Episode 61 : Taming The Sugar Monster Over Easter

Episode 61 : Taming The Sugar Monster Over Easter

Taming The Sugar Monster Over Easter

Easter is such a special time, filled with family, connection, and yes—plenty of chocolate….which can come with some serious sugar swings and bad behaviour!

In this episode, I’m diving into practical ways to help your children enjoy Easter treats, without the chaos. I share my own family’s Easter traditions, including my nonna’s beloved Italian Easter bread, and reflect on how these food memories can shape our children’s relationship with eating.

It’s not about restriction—it’s about supporting your child with nourishing food, clear boundaries, and some clever strategies that will make this Easter feel more balanced for everyone.

Links
https://nourishwithkarina.com/feedingbabies
https://nourishwithkarina.com/membership

Highlights:

Introduction (00:00.118)
Easter, Sugar Highs & Sacred Traditions: Balancing Celebrations and Meltdowns (02:01.228)
More Than a Meal: How Food Connects Generations at Easter (04:24.942)
Feeding Struggles, Furry Sidekicks & Family Traditions: Nova’s Honest Journey with Her Fussy Eater (06:41.674)
Sugar Rush Survival: How to Balance Chocolate and Chaos at Easter (09:09.004)
Feeding Freedom: How to Reduce Food Stress and Support Your Child’s Nutrition with Confidence (11:23.65)
Smart Snacking and Sugar Swings: How to Keep Your Kids' Blood Sugar Stable This Easter (13:45.614)
Teaching Treat Balance: How to Handle Chocolate Without the Guilt or Power Struggles (15:59.198)
Feeding with Love and Laughter: Real Talk on Fussy Eaters, Chocolate Battles, and Family Food Wins (18:01.408)
Backyard Memories: Why the Best Family Moments Are Often the Simplest (20:20.694)
Slowing Down, Showing Up: A Real Talk on Sugar, Connection & Childhood Memories (22:39.512)

Show notes

READ TRANSCRIPT

Show Notes

Taming The Sugar Monster Over Easter

Easter is such a special time, filled with family, connection, and yes—plenty of chocolate….which can come with some serious sugar swings and bad behaviour!

It’s not about restriction—it’s about supporting your child with nourishing food, clear boundaries, and some clever strategies that will make this Easter feel more balanced for everyone.

Here’s what we cover in this episode:

Sugar Management Made Simple
Practical tips to reduce sugar overload without taking away from the fun of Easter.
Start the Day Right
The importance of what we do first thing.
Toddler vs Big Kid Strategies
Different approaches depending on age, stage, and your family's approach..
Building Food Memories
How family food traditions are so valuable.
The Magic of Movement
Ideas to get your kids active over the holidays—helping to regulate behaviour and burn off that excess energy.

More about Karina and Nourishing Kids!
Karina's popular Nourishing Kids lifts the "food stress" load, giving mums a clear plan to get kids trying new healthy foods and guidance on how to feed their family more easily! Learn more here https://nourishwithkarina.com/nourishingkids

Her Podcast The Easy Feed dives into popular topics - check it out here https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/the-easy-feed/id1710594874

Karina is a regular on Channel 7, Sunrise. Check out her segments here: https://nourishwithkarina.com/press

For online consultations & personalised support. Click here https://nourishwithkarina.com/nutrition-consultation

Karina's popular Kids Food Reviews are here https://nourishwithkarina.com/food-reviews

If you have a Fussy Eater, register for Karina's online training and learn the 3 Essential Steps required to end fussy eating. https://nourishwithkarina.easywebinar.live/endfussyeating

Introduction (00:00.086)
You're listening to the Easy Feed podcast episode number 61, Taming the Sugar Monster and Kids Over Easter.

Hi there, I'm Karina Savage and with over 20 years experience feeding children, including my own, I've learnt all the secrets that busy mums need to get their children eating better and actually enjoying healthy foods. So a huge welcome to the Easy Feed podcast. Hello, hello. I hope you're well. Easter is around the corner. School holidays have arrived.

