Lent is designed to cleanse the bodies and souls of believing Christians before the bright holiday of Easter. This is the strictest period in the Orthodox calendar. If your family is fasting, it is wise to gradually teach your child to fast. But do not demand from him a complete rejection of worldly pleasures, sometimes give indulgence in the form of permitted sweets. Let the baby find new gustatory habits and sensations for himself.
Breakfast, as you know, should be 30 percent of the daily diet. The best option is porridge on the water. It can be buckwheat with mushrooms, millet with pumpkin, rice with raisins and dried apricots, wheat, barley, corn with vegetable oil. Dried fruits and nuts can be a sweet and healthy addition. For a change, you can offer various dips and sandwich spreads, such as bean pate, squash or eggplant caviar, honey.
Lenten lunch is no different from the usual one, except for the absence of animal products. The child must definitely receive the first, second and third courses. In modern cookbooks, you can find a large number of lean soups, cabbage soup, pickles. They can contain cereals, vegetables, pasta. It is advisable to add fresh or frozen greens to the first. For the second, it is good to serve vegetable stews and casseroles, potato cutlets with prunes, rice balls with mushroom sauce, etc. For dessert, offer berry jelly, thick compote, jam, lean biscuits or a muffin. The main thing is to diversify food so that fasting does not seem boring and scary to the child. At the same time, do not focus the baby's attention only on food. After all, fasting also includes giving up fun and entertainment, it involves daily prayers and reading spiritual books.
Dinner should be light, preferably vegetable. Serve a bright salad, seasoned with vegetable oil and lemon juice. There are many options for such salads: carrots with an orange or apple with the addition of peeled sunflower seeds, beets with prunes and nuts, a salad of green radish, root celery and pumpkin seeds, potatoes with pickles. Even the simplest vinaigrette can be varied by adding peas and beans, fish or squid. Speaking of fish. It is best not to limit your fasting intake too much, as it is a valuable supplier of phosphorus, fatty acids and minerals that are especially important for a growing body.
Despite all the advantages, fasting still deprives the child's body of some vitamins. To replenish them, daily give him a simple mixture of walnuts, dried fruits and lemon, rolled through a meat grinder, with the addition of honey. Include as many fresh fruits and meals with them in your baby's diet. And in order for the child to eat with pleasure even during Lent, take the time to decorate the dishes. A simple sprig of greens and figuratively chopped carrots can give any dish an appetizing look. Use colored dishes and brightly colored napkins to decorate your table.
