Snacks often get a bad wrap for being unhealthy…which, of course, they can be, but not if you choose wisely! Snacks can be an important part of your pregnancy diet for several reasons. Usually, when you are pregnant, you will notice you become hungry every few hours at least. This is a result of the baby ‘siphoning’ glucose (and other nutrients) from you. Ensuring a regular intake with mid-meal snacks tends to make you feel better and also makes it less likely that you’ll get super hungry for your meals. Have you noticed that once you’re excessively hungry, it’s much harder to try to control the amount you consume as well as the speed at which you eat?
You’ll often also find you can no longer fit in as much volume at a meal, especially as your pregnancy progresses. Snacks are therefore a good way to fit in your fruit and dairy requirements, as you may no longer be able to eat them together with your main meals. And often small and frequent intake also helps with other common problems in pregnancy such as nausea and heartburn/reflux.
If you’re working or at home with little kids or just aren’t used to including mid-meal snacks, it’s often hard to adjust to remembering to eat. So planning and preparation is the key! When you’re out and about you’ll probably find it challenging to find something that is both nutritious but not calorie excessive. So it pays to have a working list of options you know you can grab when you need!
Some simple examples are:
A piece of fruit
A tub of yoghurt
A glass of milk
A small fruit smoothie
Whole grain crackers or high fibre toast with cheese, peanut butter or hummus. Vege sticks with salsa
A small handful of nuts
There are just a few of dozens and dozens of other options to meet all your sweet and savoury cravings and which still consider the overall balance in your diet!
If of course you are happy eating just three meals per day and are meeting your nutritional requirements and not feeling hungry then there is no need to start adding in extra snacks either! Everyone is different, and our diets would be so boring if it were any other way!