Do you have questions about healthy snacking? Ask PHE’s expert for a chance to win a £150 voucher NOW CLOSED

[JustineBMumsnet]

Making healthy choices when it comes to your children’s snacks (especially if you’re under the demands of pester power) can be difficult.

Change4Life is supporting you in making healthier snack choices, and they have Orla Hugueniot, Senior Nutritionist on board to help answer your questions on healthy snacking.

Here’s what Change4Life has to say: ‘The new Change4Life campaign aims to help families choose healthier snacks and cut back on sugar. The campaign reveals the surprising fact that children are getting half their sugar from snacks and sugary drinks between meals. To help parents take action Change4Life are introducing a simple new tip – ‘Look for 100 calorie snacks, two a day max’ - to help parents purchase healthier snacks and provide a suggestion for how to keep snacking in check each day. For lots of ideas for healthier snacking for kids and money-off vouchers, search Change4Life.’

Here’s some more information about Orla Hugueniot:
“Orla Hugueniot is the campaign nutritionist team lead at Public Health England (PHE). Since joining PHE in 2014, she has led the provision of expert nutrition advice for PHE Change4Life campaigns including Sugar Swaps (Jan 2015), Sugar Smart (2016) and Be Food Smart (Jan 2017) and Snack Smart (Jan 2018). Orla is a PHE spokesperson and has extensive experience with the media (both UK and Australian) including radio interviews and several TV appearances. She was previously a spokesperson for the FSA. She has worked with journalists in mainstream print media as well as the more specialised health press. Her previous experience includes working at the UK’s Food Standards Agency as a Senior Nutrition Scientific Officer, and as an independent nutritionist for public health nutrition campaigns in Australia. Her qualifications include an Hons BSc degree in Human Nutrition from King’s College London and a Diploma in Science Communication from Birkbeck University (University of London). Orla is a member of the UK and Australian Nutrition Societies.”

Ask Orla your questions about healthy snacking by 22nd January and we’ll select 10-15 questions for them to answer and post their responses as soon as possible. All who post a question below (whether it’s answered or not!) will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £150 voucher.

Thanks and good luck!

MNHQ

Should I be worried about artificial sweetners??

How do processed fruit bars (Yoyos and similar) and pureed fruit pots compare to actual fruit in terms of nutrition?

I'd like to know please what the research says about the impact when parents are seen by their children to carefully monitor intake of food /fret about food - and is there a body of evidence - have studies been replicated etc

Does a 'scarcity effect' kick in where parents are visibly restricting access to food?

Is there any evidence on whether leading by example ( ie eating modestly yourself) works better/worse than actively controlling how much food is allowed?

A kid would have to be genuinely hungry to peel and chomp through more than 2 or 3 raw carrots or bell peppers. Yet a picture of the vouchers available on the c4life website makes it looks as though change4life is giving money off of malt loaf ( when I was young [definitely before Orla was born] malt was for sickly kids who couldn't put on weight) and petit filous??

Is the thinking behind this campaign that providing small snacks that do not fill you up can actually mess with the way our body regulates hunger / when we feel full? particularly if they are made up mainly of simple carbohydrates?

Dear Orla(s), do you actually just think that we aren't hard enough anymore to enforce 'no eating between meals' which used to be the norm at one time? Would that actually be the best advice - to feed filling meals so snacks don't even feature?

When is the government going to move away from its outdated thinking about fats being bad? Sugar is way, way more of a problem, and encouraging things like Petits Filous is just going to mean kids lurch from sugar crash to sugar crash.

My 13 year old is over 6ft, skinny and still growing, does this apply to him...currently a snack would be 2 slices of toast with a banana or a huge bowl of muesli with milk.

Ok firstly there is NOT 150 calories in a boiled egg. That is untrue. Depending on The size of the egg, there’s between 50 and 85

Secondly, malnutrition isn’t a massive problem in the uk, and obesity is. Restricting high calorie snacks to 100 calorie portions will either force a healthier portioning habit or encourage a different choice of snack.

What are the healthiest cereals and yogurts you would recommend for children as they all seem to have a high sugar content.

Can you recommend a variety of healthy snacks or recipes I can make?

Why does change for life recommend low fat foods for kids, when often these then contain sugars or fake sugars?

Can you explain the rationale in promoting healthy eating in and out of schools when schools are also serving sugary deserts at every school meal. My dd has just had all the healthy4life information given to her at school and on the same day said she felt sick because she had eaten a big cake after lunch. I appreciate she could have chosen not to have the cake but she is 5! I wish schools would not serve ice cream, pie, cake, biscuits etc after lunch. It makes no sense to me to have a healthy eating campaign in schools when sugar is being served at each meal time. Dd's school menu is county wide.

My dss is underweight but only lives with us 2 days out of 7. He always eats well during meal times, but knows when he is full. He always asks for chocolate or sweets, we rarely give in. If he does have a small piece of chocolate it will be after a meal.

He likes eating fruit, would a homemade smoothie be a suitable snack? Or would I be better off just giving him the fruit as it comes?

Ok firstly there is NOT 150 calories in a boiled egg. That is untrue. Depending on The size of the egg, there’s between 50 and 85

I'm assuming you are referring to my post. You are right. A typo on my part. Still I can't see how 2 boiled eggs and a large banana in a day can be considered less healthy than many of the processed snacks under 200cal such as Petit filou or cereal bars both of which are full of sugar and fat. The point is calories are not a sign of healthiness.

When looking at sugars on a label how can you tell what are natural good sugars and which are the bad kind? Or is it just all bad?

Should kids have foods that contain artificial sugar/sweetener?

Which is better? Real sugar or sweetener?

Will this campaign be adressing schools too? We have a relatively healthy diet and eat a wide variety of foods. However my daughters school frequently give out unhealthy snacks. They went on a trip to McDonald's one day too, I phoned & complained - they should be encouraging children to make healthy choices *esp considering its an school for those on the autistic spec.

How do I avoid swapping sugary snacks for salty ones? E.g. instead of giving DC a biscuit, I try to give them a cracker instead - but is this just swapping sugar for salt?

Can porridge be a healthy snack?

Teeth health? Dried fruit full of sugar and sticks in teeth promiting tooth damage and acid. Chocolate has fat, calcium and dissolves so better?

My daughter who is 8y loves nuts. How many grams do you advise she eat per day?

So you know of any children’s yogurts that are sugar free or low sugar?
All of the sugar free yogurts that I have found are also fat free so no good.

Why are they promoting processed food?

Could they look into banning pseudo healthy food? People think it's fine to give these snacks as-lib because they use certain buzz words (whole grain, natural, 1 of your five a day) but in reality they're processed crap and you may as well give the child an actual chocolate biscuit to enjoy as it's probably equally as bad but a lot tastier!

Jam and honey! My son has a healthy appetite, he enjoys porridge, who grain toast and Greek yoghurt. But he has all of these with either jam or honey, around 1/4 to 1/2 a teaspoon max. Is this okay? He has it with full fat butter (which I will not change as I refuse to have processed 'spreads' in the house)

Winky Yeo Valley do organic full fat yogs for kids with no added sugar. There’s still fruit sugar, but better than nothing!

Do you have any recommendations for the best commercial glutenfree/dairyfree snacks as so many of them are loaded with extra sugar? I've always made our own.