Good luck everybody. For those with toddlers, it's like school holidays every day, right? I guess you've got childcare and preschool and kindy and whatnot, but the school holiday parents, good luck. I don't know if you're like me, but I'm one of those parents that hasn't organized anything for the school holidays. I bump into parents and they've got the whole school holidays mapped out. They've got holiday clinics, camps.

going to the Easter show, doing this, doing that, and they've spent the last few weeks meticulously planning. And it's survival, right? Because you get to the school holidays, parents have to work or the kids are just spending their fifth hour on screen. So it's actually really good to be planned and have a strategy for school holidays. But sadly, I'm not that mum and I have absolutely no plans yet for my kids for the next two weeks. Look, we're getting a triangle in the second week.

We're actually going to try and maybe go camping before, before we get dogs again, just because there's a few places we'd like to go that aren't pet friendly and it would be great opportunity. And then we toyed with hiring an Airbnb. haven't actually worked it out yet. School holidays will be what it will be. We will survive. So hopefully you have a good school holidays as well. And in school holidays is Easter. So I wanted to talk today about what we do over Easter.

Easter, Sugar Highs & Sacred Traditions: Balancing Celebrations and Meltdowns (02:01.228)
because, you know, different families will do different things. Some people don't even celebrate Easter and that's totally to be respected. Some people will not do Easter hunts. Some people will. A lot of families, think, traditionally do Easter hunts. I grew up doing Easter hunts and I love Easter hunts and will do them for as long as I possibly can with my family because I've always really cherished them and they've held a special place in my heart and they're fun. So.

We will continue our Easter hunts and it's just an exciting time of the year, I think, for kids. But it can come with a lot of excess sugar and tantrums and meltdowns and tiredness because sometimes you're socializing and there's lots going on and kids can reach capacity and poor nutrition can exacerbate that. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to stop people connecting and stop catching up because Easter's are often a time

like Christmas, where you do catch up with family and friends and loved ones. And it's really special. So we don't want to take that away. We just want to be able to better manage the meltdown. For me, Good Friday has always been a sacred traditional day for making my nonna special Easter bread. She has a traditional Italian Easter bread. It's called pinza. It's a Northern Italian Easter bread. And I will always have very.

special memories of making this Easter bread with her. And my mum also taking on the tradition and each year trying to make it better than the previous year. But it's quite a talent to actually get it to rise properly, to get it to work. I remember one year, bless my mum, she's such a great cook, but one year she accidentally put instead of 200 grams of sugar into the recipe.

She put two kilos of sugar into the recipe and so it was actually like a rock. It still tasted delicious, but it was more like those biscotti rather than pincer. Pincer's supposed to be, it's like a dense bread-like brioche, I guess you would say. It's not like panettone. Panettone is very light and panettone is like the Christmas bread fit visually. Panettone is very light and a little bit sweet and...

More Than a Meal: How Food Connects Generations at Easter (04:24.942)
got yeast in it. So it's like a sweet bread really, you would say. So I have very fond memories of every Good Friday. And even now my mum makes it every Good Friday and we compare how we've gone. It's a whole day event. It requires you to knead it, then let it rise, knead it, then let it rise. And each time you had to let it rise for hours at a time. The traditional way is that you put the pincer

Once you've needed it. you basically make the first batch. You put it in a bowl, you let it rise, but you actually need to have a nice warm, cozy environment for the pincer. And so you put it in. What we've always done is fill up a laundry trough with warm water, hot water. And then you put the bowl or the tray with the pincer dough in it covered. So you cover it in baking paper and then.

Traditionally, my mom's use like mohair rugs to cover it to keep it, it's like a baby to keep it and warm. So it's in the bottom half of it's in water, but the water's not actually touching the dough. So it's actually, it's just warming the bowl, but the water doesn't come up past halfway up the bowl. Cause you don't want the water to get into the pins of the dough. And then you covered it and then you warm it up and then you cover it.

So it's nice and warm and cozy and it rises for a good two hours. I think you have to leave it there or two or three hours. And then you go again, then you need it. And then you got to it rise for another two or three hours. And then on the third time, I think you then pop it in the oven and cook it and see how much it's actually risen. And then you get to enjoy it. And my children now love pincers as well. And I think it's because they have grown up knowing it and

almost cherishing it like me, they've seen how much I love it and how special it is to me. And now they love it too. And that's very common with food in families. What's familiar and loved by the parents will often become familiar and loved by the children, especially if there's a strong connection to that food. Food is so much more than food. It brings people together. It bonds people. People associate very special memories and

Feeding Struggles, Furry Sidekicks & Family Traditions: Nova’s Honest Journey with Her Fussy Eater (06:41.674)
experiences with food, we attach a lot to our experiences with food. And it's important to acknowledge that food is not just eaten for nutrition. Food is a lot more than that. And an Easter can be a time when we come around to celebrate food and all different cultures will have different traditions and beautiful foods that they make at their special traditional times. And so it's fantastic.

that children get to experience this love and sharing of connection and happiness around food. It's not all just about chocolate and sugar. It's a lot more than that, which is good. Having said that, children do love chocolate. They do love Easter presents and my children will definitely be consuming way more chocolate than they need to over Easter, but I'm okay with that.

