GAPS Diet With Toddlers and Kids
Does the GAPS diet provide all necessary nutrition for growing children? How do I get picky eaters on board? What recipes are best to make if I don’t have a ton of time? Can my kids heal on full GAPS, or do they have to do intro? How can we follow the GAPS protocol while going to school and social events? I’ve experienced all these concerns and questions myself, and have heard them many times from other parents. The truth is, the GAPS diet protocol can feel very overwhelming in the beginning without a good plan. Add in resistance from children, and this gut-healing dietary protocol can feel insurmountable. Our family has been there! Along the way we learned so many tricks and good recipes to help our whole family enjoy eating well. We also experienced so much healing. Learn how your family can successfully transition to a whole foods, GAPS diet with toddlers and kids.
What is the GAPS Diet?
If you are unfamiliar with the GAPS diet, this post covers the basics, along with further reading resources you might find helpful. In a nutshell, GAPS stands for Gut and Psychology Syndrome and is a diet designed by Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride, who originally designed the GAPS diet to help her son recover from autism. Dr. Campbell-McBride has degrees in neurology and human nutrition and discovered the connection between gut health and brain health. Dr. Natasha has helped thousands of people recover from allergies, auto-immune disease, asthma, eczema, feeding issues, chronic ear infections, and digestive disorders such as diarrhea, constipation, and IBS. Eating the GAPS diet also has a large impact on those with autism, ADHD, sensory disorders, depression, and more, due to the gut-brain connection. I highly recommend getting a copy of Dr. Campbell-McBride’s book Gut and Psychology Syndrome – I still reference this book regularly after many years!
Full GAPS or Intro GAPS?
Many people start on the “full GAPS” protocol, while others who have severe situations (like our family did) might choose to begin the “introduction” protocol. The introduction protocol initially has more food limitations, but often the speed of healing is faster. Following a very scary anaphylactic reaction in our 2 year old, our family began the intro protocol the following day. It worked very well and what was needed in our situation to recover and heal rapidly. If you do not have a severe situation, starting full gaps can be a gentler approach and way to transition to whole foods with less overwhelm. Many people experience a great deal of healing just on full gaps. Whether you choose to do the full or intro protocol, I recommend setting a start date. Create time and space in your schedule for making recipes and learning together.
How to Start The GAPS Diet
- Check out this step by step free e-book How to Transition to Whole Foods Eating Without Overwhelm as a good starting resource for your family.
- Review this list of foods allowed on the full gaps diet.
- Read this post: How to Start the GAPS Intro Diet
Best GAPS Diet Recipes For Toddlers and Kids
1. GAPS Diet Desserts For Toddlers and Kids
Recreate family favorites and treats using GAPS compliant ingredients. If you are not needing to start GAPS intro immediately, take time to enjoy the transition to whole foods first, adding in treats and favorites while phasing out problematic foods. Here is a list of desserts our kids love. Our whole family has enjoyed each of these desserts on many occasions. I love how simple and easy they are to make. Having a few bulk ingredients on hand, such as raw honey and healthy fats, can be really helpful for whipping together a dessert. While some of these recipes may contain dairy, such as butter, the recipe notes indicate dairy-free substitutions, such as coconut oil, avocado oil, lard, etc. For more information how our family cured our dairy intolerances, see this post.
2. GAPS Diet Lunch and Dinner Ideas For Toddlers and Kids
I am a huge fan of home systems that make motherhood simpler, easier, and more fun! GAPS freezer meals are one of these systems! I feel like my life changed when I learned how to make GAPS pancakes in the oven and freeze them. They can be thawed on the counter or popped in the toaster to re-warm.
I really do not love meal planning, but it saves so much time and money overall. Check out this list of our family’s go-to lunch and dinner GAPS meal plans.
Tips and Tricks For GAPS Diet With Toddlers and Kids
1. Food Variation
Serving food in multiple forms can make the dining experience easier and more fun! Especially on intro, when food choices can feel a little more limited, offering many options, shapes, temperatures, and eating tools can be very helpful. For example, eat raw carrots whole, cut into sticks, crinkle cut, spiralized, coined, arranged into smiley faces on a plate, stabbed with toothpicks, etc. Or steam, roast, boil, puree, serve warm, serve cold, eat as dessert with a honey cinnamon glaze, make into “pie” by pureeing cinnamon and honey and serve in a pie dish, etc. With each food, there are many ways to prepare and present it.
A few variations of similar foods our children have enjoyed:
- Eat soup in a bowl (like people normally do, ha!). Strain soup; put broth in a special cup with a straw and the meat and veggies served on the side. :Puree soup and use as a “gravy” or a dip to dunk veggie or meat sticks into.
- Sweeten High mineral herbal tea and GAPS lemonade with honey. Enjoy warm in a “grown up” coffee cup. Serve in popsicle form, cold over ice, or ground like a slushy.
- Enjoy root veggies, such as squash, pumpkin, and carrots freshly steamed or baked with butter. Leftovers can be pureed with healthy animal fats, egg yolks, fermented kefir cream, and honey. Make creamy smoothies served warm or cold. Alternately, freeze in popsicle molds. Our nieces and nephews often ask if we have any “squash smoothie popsicles” when they come visit!
- Serve fermented kefir with honey, as a healthy fruit smoothie, as ice cream, or as a dip, like this artichoke dip.
2. Eat In Different Places
Packing a picnic for the backyard, a nearby park, on the living room floor for a movie night creates novelty and distraction. Toddlers and young children often eat better when they are happy and in good company. If you have young children, you know it can take a verrrrry long time to finish a meal as they like to leave the table often. Sit at the table (or a novel location) and eat with them to keep meal times pleasant and low pressure for eating different and new foods together.
3. Invite Kitchen Helpers
Inviting kids to participate in meal preparation makes a huge difference in willingness and eagerness to eat meals. We understand as adults, people participate in what they help create. This is all the more true for young children. Allow them to help with grocery lists, shopping, making recipes, licking the spoon, stirring ingredients, washing/playing in the dish water, etc. Our older children (9 and 7) are nearly experts in the kitchen and enjoy making many GAPS recipes, as they helped create and enjoy them as toddlers.
4. Educate Children About Healthy Eating
We make conversations about healthy eating and living a regular part of our family dialogue. This helps children understand we eat for nourishment, not just taste (though they often go hand in hand!)
Simple explanations and stories make toddlers and young children desire to make good choices. Explain the “battle” between good and bad bacteria in our bodies. Children always want the good guys to win! They will rise to aid the soldiers fighting for their good health when they imagine a victorious digestive system when they eat their fermented veggies ;).
Benefits of the GAPS Diet With Toddlers and Children
While our family has experienced enormous physical benefits from the GAPS protocol, we have also enjoyed a few lovely and unexpected familial benefits. For example, we developed a family culture around gardening, raising small animals for food, time in the kitchen learning skills, and family togetherness at meal times. In our fast-paced world, I am grateful we were forced to slow down and re-structure our priorities.
I hope you find this information helpful for beginning or continuing on your family’s healthy eating journey.
Resources
- How to Transition to Whole Foods Eating Without Overwhelm
- List of foods allowed on the full gaps diet.
- How to Start the GAPS Intro Diet
Shop This Post
This post contains affiliate links, which means I may make a small commission at no extra cost to you. See my full disclosure here.
