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It’s certainly not a conventional list of ‘baby food’ but 4 months into her foodie journey, here are some of Eliza’s favourite foods:

• Corn on the cob
• Wedges of apple
• Pate
• Grilled eggplant
• Sushi
• Fish
• Steamed asparagus
• Prawns (she goes nuts for these!) 
• Quinoa porridge
• Strawberries
• Beef stroganoff
• Curries and dahl 
• Sourdough bread.

This is what dinnertime looks like for us in a nutshell…. 

430pmish I put the finishing touches on dinner (i.e. cook it- I’ve usually prepped it earlier in the day)

5pm I remove a bit from the main dish and place it on a plate for Eliza so its cool

5:30 pm We all sit down and eat. The same meal. There is NOTHING different about what we eat and what she eats. When we go out for a meal, we’ll simply share our own meals with Eliza. 

At 10 months of age, we are having family meals. There is no ‘baby food’ and ‘adult food’… it’s just-food. I’ve made a few adjustments to our recipes (e.g. I don’t cook with any salt /  I make my own stock paste with reduced salt content/ I serve fresh chili on the side for me and Carl to add instead of cooking it in meals) but we all eat the same. This was one of the main reasons why I was drawn to the baby-led weaning approach in the first place and we are proof that it works. So be it roast dinner, a casserole, homemade butter chicken, Mexican bean soup, spaghetti bolognese, fish pie…. That’s what we all eat and we eat it together at the table sans television with the dog under the table begging for scraps. It’s all pretty… simple really.  

I’m currently in the process of writing an ebook about Baby-led weaning so I thought this ‘update’ on where we were with food was a fitting addition to the blog for now. When it comes to feeding babies, here are 3 unconventional tips from a Nutritionist that I’ve learned myself over the last 4 months…..

Babies follow your lead.

For the first 6 months of her life, Eliza watched me guzzle water and eat a lot of food. I can not emphasize enough how important nourishing yourself is as a new Mum, even if you are not breastfeeding. Why we have postpartum diets circulating in our faces is beyond me. You need food mama. And a lot of it. Whilst I realize ‘eating’ must be intrinsic on some level, I do firmly believe that Eliza’s enthusiasm for food (and water) has at least in part been influenced by watching me (and my husband too!). Sure, you can argue that we’ve just ‘had it easy’ but her enthusiasm to give most things a go and her expansive palate must, to some degree, be a result of the examples that we have set for her. 

Babies can have and love flavour.

There’s a lot of bland baby food out there… and a lot of ‘fear’ around offering food to babies that have flavour from ‘real’ ingredients like garlic, ginger, spices, and herbs. But these flavoursome morsels offer an abundance of additional micronutrients AND they condition a baby’s palate to be more accepting of a wide variety of different tastes and textures. If we want to reduce the chances of fussiness later on…. We need to be exposing babies to flavour early. When we first began our solid journey, we offered single vegetables for a week or 2… but Eliza was quickly trying food off our own plates and hence the evolution to plating up a variety of different cuisines very early on. 

Babies’ needs and tastes will change from day to day, just like our own.

Whilst I strive for as much variety as possible in our own and Eliza’s diet there are still firm favourites on repeat every few weeks. It’s interesting that the ‘parts’ of the meal she enjoys the most will change. For example, if I were to serve a roast chicken… sometimes she will just go NUTS for the meat. Once, she gnawed at a chicken leg for ages. Other times the meat may be largely ignored and the roast pumpkin or the head of cauliflower will afford all of the attention. Sometimes a firm favourite meal is largely ignored and she’ll fill up on breast milk instead whilst other times we are refilling her bowl. I’ve decided to suppress any stress that arises when this occurs and trust that Eliza is simply taking what she needs at any given moment. Just like we sometimes feel like a bowl of veggie soup and other times can’t wait to dig into a hearty steak. 

I’m not naive. I know we will face battles on our foodie journey. But we are off to a good start and a good foundation will definitely help. After all, the first 1000 days (from conception to a child’s second birthday) are arguably the most crucial time to lay a solid foundation across all facets of a baby’s life. 

Bottom line – weaning to solids does not have to be stressful. It has been a fascinating and joyous adventure for us so far… albeit messy! As with anything ‘baby-related’ you do what works for you and your family and you as a parent know what’s best for your child. I realize some of the things Eliza loves aren’t conventionally recommended, but sometimes you know better than what’s on the internet :). 

Happy weaning and look out for my eBook when it comes! 

Recently, we released another eCourse, ‘Habits for Health’ which you can read more about here. Although it’s a simple course, and will set you back just $39, I believe… its the most important work I’ve created to date. Why? Well, I’ve been a Nutritionist for over 8 years now and I’ve helped many different people with very different goals. No matter the person and no matter the goal…there are still a number of foundational habits that must be established first and foremost as a cornerstone of good health. These foundational habits ARE the content of the Habits for Health course. In some way, shape or form I will endevour to encourage EVERY client who sees me, to adopt each of these habits, no matter what their reason for seeing me in the first place may be. THAT’S why its so exciting! These foundational habits are now in a ‘teachable’ format that can be accessed by anyone at anytime who has a genuine interest in being their healthiest and happiest self… for life.

This is NOT a fad course. It is NOT an 8 week course. It is NOT a ‘take a selfie before and after’ course. It’s about working at your own pace, making sure that each habit is well and truly formed and ‘sticks’ and then keeping these habits for a lifetime. Warning: if you choose to embark on the Habits for Health course it will change your life. You may not even recognise yourself when you come out the other end.

