Kids heading back to school? It's a great time to replenish vitamins and minerals to boost your children’s immune system and help their body to function properly for better learning.
It’s also important to make sure kids guts are healthy and strong and in turn they have an effective, efficient immune system.
There are so many bugs kids can pick up in their daily lives, at school, kindy, during sports and recreation and it’s important that the mechanism for fighting the bad bugs is functioning properly.
Boost the Immune System with Vitamins & Minerals
Vitamins are organic substances, which means they’re made by plants or animals. Minerals are inorganic elements that come from soil and water and are absorbed by plants or eaten by animals.
We get vitamins and minerals from the foods we eat every day. Vitamins are classified in two categories:
1. The fat-soluble vitamins: A, D, E, and K which dissolve in fat and are stored in our body.
2. The water-soluble vitamins — C and the B-complex vitamins (such as vitamins B6, B12, niacin, riboflavin, and folate) which dissolve in water.
Our body can't store these vitamins. That’s the reason why we need a fresh supply of these vitamins every day.
Vitamins and minerals boost the immune system, support normal growth and development, and help cells and organs do their jobs. For example, Vitamin K helps blood to clot, so cuts and scrapes stop bleeding quickly. You'll find vitamin K in green leafy vegetables, broccoli, and soybeans.
And to have strong bones, you need to eat foods such as green leafy vegetables and dairy products which are rich in the mineral calcium.
Vitamins and minerals work together in complex ways, influencing how much of a given nutrient your body uses and how they may work together to reach peak absorption.
Some vitamins work in synergy to help your body better absorb other vitamins/minerals. So eating a large range of food is important because the body needs a variety of vitamins and minerals to grow and stay healthy.
It is much more beneficial to get all your required vitamins and minerals from food, rather than from supplements which are mostly synthetic and cannot be utilised by your body.
Support the Immune System with Probiotic Foods
Including fermented probiotic rich foods such as kimchi and sauerkraut in the diet of kids can be difficult due to the taste!
Immunity Fuel probiotic powder however can be easily mixed in cereal, yogurt, or smoothies simply disappears so is an easy way to get the probiotics in. Immunity Fuel is rich in probiotics, prebiotics and whole food nutrition, and ¼ - ½ of a teaspoon per day (depending on the age of the children) will be enough.
Good quality bacteria help to digest the foods so the nutrient value of the foods your kids eat can be instantly absorbed and utilised by the cells of their body.
Ensuring a diverse range of good bacteria also helps to keep the bad bacteria at bay and assists to keep their immune systems strong. This is so important at this time of the year with all the winter bugs around.
Back to School Smoothie
Here is our new smoothie recipe that boasts a high content of vitamins and minerals from whole foods as well as probiotics and prebiotics to keep the good bugs in and the bad bugs at bay. It also tastes great and the kids will love it!Back to School Smoothie Recipe
• 1 banana, frozen
• 1 cup mango chunks, frozen
• 1 cup spinach
• 1/2 medium avocado
• 1 cup unsweetened non-dairy milk (I used oat milk fortified in B12)
• Splash of vanilla extract
• 1 tsp Immunity Fuel
Blend all the ingredients together for 2 mins, pour and enjoy!
🍌 Bananas are a good source of several vitamins and minerals, especially potassium, vitamin B6, and vitamin C.
🥑 Avocados contain a high level of healthy fats which help to absorb the fat- soluble vitamins. Avocados are also a good source of vitamins C, E, K, and B6, as well as riboflavin, niacin, folate, pantothenic acid, magnesium, and potassium.
🥭 Mangoes are high in vitamin A, C, K, E, B6, and they also contain potassium and magnesium.
🥬 Spinach is an extremely nutrient-rich vegetable. It packs high amounts of carotenoids, vitamin C, vitamin K, folic acid, iron, and calcium.
So good, so tasty - Enjoy!
Nancy Poole, Nutritionist
