A Unique Child: Health & nutrition - For all seasons

While supermarkets have offered us more choice of exotic imported food, we have lost the link between the food we eat and its natural growing season. Environmentally and nutritionally we are losing out when we choose food from far-flung corners of the world.

Not only are food miles playing a part in the damage we do to our climate, but there is evidence that food picked before it is ripe and then transported and stored for long periods loses many of its nutrients, especially vitamin C. That is why at Snapdragons we prefer to buy the bulk of our food from local growers and this inevitably means a return to seasonal eating.

Eating with the seasons means that our children are being offered a wide range of different foods with new tastes and textures and a good balance of vitamins and minerals. It may also be that some food allergies are triggered by overexposure to certain foods, so a seasonal variety could help children avoid them.

Sadly, it is often much easier to stick with a limited palette of green beans, peas and sweetcorn throughout the year because children are notoriously suspicious of unfamiliar ingredients but - as it is thought that their tastes are largely formed in the first five years - trying new foods is important for their future enjoyment of healthy food. Parents are constantly surprised by what their children have agreed to try at nursery.

GROWING YOUR OWN

At our nursery in Keynsham we are lucky to have a big walled garden, once the kitchen garden for a large Victorian household. In the autumn, we have an abundant supply of Bramley apples, damsons and the juiciest blackberries. There is even an ancient medlar tree - an ornamental flowering tree with edible fruit.

Our chef, Raquel Kneeves, has established a vegetable patch where she has grown an impressive array of vegetables over the past two years with the help of children who love to plant, water, harvest and cook their own produce.

She laid out the beds in a circle around a central herb tub and keeps a record of what she plants in each section so that the crops can be rotated. This helps to avoid specific diseases and pests building up in the same spot and allows plants to use nutrients left in the soil by other varieties.

The most successful crops have been courgettes, tomatoes, beetroot and a selection of green leafy vegetables, but Raquel has also branched into the more exotic by planting peppers, sweet potatoes and even ginger. Not everyone has enough space to try such a wide range, but even the tiniest gardens can provide a good crop of courgettes grown in pots or trailing tomatoes in hanging baskets.

OUR LOCAL GROWER

While we grow some of our vegetables, we can't realistically feed a nursery of some 100 children this way, so we have chosen to buy our fruit and vegetables from local wholesaler Lovejoys. It is always willing to talk through alternatives, offers advice on cost-effective produce and aims to supply customers within a one-hour radius of its base in West Wiltshire.

It knows that traceability is important to us and our invoices show the place of origin of every item we buy. This means we can keep track of the proportion of our spend that goes on local produce, something which our Food for Life Partnership Gold Catering Mark from the Soil Association requires us to do.

MENU PLANNING

We plan our menus on a four-week cycle and change them every three months to reflect the seasons.

This means that each meal combination will only be repeated three times a year, giving us a wonderful opportunity to introduce children to new tastes. It is quite a commitment and takes a lot of work to get right because we have to ensure a balanced diet for all our children no matter how many sessions they attend.

WHAT IS IN SEASON?

We feel we have a good understanding of seasonal availability, but we also have trusted sources we go to for advice on seasonal produce, including the Soil Association, Lovejoys and the Children's Food Trust, which has a very useful 'In Season' poster.

If you turn to the internet for advice on seasonal produce, remember to check you are on a UK site. When using seasonal vegetables, it is useful to be flexible with recipes. Raquel is very inventive and regularly substitutes ingredients when there is an offer from Lovejoys or a glut from her vegetable plot. Last summer, courgettes and beetroot made appearances in everything from sausage rolls to cakes, and Raquel makes delicious bread for the children with all sorts of vegetable combinations.

MOROCCAN CHICKPEA BURGERS

With wholemeal buns, yoghurt dressing and red cabbage salad

Ingredients (serves four)

- 1 tin organic chickpeas (in unsalted water)

- 1 medium onion (diced)

- 2 stalks celery (sliced)

- 1 clove garlic (chopped)

- 1 large parsnip (grated)

- 2 medium carrots (grated)

- 1/2 cauliflower (finely chopped)

- 1 large sweet potato (grated)

- 1 organic egg

- small bunches of both fresh flat leaf parsley and fresh coriander (chopped)

- 1 tsp each of ground cumin, ground cinnamon and sweet paprika

- 1/2 tsp each of turmeric and black or white pepper

- rapeseed oil

Method

- Saute all the vegetables until soft, but do not brown.

- Add the spices, stir to combine, remove from heat and turn into a large bowl.

- Blitz drained and rinsed chickpeas in a food processor. You want them to be coarsely chopped, not a smooth puree.

- Combine the chickpeas with the vegetables and add the egg and chopped herbs.

- Form into patties and place on a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper.

- Drizzle a little rapeseed oil over the patties and cook in at 200degC (gas mark 6) for 20 minutes or until golden.

Dressing: Grate or finely chop 1/4 cucumber; squeeze out excess water by hand; mix with 1 tbsp chopped fresh mint and 250g organic natural yoghurt.

Salad: Shred finely or grate 1/4 red cabbage; toast 1 tsp cumin seeds briefly in a small, dry pan; add to the cabbage; sprinkle with juice of a lemon and a glug of rapeseed oil.

Mary Llewellin is business development manager at Snapdragons, www.snapdragonsnursery.com

MORE INFORMATION

• 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. For more information, see www.snapdragonsnursery.com.
• Could you be the next winner of our Nursery Food Award? The Nursery World Awards 2015 are now open for entries. See www.nurseryworldawards.com.

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