Carbohydrates

When we talk about carbohydrates in the diet, we're usually talking about foods that are rich in starch, and that is complex carbohydrate. And it is also known as polysaccharide. The name comes from the fact that
starchy foods are made up of many sugars. Poly meaning many and saccharide is another chemical name for sugars. And those sugars are linked together by chemical bonds.

Dietary carbohydrates are simple carbs, or simple sugars. The simplest simple sugars are called glucose.
Another kind of sugar is called fructose which is found in fruits. And the next one is galactose. These three are called monosaccharides,mono meaning one, and saccharide meaning sugar, so these are single sugars.

When glucose and fructose combined, or linked together, they form another kind of sugar called sucrose which is known as table sugar. Too much of this kind of sugar is not good for health.The other two unit sugar that you may have heard of is called lactose. And it's a combination of glucose and galactose. It's the sugar found in milk. And some people have a hard time digesting it.

These two sugars, sucrose and lactose, are examples of disaccharides or two unit sugars. Both of these types of carbohydrates give us energy. Now there's another type of carbohydrate, also a type of complex carbohydrate, that gives us no energy, because our bodies can't break it down. But it's important and it's called dietary fiber. There are two kinds of dietary fiber. They are soluble fiber and insoluble fiber.

Soluble fiber, you might've guessed it from the name, it dissolves in water. It's believed to support the health of the intestinal walls and it helps to regulate cholesterol levels. Insoluble fiber doesn't dissolve in water, but instead it absorbs water,like a sponge. Since it absorbs water, it acts as a stool softener. It prevents us from getting constipated. By the way, fiber is also a polysaccharide. But our bodies can't break these bonds, so
it doesn't give us any energy.

Now, both types of fiber are found in fruits and veggies. When we choose things like brown rice over white
rice, or when we choose whole grain bread over white bread, we're basically making a choice that increases
the amount of fiber that's connected to our starchy carbohydrates. And this is better for our health, and will also prevent us from getting hungry again too quickly. So it's a good thing to do. Go for the foods that are rich in fiber.

Proteins

Proteins are really important part of a balanced diet, because they form, the building blocks of children's growing bodies. Proteins make up a large portion of the muscle in our children's bodies. But proteins also play a whole bunch of other important roles in our bodies and our children's bodies. For example, when we get sick, our immune system is activated. Proteins are a very important part of that whole immune system. Proteins act as transporters in a variety of different roles in the body.

Proteins also help us maintain the right fluid distribution in our bodies. So the fluid stays where it should be
because of the fact that the proteins keep it where it should be. So if we're thinking of proteins as the building blocks of our children's bodies, then we can think of amino acids as the building blocks of the proteins. There are 20 different kinds of amino acids. And we can actually make a lot of them. But there are 9 of them we call essential, because we have to get these 9 from the foods that we eat.

Things like eggs, chicken, red meat and fish are good animal source of protein. Dairy products like milk, cheese and yogurt are also a good source of protein. There are also many vegetable source of protein. And those are things like tofu, nuts, beans and other legumes like lentils. The important thing to note is that the
animal sources of protein tend to be complete. That means that they contain all of the 9 essential amino
acids in sufficient amounts to support growth, repair and maintenance of our children's bodies. Whereas the non-meat sources, for example, the dairy and the vegetarian sources of protein, tend to be incomplete.
So they might contain all of the essential amino acids, but usually not in sufficient amounts to support growth.

If you combine vegetarian sources of protein with other foods, then you can end up with a meal that provides
a complete set of amino acids.And some of these dishes are actually the traditional foods like Indian dal and rice. These foods naturally complement each other and provide you with a complete set of amino acids.
As with all diets, variety is the key to a healthy vegetarian diet.