Chocolate for kids

In the right quantity it's healthy and it makes them happy


Everyone, ever since they are kids, has learnt to appreciate the tastiest food there’s in the world: chocolate! Dark, milky, with nuts or cereals, nowadays you have only to choose between lots of tastes that big companies propose and that make our kids’ mouth water.

Cioccolato ai bambini Cioccolato-Bambini-400x300_74_1.jpg (Art. corrente, Pag. 1, Foto ridotta)
But how much has been told about it? Is it bad? Does it make you fat? Does it increase pimples? And, for our kids, how much is healthy to eat it? Can they eat every flavor of chocolate and from what age? Those are only some doubts that mums and dads have in mind. For this reason, it’s necessary to make things more clear trying to find out what experts and pediatricians think about the relation between chocolate and kids.

Chocolates and kids, when the first taste?

 

When you have little babies, every mum and dad want their kid tastes lots of new foods with different tastes and flavors, sometimes following the pediatrician advice, other times acting on their own. About chocolate, all pediatricians agree with the fact that kids have to taste it, in small quantity, and only after their first birthday or, better, once they’re 18 months old.
All pediatricians agrees that, due to their anatomic composition, namely their liver and their kidneys aren’t completely grown, kids are not able to assimilate chocolate in the right way, because a chocolate bar is composed by a lot of saturated fats. Before this age kids can try to taste cocoa by giving them products expressly studied as foods for kids: cocoa powder to shake with milk, childhood biscuits with low fat cocoa or some healthy snacks.
Chocolate is good for kids and it’s a nourishing and healthy food, it doesn’t create any serious problem for the growth, kids can eat it but always in small quantity. Pediatrician word!


Which are chocolate’s effects on kids?

 

Chocolate has a healthy effect on kids also thanks to various nourishing substances contained in it. We’re talking about magnesium, phosphorus and flavonoids that characterize it as a nourishing food, except for the saturated fats or cocoa butter and additional sugar that we find, for example, in white, milky or gianduja chocolate bars.
For this reason it is always suggested to not exaggerate in quantity and to be very careful at ingredients reported in the back of the package, privileging only high quality chocolate. Anyway eating chocolate doesn’t implicate intolerances or tooth decay.
A well-known effect of chocolate is to stimulate serotonin, the most important neurotransmitter that influences people mood making them happier. About kids, you have to be more careful because exceeding in serotonin stimulation, could cause an exaggerated exciting. That’s the reason why it’s not suggested to eat chocolate during the evening and after dinner because the risk is that kids doesn’t want to go to bed or they’re full of energy until late night.
In addition, lots of studies have demonstrated that chocolate has healthy effects on kids already when they’re in their mother womb. If the future mother eats chocolate, in small quantity and every day, during her motherhood, her little babies will be happier and smiling. After all, the credit for this goes to effects of stimulation of chocolate on serotonin; in this case, eating chocolate has healthy effects, not only for the baby, but also for his future mum, because it has been demonstrated that:

  • It reduces the possibility of facing anemic situations;
  • It improves and regulates blood pressure in pregnant women;
  • It regulates and lows LDL value, which is bad cholesterol;
  • It reduces preeclampsia risk.

 

Which chocolate is better for kids?

 

At this point it’s important to understand that you have to give kids only the best quality chocolate. To define a good quality chocolate it has to contain at least 30% of cocoa inside. It can be a piece of dark chocolate, milk chocolate or white chocolate but you have to pay attention to ingredients contained. Surely, the healthiest chocolate is the dark one because his main ingredient is cocoa and the other ingredients, such as sugar and vegetable fats, are presents in small percentage, but it’s also true that this chocolate is the less favorite of kids, due to his bitter taste.
The favorite chocolate from kids, but not only kids, is milk or white chocolate.


Taking in consideration white chocolate, it is wrong to consider it true chocolate, because it doesn’t contains cocoa, instead it contains a quantity of cocoa butter that is equal to or greater than 30%. This fact makes it sweeter, and so more desirable for kids taste, but, at the same time, it is more fat and less healthy. To make up for it, milk chocolate, that has to contain at least a quantity equal to 30% of cocoa, is an excellent vitamin A source.

In conclusion, you can start to give chocolate to your kids starting after their first birthday. It’s better to let them taste it in small quantity, like this they gradually get used to this new flavor. You’d better choose quality chocolate, maybe dark chocolate, that could turn out to be a little bit bitter, but, as time goes, it will accustom their taste to the very real chocolate flavor. If you choose, instead, milk or white chocolate, you have to try to not exaggerate in doses. Chocolate is not bad for kids, it’s nourishing and healthy instead. The only thing you have to watch out is the quantity of fat and sugar adds under development of bars and chocolates.


What’s a perfect solution to be sure that your kids eat quality chocolate in funny shapes and “kids proof”?


You can use our molds for chocolates and Easter eggs, made of the funniest shapes for your kids. You can choose between lots of varieties: shell and fish shape, molds in mushroom shape, chestnut and nut shape or also molds for the realization of chocolate lollypops. You can decorate them with your kids’ favorites ingredients and, above all, you are free to choose by yourself chocolate you prefer, always being sure it’s a quality chocolate.

That’s not all, chocolates realized with our molds provide an extra safety. Indeed, our products 100% made in Italy, are made by specialized personnel and realized in BPA-free material.