Healthy holiday treats for kids

'Tis the season, again! The season for cakes, cookies, candies and eggnog, that is. They can fill up your child with refined sugar in no time. Unlike adults, children usually do not have the verbal skills to properly express any unpleasant feelings they experience from eating too much of the wrong foods.

Oftentimes, an excess of refined flours and sugars results in a food "high," causing children to act out and be hyperactive or overly silly, followed by a food crash, with symptoms like fatigue, moodiness and irritability.

In addition to affecting your child's behaviour and mood, too much sugar also has effects on a child's health, which can include:

• Weight gain. Eating too much refined sugar and flour found in shortbread, cookies, cakes and white bread facilitates the excess storage of fat in the body.

• Suppressed immune system function. Eating too much white sugar dramatically reduces the number of white blood cells (leucocytes) in the body that are necessary to fight off infection.

Tips for healthy eating
In order to keep the holidays fun and tasty and keep your child from thinking you are the Sugar Scrooge, follow these healthy holiday eating tips:

1. Go for natural sugars
It's easy to tell if a food item contains white sugar. When reading a label, simply look for the words ending in the suffix -ose, such as high fructose, maltose and sucrose. Corn syrup should also be avoided. When selecting sugars, it is best to select those that are unrefined and therefore contain more fibre and nutrients. Examples are fruit (like apple sauce), maple syrup, honey, date sugar, sucanat and barley malt syrup.

2. Bake with "sweet spices"
When baking, use "sweet" spices, such as vanilla and almond extracts, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and allspice, to add flavour to cookies.

3. Keep cut-up fruits and vegetables on the table
You child is more likely to eat fruits and vegetables when they are easy to eat and always available. Cut-up apples, pineapple slices, strawberries and pears are a terrific treat for children with a little dark chocolate drizzled over top. Carrot sticks, celery, broccoli and cucumber slices are perfect for dipping into hummus or ranch dip or with a bit of grated cheese melted over top.

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