RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 A comparison of preprepared commercial infant feeding meals with home-cooked recipes
JF Archives of Disease in Childhood
JO Arch Dis Child
FD BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health
SP 1037
OP 1042
DO 10.1136/archdischild-2015-310098
VO 101
IS 11
A1 Sharon A Carstairs
A1 Leone CA Craig
A1 Debbi Marais
A1 Ourania E Bora
A1 Kirsty Kiezebrink
YR 2016
UL http://adc.bmj.com/content/101/11/1037.abstract
AB Objectives To compare the cost, nutritional and food variety contents of commercial meals and published infant and young child feeding (IYCF) home-cooked recipes, and to compare nutritional contents to age-specific recommendations.Design Cross-sectional study.Setting Full range of preprepared main meals available within the UK market. Main-meal recipes identified from a survey of Amazon's top 20 best-sellers and IYCF cookbooks available from local libraries.Samples 278 commercial IYCF savoury meals from UK market and 408 home-cooked recipes from best-selling IYCF published cookbooks.Main outcome measures Cost and nutritional content per 100 g and food variety per meal for both commercial meals and home-cooked recipes.Results Commercial products provided more ‘vegetable’ variety per meal (median=3.0; r=−0.33) than home-cooked recipes (2.0). Home-cooked recipes provided 26% more energy and 44% more protein and total fat than commercial products (r=−0.40, −0.31, −0.40, respectively) while costing less (£0.33/100 g and £0.68/100 g, respectively). The majority of commercial products (65%) met energy density recommendations but 50% of home-cooked recipes exceeded the maximum range.Conclusions The majority of commercial meals provided an energy-dense meal with greater vegetable variety per meal to their home-cooked counterparts. Home-cooked recipes provided a cheaper meal option, however the majority exceeded recommendations for energy and fats.