Today we're returning to a topic that's often talked about by experts, fathers, mothers and people. We're talking about food and its components, which are crucial to a child's growth and development.
In this post we want to highlight something that comes with the action of eating - savouring food. We human beings are very expressive and know when we like something, which triggers that feeling of pleasure, and so savouring is an action that is completely connected to eating. Babies, having this discovery phase in food, are even more pleasurable for them. Feeling the textures, discovering the thousand and one flavours they find at every meal and their reactions to each food that becomes their favourite, until a new one comes along.
For parents, watching their little ones savour food is the most delicious thing. Giving them the opportunity to start shaping their taste buds and allowing them, from an early age, to try foods they'll like better and others they'll give a second chance, because they don't want to leave any out.
But what about inside the tummy? Is it possible that babies can already start to form their taste preferences? We were surprised to find out in our research that babies' preferences can actually start to be created from the mum's tummy.
As far as we can tell, certain foods that the mother may eat during her pregnancy can influence the little one's taste preferences from an early stage. Some flavours of certain foods such as garlic, curry, banana or vanilla are able to cross the placenta and enter the amniotic fluid during pregnancy, which may prove that the baby can be subjected to these kind of aromas and flavours while still in the mother's tummy.
During the breastfeeding period, it is also possible that certain foods consumed can be found in the mother's milk, so if they are consumed by the baby, it will be another opportunity for the little one to create their own taste preferences. What's more, exposing children to this variety of flavours from an early age tends to make it easier for them to adapt to new foods than children who are only bottle-fed. However, this is just a comparison that we may or may not agree with, as we believe that the context and situation in which a baby is exposed from an early age is extremely decisive in shaping certain aspects in the future, in this case food.
This exposure to certain flavours means that, later on, little ones tend to choose foods that they liked from day one, whether during pregnancy or breastfeeding.
Today we're bringing you a topic on food that we found interesting and curious, in terms of the growth and development of little ones. In this case, the influence of the mother's eating habits and what can be passed on to the baby during pregnancy and breastfeeding. Without realising it, mum is already starting to show the world outside and the little one already comes with some more or less defined taste preferences and you'll see that he's still going to show that.
What about you? Mums out there, can you verify this theme that we've blogged about today? What food were you surprised your baby loved? We want to know your experience. We want to know your opinion.
