The Irish Examiner – Sharon Ní Chonchúir
Official guidelines suggest that school-age children need between 1,600 and 2,500 calories a day, depending on their age, body weight, and activity levels. But instead of focusing on numbers, Orla Walsh, a dietician with the Dublin Nutrition Centre, thinks it might be better to look at the nutritional value of food. “By exchanging certain foods for lower energy density foods, this can result in a child eating the same volume of food but lower overall calories,” she says. “A simple way to do this is to add more fruit and vegetables to the diet.” (more)