UKC

If you've got a child that is extremely active( hard activity beyond 15 hours a week) but is vegi, and fussy at that, are any calories better than none?
We try to fill her with pancakes, quorn sausage rolls, Yorkshire puddings and milk shakes plus raw veg. She is constantly hungry, but I'm concerned whether giving her 'fatty' foods is long term damaging.
I reckon she burns 4000 kc/ day, weighing 50 k.?

In reply to Skol:

Im no expert but I think if she is burning them off its probably ok. Does she eat pasta? Or rice or potatoes. I would think she needs plenty of carbs.

In reply to Skol:

Most non-animal fats are unsaturated so not a problem... as a general rule no more than a third of you fat intake should be saturated, but that's unlikely with a vegetarian diet.

The main thing is making sure that you're getting complimentary proteins. With a balanced diet including meat, you can reasonably assume you'll get enough of each of the essential amino acids, but a lot of vegetables are deficient in one or more. Legumes tend to be short on methionine and grains tend to be short of lysine, so mixing grains and beans is a good idea. Eggs are about the most complete protein source available so are a good idea unless and until she decides to become vegan.

In reply to Skol:

Quorn is of questionable nutritional value. Raw veg broadly supplies fewer calories than cooked. Fear of saturated fatis predicated on poor science much of which has been overturned of late.

For active veggie kids encourage eating of eggs and nutrient rich carb sources like potatoes and sweet potatoes rather than pasta, cereal and most breads.

In reply to Shani:

My ex used to feed me quorn occasionally... from the volume of gaseous effluent this produced I became convinced that the substance is entirely indigestible.

In reply to Ciro:
Quorn is a great example of how we can engineer the texture, colour, smell and taste of a substance (in this case, vat-grown mould), to make it resemble food - but whether it should actually qualify as food is questionable.