In a world obsessed with instant change…. promising you a new body overnight…. selling you the latest pill, potion or metabolic supplement to help you look younger, skinner and less wrinkly… I’m heat to say ‘forget that crap.’ You are you. And you are pretty great. But you deserve to be the BEST version of you. And there is NO magic formula… NO magic pill…. YOU are the magic. Habits for Health is about helping you change your lifestyle and adapt 9 foundational habits that will simply allow your magic to shine. Honestly, I’d love it if every client I ever saw worked their way through this course before they even booked an appointment – I honestly feel I’d be just about redundant!

It’s just $39 by the way. You can check it out here. Let’s all start saying no to fads and just live better. That’s what this is about. And you are so very worth it.

“Each tiny habit is like an atom. It will only result in a very small change. But each atom is part of a larger system… and each atomic habit will contribute to a massive changë.” (James Clear, author of Atomic Habits)

The metabolism is a fascinating thing. Our bodies have evolved to do all kinds of cool things in order to guarantee our survival. Look after the body optimally, the way its supposed to be nurtured and chances are it will be behave as it should in return. But in this crazy world we live in, with more stress, more food, less movement, more technology and less nature than ever before…. things can get a little confusing.

Metabolism is a very complex concept, but let’s focus on 2 terms only for this blog. These are ‘metabolic flexibility’ and ‘lipolysis.’ These are two terms we speak with our clients about quite regularly so we thought we’d share them on the blog today. Let’s start with ‘metabolic flexibility.’

Our bodies utilize two different forms of fuel for energy and survival and ideally, switch between both as required. The first fuel source is glucose and the second is fatty acids – essentially stored fat. Metabolic flexibility is essentially a fancy way of saying that the body can efficiently and comfortably switch between both as required. Consider that shortly after you eat a meal, carbohydrates will be more readily available thus the body will utilize glucose for energy. However, many hours later or say overnight, provided that meal was not too large, the body may switch into a fat burning mode instead. If we consider the evolution of human life, metabolic flexibility makes a lot of sense. Thousands of years ago, food availability varied with the seasons. There were times of feast and famine. The ability of the body to switch between these two mechanisms would have been a must for survival of the species.

Now a days, things aren’t so. Consume a diet of wholefoods, not in excess and you can loosely recreate a similar pattern – switching the body between fat and carbohydrate burning. However, overeating, the over consumption of highly processed carbohydrates, high cortisol, little or no movement, consistent snacking…. well all of these factors may mean the body is rarely forced into a fat burning state because instead, it has a steady supply of carbohydrates to keep it fueled.

Here at the Balanced Nutritionist, we are ‘pro’ metabolic flexibility. We think it makes sense on many levels – particularly when we consider human evolution. Many engage in debate over whether carbohydrate burning has any validity and instead believe our fat burning pathways should be constantly ‘on’ but we take a more balanced view on this. However, that debate is not the main purpose of this article.

Instead, let’s focus on our second concept, ‘lipolysis.’ Lipolysis is the fancy term to describe the mobilisation and break down of fatty acid cells for energy. Put simply, some degree of lipolysis is important for healthy weight management and certainly for fat loss. Yet, some find it difficult, even when they drastically reduce their food intake, to activate lipolysis, which essentially means they can’t seem to shift body fat.

This brings us to the crux of today’s article. You see there are two main conditions that need to be met in order for lipolysis to take place:

1. Blood sugar, or glucose levels need to be relatively low. If blood sugar levels are high, the body will continue to use this as a fuel source instead and fat burning will not take place. So if someone has higher than normal blood sugar levels, say because they are prediabetic or insulin resistant, their capacity to burn fat for fuel will be low.
2. Insulin levels must also be low. Insulin is one smart hormone. It is actually capable of blocking the enzymes responsible for making fat burning happen. Once again, prediabetes or poorly controlled diabetes or anyone with insulin resistance is likely to have high insulin levels fairly consistently, thus posing another challenge to fat burning. (note: fasting blood sugar levels can appear well controlled on blood tests, but corresponding insulin levels may still be elevated. It is possible and sometimes indicated, to have both fasting blood sugar levels and insulin levels tested to obtain a full picture).

Now, these hormones can be elevated for obvious reasons. Overeating, the consumption of junk food, consistent snacking between meals etc. will all drive both blood sugar and therefore insulin levels up as well. But, for those with insulin resistant conditions, these two hormones can be triggered extremely easily, even by seemingly healthy meal choices. Crux of the story? Lipolysis can be incredibly challenging for anyone with blood sugar and insulin regulation issues. You may even consume a seemingly perfect diet and not overeat, but still have difficulty achieving lipolysis and metabolic flexibility.

We wrote this blog because many of our clients find that understanding this concept really helps them understand fat loss better. We hope it brings some clarity to you as well. If you are concerned about your perceived ‘lack of’ metabolic flexibility, here are some tips that we’ll close on:

• Make sure your meals contain protein. That they aren’t purely carbohydrates on a plate. E.g. a sandwich with vegemite? Note going to cut it for lunch.
• Make sure you eat proper meals, with a break in between of at least 4 hours to allow time to digest and time for blood sugar and insulin levels to decrease.
• ensure that breaks are actual breaks; remember anything with flavour (including tea and coffee) has the ability to trigger a hormonal response in the body i.e. stimulate blood sugar levels.
• Move more. Exercise does stimulate lipolysis. But its also natural for us to move. We are designed to eat and move not eat and be sedentary.
• Don’t eat a really large meal at night especially one with dessert. The overnight ‘fast’ we naturally attain when we sleep is a good opportunity for fat burning.
• Drink water. Not sugary crap. Plus, being hydrated increases the efficiency of the body on all levels.
• Finally, if you are still struggling with weight management or fat loss to a healthy range, consult a professional as insulin resistant conditions require tailored advice.