Baby foods 'too sweet'

Baby foods discourage children from developing a taste for green vegetables as they contain too many sweet tasting ingredients, researchers say.

A University of Glasgow study of 329 baby foods revealed that fruit and sweet vegetables are used far more readily than bitter ones such as spinach.

Researchers, writing in the journal Maternal and Child Nurtrition, found that the most common ingredients mentioned in baby foods were apple, banana, tomato, mango, carrot and sweet potato.

Despite containing large amounts of vegetables, the researchers say these foods are probably too sweet to encourage children to eat their greens. They said parents should be encouraged to offer home-cooked vegetables to promote a wider range of tastes in their children.

Dr Ada Garcia, who led the research, said: “Infants have an innate preference for sweet foods. While manufacturers clearly recognise the demand for products that appear to be healthy, commercial pressure will ensure these products are highly palatable.

“Taste learning requires parents to introduce their children to less palatable bitter tastes and keep offering them. However, it is probably unrealistic to expect commercial products to assist in this process.”

Garcia added: “A recent study showed that while commercial baby foods list fruit and vegetables as ingredients, higher use of these foods was associated with lower intake of fruit and vegetables in infancy which persisted into school age.

“The risk is that while parents may think commercial baby foods are introducing their children to healthy vegetable tastes, actually they are mainly reinforcing preferences for sweet foods.

“Infants usually accept new foods and tastes well if vegetable tastes are introduced early, and this early experience influences food preference later in childhood.”