And the reason I'm okay with that is because I know Easter is once a year. It's not what's happening every day. And that's what's really important in terms of nutrition. It's not the one off here and there that we really need to obsess over. So my children are going to have more chocolate than I would probably like them to have over Easter. But as I said, it's once a year and it's not something that they're going to be doing every day. In fact, what we will do is we will use some of the excess chocolate that they get from Easter.

And I'll include them as treats in their lunchbox moving forward. So how do we actually manage the sugar rush and the behavior? Because you might be saying to me, yeah, karina, it's fine if they have more than they would normally have over Easter, but what if they're an absolute nightmare to deal with? What if you're going to friends' places and it's time to leave and they absolutely lose their, you know what? And you know, that's because they've just eaten too much crappy food. Pardon the French, but it's,

It's a reality with kids and you may say to me, yeah, great. I don't want that. And I'm like, okay, that's fair enough. As I said, everybody's got their own rules and it's really specific on your child and the impact that sugar has on your child and obviously, you know, their personality. But I've got some tips for you that will help manage the sugar rush in our kids over this Easter period. And you can also apply this to other times of the year, perhaps over Christmas or.

Sugar Rush Survival: How to Balance Chocolate and Chaos at Easter (09:09.004)
birthday parties when there's going to be a concentrated time or period of days where there's going to be way more sugar consumed than you feel comfortable with. So to start off with, it's really important that we start the day. We need to put something in their stomach that actually gives them a bit of a base before, not before.

I should say probably with the first mouthful of chocolate, because if they go on an Easter hunt, chances are very high that chocolate is going to be the first thing that goes into their bellies. But what we need to do is we need to chase that down relatively quickly with something more wholesome that's going to help fuel them up and actually lessen the impact of sugar in their system. Because when sugar is eaten in isolation on its own,

It's going to have a different impact on blood sugar levels than when eaten with other foods, especially those that are high in things like protein, fat and fiber, because those foods will help slow down the sugar rush. I talked a lot in my nourishing members call the other day, two days ago, on glycemic index on sugar levels and how we better manage sugar levels in kids and slow down.

the sugar rush and we talked about all different strategies and different foods that they can put with more sugary foods to help slow down the sugar rush. So in some kids, they love white bread. They love all the white things, but they're not great for their blood sugar levels. Okay. I want to pause just for a second to let you know about something very important. If your child's eating is driving you nuts, it might be time for a new feeding plan. A plan that gets your kids eating well with no battles or bribes at the table.

If you're a busy time poor mum who's tried everything to get a child to eat better but nothing is working, then listen up. It's not your fault that there is a new way light at the end of the tunnel. I've been there and I know that there is a new way. The thing is there's no feeding kids rule book which is exactly why I've used my 23 years experience as a paediatric dietician and 12 years experience as a mother, including my own fasciitis.

Feeding Freedom: How to Reduce Food Stress and Support Your Child’s Nutrition with Confidence (11:23.65)
to create my own method to improve my children's eating habits and nutrition that actually works. I've helped thousands of parents over the past 23 years to improve their children's eating habits and reduce the stress and burden of feeding. The mum guilt is real, I get it. Creating a healthy feeding plan is the only way to get your child eating healthier and end the food stress and worry for good. The feeding burden is so real, it's so overwhelming. I've felt it, I've lived it.

