There’s only so much time in the day for the whole family to sit down together and enjoy a wholesome, home-cooked meal. Unfortunately for us, this means we’ll likely often be struck with some of those dreaded hunger pangs as we go about our jam-packed everyday lives. Enter snacking. Though it’s a heavily debated topic, let’s face it: snacking will oftentimes be our savior in the midst of a long day. But the real question remains: is this snacking really good for us? And for that matter, is it really good for the children?

To be fair, there is a simple reason for why this topic is so controversial. “Snacking” itself does not actually possess a concrete scientific definition. Likewise, an answer as to whether this snacking is really beneficial (or detrimental) to a child’s health remains just as ambiguous. And because of this, the best we can do is to try and better understand it—and its implications—and take the time to analyze it from a few different perspectives.

Statistically, children today are snacking more than ever before. According to Dr. Barry Popkin, a professor of nutritional health at the University of North Carolina, children aged between 2 and 8 around the world, on average, currently consume anywhere from three to seven snacks (which he designates as “[any]food consumed superfluously between the day’s primary meals”) every day. Compare that to not that long ago; the mean number of snacks consumed, per day, by children of the same demographic in 1970 was a mere one to two.

So what does this mean, exactly? Are children today becoming intoxicated by the addictive nature of calorie-laden snack foods? Of high concentrations of sodium, sugar, and dietary fats? Well, not exactly. Or, rather, it depends. And this is exactly where the multiple perspectives angle comes in.

Children are growing, and this in itself means that they have substantially higher energy needs than adults. Simply put, they burn a lot of calories every day just being them. And to support growth in early years, it is beneficial for them to consume at least as many calories as they expend. The problem is that, oftentimes, even with three meals a day, it can be difficult to satisfy those caloric requirements, especially for children who are active in their day-to-day lives (think after-school soccer or basketball or tennis practices multiple days a week). This is where snacking is especially helpful—providing some growth-stimulating fuel throughout a child’s daily schedule.

But again, multiple perspectives. Snacking carries with it a barrage of caveats that must be addressed. Despite the advantages that come with implementing snacks into your child’s diet, it must be done with care and strategy. This means paying close attention to not only the content of the snacks themselves, but also the ways in which they are being consumed. After all, packing pre-portioned organic nut butter with fresh celery sticks for your child’s morning recess is really not the same thing as allowing him or her to pop open a bag of deep-fried potato chips and plop down in front of the television.

In summary, the takeaway should be as follows. First, monitor (if possible) and consider the quality of the foods your child is used to snacking on. If you find that their choices tend to lean towards the unhealthy, remember that small changes can really go a long way. For instance, 100 grams of watermelon yields a respectable volume of fruit, and boasts a mere 30 calories, while 100 grams of, say, M&M’s barely give you a measly handful, and pack on a whopping 480 calories.

Second, consider constructing your own approach to snacking which you’d like to see your child adopt. If a kid is left to their own devices, it wouldn’t be surprising that they’d give in to their cravings and pick the cupcake over the apple. But few children would refuse the apple if it were given to them to begin with. Not to mention, introducing structure into the way your child snacks can provide a sense of comfort—for both you and them. If you know that your child tends to get hungry coming home in the afternoon, have some healthy snack options ready. You will be comforted to know what’s going into their bellies, and they, in turn, will know to expect a wholesome treat after a long day at school. Over time, a structure like this can adapt a child’s mindset—building, early on, a healthy and balanced relationship with food.

Photos: alarmy.com, longroom.com.uk, The Food Network

Eating out in Beijing is a culinary delight. With the tastebuds of locals evolving to desire more diversity and better quality, expats especially benefit from the areas of the city that want to cater to these wishes.

That is, it’s all a joy until you want to know how much food you’re fitting into your pie hole and how many calories it’ll set you back. It’s frustrating especially if you’re trying to get into nutritional ketosis and you want to measure out how many net carbs and fats are in each meal. Whether you’re on a low carb, Paleo, or general calorie-counting diet, it’s simply hard to find out what’s in each dish without taking your food scale and grilling the chef on the spot.

Flying blind is what waist conscious foodies here in Beijing have to live with, because we found all of four brands that carry nutrition information. We’d be happy to be proved totally wrong on this, readers, for the sake of all our summer bikini strivings.

Obentos
What we like about Obentos is that even if you’re building your own box online, they’ll calculate the total nutritional numbers for you. That’s just too cool. Our suggestion would be to add fiber so we can figure out net carbs (total carbs minus fiber).

Mon-Fri 8am-10pm, Sun-Sat 9am-10pm.
B1 – 109, Grand Summit Phase 2, Liangmaqiao, Chaoyang. (朝阳区亮马桥东方东路19号官舍B1层)

Glo Kitchen
We give props to Glo Kitchen for trying to get the information we need out there, but some of the information on their website is missing. We hope more complete information is available on location.

Open daily 11am-9.30pm.
(1) Unit 103A, Guanghua Lu Soho, 22 Guanghua Lu, Chaoyang, (朝阳区光华路22号 光华路SOHO一期103A&B室) (2) Unit 101, Bldg 7, 97 Jianguo Lu, Chaoyang (朝阳区建国路97号万达广场7号楼101)

Tribe Nutrition
Tribe Nutrition meal plans are meant to make life easy, with planning and cooking done by chefs and nutritionists. Detailed information for nutrition is available on each dish’s box, with the calorie range of each meal plan available online before you pick.

7-Eleven
We wish we were joking, but with desperate times comes desperate calorie-counting measures. This chain that never sleeps makes it onto the list because we can always count on their salads having the nutrition information we need to stay on our diet while out and about.

Locations vary. Open daily all day at certain locations. Search for 便利店 on Baidu to find the closest location near you.

Labels Are Not Complicated
Life happens. It’s not realistic to expect that we’ll never eat out when our food scales are unavailable, so we hope more places will release their nutrition information. And since most of the chain restaurants need to standardize food servings to count costs anyway, we know that they can easily provide this information with a scale, a calculator, and a link to the USDA Food Composition Database where they can find comparable food items.  Simple labels should at least include total calories, protein, fat, carbs, sugars, and fiber. Extra points for sodium.

We’re happy to keep this blog updated as more F&B providers compile nutrition information. Just let us know if we’ve missed someone in the comments, and we’ll add their name to the list.

More stories by this author here.
Email: vanessajencks@truerun.com
Twitter: @vanessa_jencks
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