For most of the first year, you can ensure a healthful vegan diet for your newborn either by breastfeeding or by offering a soy-based infant formula approved by your pediatrician. Sometimes vitamin B12, vitamin D and iron supplements are given during the first year, but be sure to ask your pediatrician.
Vegan and vegetarian diets are safe for babies and toddlers, and can provide all the nutrients they need – with a few caveats. Once your baby shows signs of readiness (around 6 months old), you can start introducing solid foods.
Children who followed a raw vegan diet overall consumed calories, calcium, and Vitamin D well below the recommended amounts which may have accounted for a slower growth (6). We know that these nutrients like calcium and Vitamin D are essential for maintaining normal bone growth throughout childhood.
Vegan infants
For those children who do not have diagnosed allergies and are not on hypoallergenic formula, unsweetened calcium-fortified milk alternatives, such as soya, almond and oat drinks can be offered from one year of age as part of a healthy, balanced diet which contains plenty of calcium, protein and energy.
Vegan infants need a good variety of protein foods, such as peas, beans, lentils, soya beans, tofu, soya yoghurt, nut and seed butters, as well as cereal foods and grains. Pulses are very good first foods to offer because they can be mashed easily and provide a variety of tastes and textures.
If your child is vegetarian or does not like to eat meat (e.g., beef, pork, goat), chicken, turkey or fish, offer alternatives such as eggs, peanut butter, tofu, beans, lentils, nuts, seeds and soy-based meat substitutes. These foods have similar nutrients and will help your child meet their nutritional needs.
Infants of vegan women weighed less at birth than did infants of omnivores (average of 6 lb. 10 oz. vs. 7 lb.
There is strong data to show that well-designed plant-based diets (both vegan and vegetarian) are safe and nutritionally adequate. They may even offer kids health advantages, like a lower risk for chronic diseases as they get older.
The 2021 study, which looked at 187 healthy children ages 5 to 10, found that those on vegan diets had lower levels of body fat and the unhealthy form of cholesterol, as well as less nutritional deficiencies.
Kids are more prone to iron deficiency than any other nutrient, and it's much more common for children who don't eat meat. It's an important component of hemoglobin, the component of red blood cells that dutifully carries oxygen from the lungs to the bloodstream.
Short answer: no. But let's examine it in more detail. A piece of advice that parents often receive from their paediatrician, social environment, or social media is that their babies should be eating meat every day. This piece of advice mainly includes beef, which should be alternated with chicken on some days.
Foods such as beans, pulses, nut butters, oats and quinoa are all great ways to increase the protein in your baby's diet. Quinoa, amaranth and buckwheat are all complete proteins, meaning they contain all 9 essential amino acids, so we love including these in our Mamamade recipes!
And just as vegetarian diets can be nutritious and safe for adults, they can be nutritious and safe for babies and toddlers, too. Our babies' first foods, after all, tend to be cereals, mashed vegetables and puréed fruits.
Meeting the requirements of vitamin B12 for plant-based kids can be easily achieved with a diet that incorporates a variety of B12- fortified foods and an appropriate B12 supplement.
Breast milk is vegan so you don't need to feel guilty giving it to your infant. It doesn't go against the idea of veganism since you consented to the milk that you're giving your baby. You're not considered less vegan by breastfeeding, and your baby can start life out as a vegan, too.
Most formula is based on cow's milk, and many also contain fish oils. Soya-based formulas contain less animal-derived products than most, but they're still not fully vegan.
There are a variety of reasons that toddlers shy away from meat. First, it can be too hard to chew—softer and cut up meat works better. Second, the texture can bother children, especially when it's a new meat. To remedy this, parents can encourage toddlers to touch and guess how the food will feel in their mouths.
Williams added that children who don't get enough protein may experience health issues, including fatigue, poor concentration, slowed growth, bone and joint pain, delayed wound healing and decreased immune response.
Insufficient nutrient supply in preterm infants and protein deprivation in particular can represent a nutritional emergency. It can cause many of the features of the starvation response, including insulin resistance and hyperglycemia, as well as growth failure and neurological injury.
But not all children enjoy the taste or texture of meat. Certain meats, such as steak or pork, can be harder for little ones to chew, too. Try not to worry if your child refuses to eat meat. They can still get the nutrients they need from a healthy vegetarian diet.
Eggs may be introduced as soon as baby is ready to start solids, which is generally around 6 months of age. Egg is a common food allergen, so consider baby's risk factors and start with scant quantities of well-cooked egg (white and yolk) as some babies can have severe reactions to even the smallest amount of eggs.
Meat is also the best source of high-quality protein, which plays an essential role in many bodily functions. It helps provide the body with energy, repair tissues, and develop organs properly — all of which are crucial for your baby's growing body.
Babies can have a vegetarian diet if it gives them enough nutrients. Parents may be used to eating a vegetarian diet themselves for cultural or ethical reasons. Parents can begin feeding babies a vegetarian diet when they can begin eating solid foods.