but I want you to know that there's absolutely hope that things will change for you. It did for me and I know that it can for you too. I'm here to stop your food stress, boost your feeding confidence and end the battles for good. I'm here to give you freedom from worry, frustration, overwhelm at meal times from the battles and the bribes, freedom from it all. Click below on the show notes to take your step towards feeding freedom. All right, let's get back into it. So we talked about ways that we can actually

pair up those white things with other foods to help slow down the release of sugar and actually improve the sugar levels and actually improve their overall sugar levels and the stability of their sugar levels, which is really important for concentration and learning and less tantrums. So starting with a good breakfast will absolutely help to ensure that they are well-fueled. It's going to help reduce sugar cravings as well, because if they've got something decent in their belly,

then they're much less likely to want to reach to that fourth or fifth or sixth chocolate because they're actually satisfied. So it's really important to put something in earlier rather than later because it's going to help reduce the overall load of sugar going in across the day. So whether that's a smoothie, whether that's eggs on toast, avocado or peanut butter on grainy sourdough, whether it's a bowl of porridge or wheat bix.

something's got to go in that's nutritious and decent so that they can fill up, put some good food in their body and help manage the sugar across the day. And as I said, foods rich in protein, fat and fiber will all help to manage the blood sugar levels. And I've got all of this information at your fingertips inside Nourishing Kids. And it's just about making sure that we are pairing up these foods.

Smart Snacking and Sugar Swings: How to Keep Your Kids' Blood Sugar Stable This Easter (13:45.614)
throughout the day because it's really important to help stop that shark tooth like blood sugar level where you've got big swings. You've got the sugar rushing up and then the sugar crashing down and then the sugar rushing up and then the sugar crashing down. Other carbohydrate foods will also exacerbate a high chocolate intake because carbohydrate foods will break down to sugar as well. So if your child's eating

chocolate throughout the day. You don't also want to be throwing at them crackers and muesli bars and things like that, that are all carbohydrates that are all also going to break down to sugar. It's only going to further exacerbate high blood sugar levels. Homemade snacks are a great option. I've got some fantastic snack ideas. I've got a healthy snacks guide. I'll pop the link to that in my show notes. 60 healthy kids' snacks.

And then also my homemade recipes will also be much higher in fiber and protein. And you can check them out on my website, heading to nourishwithkarina.com and then click on the recipes tab and you'll find healthy kids recipes there. So making wholemeal muffins, my black bean brownie, they're going to be much healthier options than like a cracker or a chocolate music bar. It's going to help manage blood sugar levels. Having said that, I would still be focusing on those really

protein and healthy fat rich foods. Now, if you're listening and you have a younger child, so toddler age, the rules are different. I think the younger they are, the more you can get away with limiting their intake and really having clear boundaries around A, how much they're given, B, how often they see or are offered these chocolate Easter eggs.

Well, chocolate, chocolates in general, at least time you get all sorts of chocolates because with the young ones, A, they're not at school. They tend to not be given as much externally. And so it's really more about what's offered from the parents or the direct family. So you can chat to them and say, look, can you just give them a giant toy or not giant toy? Actually, you don't want a giant toy. Can you just give them something non-chocolate?

Teaching Treat Balance: How to Handle Chocolate Without the Guilt or Power Struggles (15:59.198)
and little chocolate eggs, can chat to them about that. And you can definitely offer chocolate at snack times and then just put it away, put it out of sight because they're often distracted by other things. And if you've got real structured meal and snack times, that's when you can bring out the chocolate and then just put it away out of sight, top back of the cupboard so they can't see it. That's really important because if they can see it, then they're much more likely to want it.

throughout the day with the older kids that can reach the top of the cupboard or have got eggs or bunnies that they've been given from school friends or teachers even. Then, and they're in their room, then it's a little trickier. And I think it's about having a chat to them about spreading out their intake of chocolate. So not having too much in one go because it could make their tummy feel sick.

Trying to educate them around the fact that this is a sometimes food and yes, of course they could eat it all in one go, but it's going to be better for them if they spread it out. I think at the end of the day, we need to teach our children how treat foods fit into a healthy, balanced lifestyle. I hate the word diet, so I try and avoid saying it at all costs. It's important that we teach them how it fits rather than avoiding it and forbidding it because then it becomes a forbidden fruit.

And then they get a want to even more and then they're to sneak it and hide it. And then you create this sort of vicious cycle where they're not learning how it fits within the healthy balanced way of eating.

Having said that, it's hard because my children are quite different. One will just devour it all and probably hard wrappers behind the cupboard, much to my dismay because I've tried hard to make that not happen. And I think we're getting there. We've got much less wrappers behind cupboards these days. I'm like, you don't have to hide a buddy. And then my daughter, who will just have Easter eggs sitting all around her room, hidden from her brother, you, and all these secret places. But she'll have eggs there from.

