because if they're thirsty they'll go buy a can of coke rather than drink their water but if they've got water that's free they'll drink that first so it's all about sort of looking for the pinch points during the day and thinking when might they want to have those upf snacks so is it that um you know are they coming home on the bus and there's a corner shop on the way before they get to the bus is everyone going there have they got enough money um so that might be the time where you think yep that's the only time i can't control but i can control what goes in their bag or you know actually i'm picking them up to take them to football after school so actually what i'm going to do is i'm going to make sure that i've got a big bag of food so they don't need to go to the shop but you've got to be quite relaxed and i think the most important message that every parent needs to understand is children will remember the habits that you put in at home and not what is influenced by their friends or their friends families or when they're out and about so they will have a very emotional tie with say your homemade chapati pie they will love it forever when they're out and about and they're at uni they'll be calling you saying how do you make that shepherd's pie mum because that will make them feel at home and safe so foods that you cook from scratch at home where they smell the lovely food that you're cooking and they're enjoying it together and they've got that lovely feel of family being together will make a much more emotional attachment to that food than if they're with a mate and they grab a can of coke and a packet of quavers on the way back from school they'll remember the conversation but they won't actually remember what they've eaten so it's all about paving the way for habits in the future so yes you want to help their behavior and their mood and things now and that's where positive nutrition can make a huge impact in terms of things like as i said breakfast snacks that you make at home is really important too and all those sorts of things but i know that that's not always going to be 100 of the picture but what's really interesting and it may just be my children we're real foodies we've always talked about food at home but the good stuff they've both you know that they they and their friends talk about food quite a lot they enjoy cooking for each other they you know what i mean they've actually really got a buzz out of it and you know they've learned a lot from youtube as well on cooking as well but you know it's not necessarily all about healthy eating it's about eat cooking from scratch is key and i think it's creating that culture at home of food is special and food is nourishing as rather than putting so i have so i've been cooking for a long time and i've been cooking for a long time and i've as far as i'm aware have never said oh naughty cake oh how naughty we're having cake i've just said oh fantastic we're having cake we just had a lovely walk let's sit down together a cup of tea and really enjoy this cake together it looks so good it's got walnuts it's got coffee in it or whatever you know and talk about it and create that culture of positivity around food and you know taking them off when they do have time with you to maybe local markets food markets or farm shops or just you know finding lots of recipe books and saying look okay you're fed up with my cooking what do you want to cook and i do think actually some of these box schemes are quite good you know like whether it's you know gusto or hello fresh or whatever mindful chef i think they're all quite good because they're introducing new ingredients to families and the teams are quite engaged and sometimes oh i can do that it's giving me the instructions i know what to do and everything's sort of ready for them to do so it's not a big hassle so that is another entry way into getting them into the kitchen into really enjoying the foods that they're eating so i think don't sweat how many snacks they're having but if you can get obviously lunch is going to be a hard one but basically if you can get a good breakfast and a good dinner and each day that is going to be two-thirds of the nutrition they need in the day and everything else is sort of a bonus as such and at the weekends you may be in control of all three meals and even better and then at the weekends do some baking together you know they i mean i think everything is going to be in control of all three meals and even better every teenager just well most teenagers absolutely love to bake muffins and things and so if you've got some fun recipes you know with a bit of grated courgette or some nuts and seeds or whatever it is in there they'll get engaged in the process and really enjoy the outcome and the great thing is with these snacks is you can freeze them so there's always ones that you can pull out first thing in the morning put in a lunchbox or a snack box and they'll defrost within 20 minutes maximum so you know they're there ready for the child to eat on the way to school or at school or after school depending on how independent they are so it can be done it's a little bit more effort but if you can get them to be involved and engaged too i think that's really key
Speaker 3yeah and i would say a hundred percent second everything that you said there lucinda you know my children were supremely guilty of eating all sorts of rubbish in their teen years but they both went to university and they would both message me to ask for specific recipes of things that we made i had to take photographs of so i think you know if we focus on the wins that we can make rather than get too caught up in the the rubbish that they're eating when they're not with us and really trying to kind of make those as good as we can possibly make them and get them involved because they just they want to be involved they want to be sort of deciding what recipes they want to eat and and all of those lovely things one final question lucinda and this is very much around knowing full well that families are supremely busy and there is always a huge amount of guilt as a parent if you you know feeling that you're not always doing the right things for your child so we know how important food is as a busy parent what three quick wins can you give me in terms of easy food that won't take up a huge amount of my time that i know that my children are going to that is going to give them some good stuff on those days where i'm literally walking in and i've only got 20 minutes or half an hour an hour before i i have got food to present on the table so if you've
Speaker 4had a child that you've had to prepare a packed lunch for anyway um then it's a good time to prepare breakfast at that point so think ahead so something like an overnight oats or just put things out so either in the fridge or on the side depending on you know if they need to stay fresh or whatever um so that they're ready for the morning so that's one thing so overnight oats for instance you put oats and some apple juice and some yogurt and you know and lots of different you know all sorts of things in there and then maybe a little bit of sweetener in the morning a bit of maple syrup or honey just to bring it together um and that can be super easy and you could heat them up a little bit if it's the winter So that would be my first win is to prepare the night before as much as possible. And even if, as I said, it's just putting it out so it's ready to go. So you're not faffing going, I can't find the eggs or I can't find the milk or whatever. It's all just sort of sitting at eye height in the fridge, for instance, so that you just pull them out and go. The second thing is to, you know, do rely on things like fresh fruit, do rely on frozen vegetables. It's OK to have those. So frozen fruit and frozen berries are good, too. And I think a smoothie is a real winner because you can put a lot in there and it's just practicing a little bit. Maybe at the weekends, just get some consistency and so forth and getting ones that they like. But you can get some quite good smoothie packs now from supermarkets with most of the things in. And you can just add a couple of extra bits and pieces, like maybe some protein powder or something to there or some yogurt. So I think smoothies are a really, really good win, too. And then I would say, you know, always batch cook as much as possible. So I will always try and get the sort of, you know, the deal. Say, you know, if I'm buying beef mince for bolognese or lamb mince for, say, shepherd's pie, I'll buy, you know, two or three because there's a deal on. And then I'll make, you know, three, four, five shepherd's pies or bolognese and just have masses in the freezer. So it's OK to kind of have some of your main meals on repeat and always have something there because, you know, you can just pop it out the night before and it will defrost overnight. And then, you know, it's there for you the next evening when you get back from work. So I'd say that, you know, it's prepared. Breakfast the night before. Think about smoothies to sort of supercharge and sort of a quick blitz. And then the third thing is to batch cook as much as possible.
Speaker 3Oh, Lucinda, those are some really genuinely easy things that we can all kind of implement and put in place. And as always, you have been phenomenal. So much good stuff and so much information. And we will be sharing the link directly to Lucinda and also her blog and also her shop as well as her. But incredible books. I have got both cookbooks. They are fantastic. And we have sort of they've got to that point, Lucinda, sorry, where they've ended up being smudged in places where things have been cooked and then accidentally have spilled over onto the pages. But thank you so much again for all of your incredible knowledge, which you've shared. And hopefully we'll have you back on again really soon.
Speaker 4It's been lovely to catch up with you, Marianne, again and take care and we'll see each other hopefully in the flesh soon.
Speaker 5Thank you. Thank you.
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