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Healthy
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Fun Fruits!
The old saying, "an apple a day keeps the doctor away," has been replaced by a new message: "Five a day for better health!" Everyone over the age of two should try to eat at least two servings of fruit and three servings of vegetables each day. And it does not have to be apples!
With so many fiber-rich fruits to choose from, it should be easy to get children of all ages to eat at least two servings of fruit each day. Sweet, tangy, sour, soft, crunchy, or juicy--fruits are fun to eat and make meals inviting.
The natural sugar (fructose) in fruits and pure fruit juice provides "get up and go" power, or energy, and "good stuff" such as vitamins and fiber. Oranges, Mandarin oranges, tangerines, grapefruits, lemons, limes, strawberries, pineapple, and melons (watermelon, cantaloupe and honeydew) are good sources of Vitamin C. This vitamin does many things such as: keeps blood vessels, gums and teeth healthy; helps the body absorb other nutrients in foods, including iron, to promote healthy red blood cells; provides important boosters for the immune system; and, helps make collagen, the sticky substance that holds cells together, strengthens tissue, helps protect against bruising, and strengthens and helps repair damaged muscle.
Red, orange, or yellow fruits such as peaches, tangerines, apricots, and plums contain Vitamin A. These brightly colored fruits promote proper bone growth, improve vision (especially night vision), and help make skin healthy and hair shiny.
Fruit juice with pulp, pineapple chunks, and apples or pears with the peelings are excellent sources of fiber. Fiber helps control cholesterol and thus, reduces the incidence of hardening of the arteries (coronary heart disease). It also helps with digestion and elimination (removal of waste).
A child's diet should contain at least two servings of fruit, fresh, frozen, canned, dried or juiced, daily. Try to offer fruit more often than fruit juice because it is more filling and contains more nutrients than juice. Provide fruit for breakfast such as fresh fruit on cereal or pure fruit juice. Include fruit once or twice each day, either with meals or as a snack. Here are some fun ways to introduce fruits.
Spend a week exploring fruits through stories, dramatic play, songs, dance, games and sensory explorations.Use shapes to remember fruits. Hold out your thumb and index finger. Slowly bring them together to make a circle. Ask, "What shapes are most fruits?" (A circle) Let children name fruits.
Let children vote on what fruits to include on a snack picnic. Wedges of watermelon, orange juice, fresh fruit, frozen bananas, or fruit salad can be fun.
Read stories or books about fruit.
Provide different whole fresh fruits. Have children choose their favorite fruit and tell why they like it. Look at colors, shapes, and textures.
Explain that fruits grow on plants. Fruits serve as a protective container for plant seeds. Show how the strawberry seeds are on the outside of the berry. "Can you see them?" Cut a raspberry in half and look for the tiny seeds inside the round parts of the berry. Cut an apple in half to make circles with "stars"
of seeds inside.
Look at, touch, and talk about seeds in the various fruits. Compare sizes and shapes. Most seeds, like those in apples, peaches, watermelon, and plums are not eaten. Some seeds are eaten like those in kiwi, strawberries, and blueberries. Do you taste seeds when you eat strawberries or raspberries?
Insert pretzel sticks into apple slices, banana slices, pineapple cubes, strawberries, or melon balls. Let children choose their fruit for snack or mealtime. Ask them to smell each fruit, and then taste them.
Whether you call it soup or salad, this clever fruit combo is fun to make and eat.Fruit Soup
Learn where fruits grow by finger play.1 apple cored and diced
3/4 cup orange juice
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Juice of half a grapefruit
1/2 cup diced strawberries
1/3 cup diced peaches
1/4 cup crushed pineappleStir all the ingredients in a medium-size bowl. Makes three servings.
Have children repeat each line of the poem The Apple Tree after you. Say it several times:
Drying apples can show one way that some fruits can be saved.Way up high in an apple tree
(Raise hands overhead)Two little apples looked at me.
(Keep arms overhead and make two circles using forefingers and thumbs.)I shook that tree as hard as I could.
(Make two fists and place them on top of each other. Hold them in front of you and shake.)Down fell the apples.
(Raise hands and bring down in front of your body.)Um-m they were good.
(Rub stomach with one hand.)
Drying Apples
2 apples
1 gallon cold water
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Peel and core apples. Cut each apple into 10 rings, about 1/4 inch thick. Drop rings in a bowl containing cold water and lemon juice and soak for 2 or 3 minutes (to keep rings from browning). Drain rings and let children pat them dry with paper towels.
Place a sheet of wax paper in a microwave oven. Arrange apple rings on the wax paper so that they are not touching. Set microwave on defrost for 35-45 minutes. The apples will be rubbery and dry when they are done. Store in an airtight container.
Burgin Fowlkes, RD, LD, Senior Nutrition Educator, Health Program & Communications, Jefferson County AL Dept. of Health
Resources
5 a Day for Better Health, National Cancer Institute, 6130 Executive Blvd., EPN 232, Bethesda, MD 20892-7332; www.5aday.gov
Food Guide Pyramid for Young Children, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion, 1120 20th Street NW, Suite 200, North Lobby, Washington, DC 20036; (202) 606-8000; www.usda.gov/cnpp
Internet Resources
National Cancer Institute, www.5aday.gov
Produce for Better Health Foundation, www.5aday.com
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