Prevention of childhood obesity and chronic disease can start in the kitchen.
Teaching healthy eating habits from a young age will help save your child from the effects of processed foods. There is a strong connection between food and health.
First, learn some simple steps to prepare healthier meals. You don’t have to prepare gourmet meals every night. Easy recipes and simple prep tasks work well for busy families. Develop a taste in your young ones for healthy food.
Second, it’s never too late to help a picky eater. Physical symptoms may have led to picky eating, if some foods were previously uncomfortable to eat. Getting a physiological diagnosis can help guide a joyful food experience. It may take 15 tries to enjoy something new. Tasting small amounts of new things makes food introduction easier.
Finally, encourage your children to be part of the food preparation process. Create a small garden and tend it with your kids. Knowing where food originates contributes to a joyful eating experience. Start with an herb garden and work up to a small, raised garden that works well with the space and sunlight available to you.
Listen as Dr. Nimali Fernando joins Dr. Holly Lucille to share tips on encouraging healthy eating habits in children.
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Creating Healthy Eating Habits
Featuring:
Dr. Nimali Fernando is a pediatrician practicing in Fredericksburg, VA, and founder of the website doctoryum.org and The Doctor Yum Project.
She graduated from the University of Pittsburgh school of Medicine and School of Public Health with an MD and Masters in Public Health. She completed residency and chief residency in Pediatrics at The University of Texas Health Sciences Center Houston and served there for two years as a Clinical Assistant Professor in the department of Pediatrics.
Nimali Fernando, MD, MPH
Dr. Nimali Fernando is a pediatrician practicing in Fredericksburg, VA, and founder of the website doctoryum.org and The Doctor Yum Project. She graduated from the University of Pittsburgh school of Medicine and School of Public Health with an MD and Masters in Public Health. She completed residency and chief residency in Pediatrics at The University of Texas Health Sciences Center Houston and served there for two years as a Clinical Assistant Professor in the department of Pediatrics.
In 2005 she and her husband, also a physician, moved their family back east to Fredericksburg.
In 2014 she opened Yum Pediatrics, a full service general pediatrics practice with a focus on wellness and prevention through a healthy diet. Yum Pediatrics shares a large teaching kitchen and teaching garden with The Doctor Yum Project. She is also co-author of the new book, Raising a Healthy, Happy Eater, a Parent’s Handbook, and just started a new website with her co-author, ParentingInTheKitchen.com, a go-to resource for raising healthy, happy eaters.
A portion of the royalties of her new book and website will be donated to the Doctor Yum Project’s programs.
In 2014 she opened Yum Pediatrics, a full service general pediatrics practice with a focus on wellness and prevention through a healthy diet. Yum Pediatrics shares a large teaching kitchen and teaching garden with The Doctor Yum Project. She is also co-author of the new book, Raising a Healthy, Happy Eater, a Parent’s Handbook, and just started a new website with her co-author, ParentingInTheKitchen.com, a go-to resource for raising healthy, happy eaters.
A portion of the royalties of her new book and website will be donated to the Doctor Yum Project’s programs.