A Unique Child: Health & Nutrition - Sugar craft

I’d like to start with a confession. I love Jamie Oliver. I’m sorry, Jules, I know he’s yours but I’ve said it now and I know I am not alone. Ever since he buzzed onto our televisions on his moped 20 years ago and introduced us to his bachelor pad, his buddies, his one-day-to-be-wife, Jules, and his deceptively casual approach to robust Italian cooking, the nation has followed his progress, cooked his latest creations and, recently, watched him take on the establishment.

Alarmed by the loss of kitchens and trained cooks in schools and the subsequent slide in nutritional standards, he launched his campaign to bring back proper cooking and healthy school dinners, dragging the Government behind him. Now he’s turned his impressive energy to fighting the food industry in a battle to cut the harmful quantity of sugar in processed food.

Although experts have warned for years that we cannot go on consuming sugar at current levels without serious health consequences, the focus seemed to be on the individual to take control of their diet. Jamie Oliver and his significant publicity machine have upped the pressure dramatically. He has placed the emphasis of his campaign firmly on the food industry because much of the sugar we consume is hidden in prepared food and drinks, not in the sugar we add to our tea. To tackle that, we need food manufacturers to be on board.

The trouble is that sugar is a cheap way to make things taste good. The World Health Organization (WHO) suggests imposing a ‘sugar tax’, which would raise the price of high-sugar products, particularly fizzy drinks, and help to subsidise the cost of treating obesity, diabetes, heart disease, tooth decay and the cancers associated with a high-sugar diet.

THE WRONG SORT OF SUGAR

WHO’s Commission on Ending Childhood Obesity also identifies food labelling as an area that needs to change. The traffic-light scheme helps identify high-sugar products at a glance, but the labels do not differentiate between added sugars and those that occur naturally in the food.

Fruit, vegetables, milk, beans and grains all contain sugar to some degree, but these intrinsic sugars are not as harmful because it takes our bodies longer to extract the sugar, delivering a long-lasting, even supply of energy instead of a surge of empty calories that leaves you tired and craving more sweet food.

The NHS Change4Life Sugar Smart campaign concentrates on added sugars, advising that a four-year-old child should not exceed the equivalent of five sugar cubes (19g) of added sugar a day. It has even developed the Change4Life Sugar Smart app, which will tell you how many cubes of added sugar there are in an item when you scan the barcode. By added sugar, it means anything added by a manufacturer, cook or consumer – and it isn’t just the sugar you buy in a bag, but includes honey, syrups, fruit juice and nectars.

A FRESH START

People like to eat what they’re used to. Our tastebuds have been trained to like more and more sugar, and savoury foods are not safe from this trend either; shop-bought bread, soup and salad dressings can contain as much sugar as cakes and biscuits. Unfortunately, even when companies attempt change, it can backfire.

Indra Nooyi, the chief executive officer of PepsiCo, concerned by the diabetes epidemic in India, attempted to introduce some healthier products, but they have not proved popular and the balance sheet has suffered. With very young children, we have a chance to make a clean break from this cycle – rather than having to wean children off unhealthy, sugary foods, we can avoid introducing them in the first place.

TAKE CONTROL, COOK YOUR OWN

The best way to take control of children’s sugar consumption is to cook from scratch. That way, savoury dishes stay savoury and the sweet dishes can be just a little bit less sweet – and twice as delicious.

At Snapdragons we have cakes and biscuits on our menu a few times a week, but we reduce the amount of sugar in several ways:

• One simple step is to reduce the portion size of a biscuit but serve it with something else. A small homemade shortbread biscuit is perfect alongside natural yogurt and fruit puree, for instance.
• Adapt recipes by reducing the amount of sugar by two thirds – enough to cut the sweetness but not enough to change the texture.
• Alternatively, substitute some of the sugar with mashed banana, pureed orange, grated carrot, parsnip or beetroot, which will add natural sugar of the kind that takes the body longer to extract.
• Bananas and custard become even more flavoursome and just that little bit healthier if you swap some of the sugar with pureed banana – double banana custard!
• Swap cakes for scones and top with fresh strawberries. Or serve individual shortcrust pastry tarts filled with a layer of sliced banana, then a mixture of strawberries and raspberries.
• Keep back a handful of berries, puree them, then thicken over a gentle heat with a little arrowroot, cool and pour a thin layer over the fruit to make the tart glossy and even more inviting.
• Breakfast cereals are one of the worst culprits for added sugar, but skipping breakfast is just as bad for setting off sugar cravings. We offer porridge with fruit, wholemeal toast with cream cheese, or maybe drop pancakes and sliced banana in the mornings for our early birds, giving them the best start for another fun-packed day.

Mary Llewellin is operations manager at Snapdragons. Snapdragons Keynsham has the Food For Life Partnership Gold Catering Mark, a Children’s Food Trust Award, is accredited by the Vegetarian Society and was winner of the Nursery World Nursery Food Award in 2012 and 2014. See www.snapdragonsnursery.com

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