Feeding with Love and Laughter: Real Talk on Fussy Eaters, Chocolate Battles, and Family Food Wins (18:01.408)
at one or two Easter's ago, it's hilarious. Kids are very different in their approach and their behaviors around food. But I think at the end of the day, we need to teach them that it's okay to have treats. They just need to fit. And sometimes we have a bit more than we probably need and that's okay, but we really need to try and balance it out. And it's that message of moderation that is key rather than completely forbidding it and saying it's a bad food.

because we don't really want to be putting positive and negative connotations on food. Look, I'm still guilty of it. It's hard to not do it, but the more we can talk about it, sometimes foods and everyday foods, the better. The other thing we need to consider with our children having lots of chocolate is their teeth and how many fillings they're to have. We don't want their teeth to fall out by the age of 30. So that's another reason.

you can use for moderating their chocolate intake and say to them, look, you don't remember that feeling that you had, or you don't want to have a feeling, or you can talk about their dental health as another reason for moderating their chocolate intake, if it's going to work. Trying to link a reason and a why may help them understand, but sometimes kids just don't care and they just want to the chocolate. So it's sometimes a challenge.

Easter and times of the year when families are off together is a great opportunity to be more active. And not only does this help create a distraction from smashing yet another Easter egg, but it also gets them active, which burns up sugar in their blood, which can help manage behaviour and tantrums and sugar highs. So it's a good distraction and also helps burn up some sugar.

So Easter's a great opportunity for family bike rides. could be walks. It could be games of soccer in the park, family basketball, beach cricket if it's summer. mean, most states, I guess if you're at the top end of Australia, it's probably still hot. Actually, I Adelaide's still having a heat wave. They're probably, you're still going to have a heat wave over Easter. The poor things, we need some rain there. So maybe there's beach cricket in SA this year as well.

Backyard Memories: Why the Best Family Moments Are Often the Simplest (20:20.694)
Or even homemade obstacle courses in the backyard. I have real fond memories of doing this with my brother and my parents set it up. And I wish I'd done more and I actually need to try to do this with my kids. My dad was in the physical activity recreation space and I guess.

It was probably more at the forefront of his mind because this is what he was involved in day to day. But he would set up all these cool activities and obstacle courses and we would just do fun things in the backyard and it didn't cost money. It was just spending time together, having fun, being physically active. And I feel like we, we've lost some of that in

today's busy world, I feel even myself included, often I'm looking at what we can do externally, where we can go to do stuff with the family and often it costs money. But if we actually strip it back to basics and get out a hula hoop and a rope and a chair and you got to jump through this and climb over that and run and jump and skip and hop and whatever, roll and beat your brother and get back to the finish line before he does. That's...

fun and it's fun for kids and they remember that stuff. As you can tell now, you know, I remember that from, goodness, now I'm going to show my age, a good more than 30 years ago. So it's really another reminder that it can be as simple as that. Just connection, family time. We need to bring it back to basics and.

That's really special to me when I think back to those memories that I'm really fond of. It's all times that I've spent with my family connecting, whether it's making the Easter bread, whether it's learning how to make my daughter's special meat salsa, doing family obstacle course in the backyard. It's all time when my parents have just stopped and spent time with me or my grandparents have stopped and spent time with me.

Slowing Down, Showing Up: A Real Talk on Sugar, Connection & Childhood Memories (22:39.512)
So even as I'm recording this podcast, it's really a good reminder to stop, pause, breathe and say, how can I connect and take 10 minutes or 20 minutes out of my day to actually create some really quality time with my child. Whether it's around food, whether it's around physical activity, whether it's playing a game of Uno, think it's a nice little reminder.

So of course I've digressed, but I think it's really important and it's actually been a nice little reminder for me recording this podcast this morning as well. Okay, I'll wrap it up soon. I just wanted to give you a little insight into how you can perhaps manage sugar levels in your children a little easier over the Easter holiday period. If you do celebrate Easter, happy Easter. I hope that you have a beautiful time together as a family.

If you don't celebrate Easter, then I wish you a happy holiday period anyway. If you've got any questions, please connect with me. Send me an email. Hello at nourrishwithkarina.com. My name's spelled K-A-R-I-N-A. Or connect with me on Instagram, nourrishwithkarina. I wish you a beautiful week. Bye for now.