Try a fry for a healthy baby
While a traditional fry-up of eggs, bacon, liver and kidneys may not appeal to those mums-to-be battling morning sickness, the benefits from a nutrient called choline, which is related to the Vitamin B family, has been found to help cells grow and work correctly.
Scientists at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill* found that choline is essential for the healthy development of unborn babies’ brains. They studied the effects of choline in mice and found that mice mums who had too little choline in their diet had babies with fewer blood vessels in their brains. If a developing foetus has too few blood vessels, the brain will not develop properly.
Many nutrition experts are confident that most women get plenty of choline from food, but some studies have suggested that as many as one in four women may be deficient.
So what should mums-to-be be tucking into on a regular basis? Egg yolks, bacon, offal, like liver and kidneys, milk, wheatgerm, spinach and other green leaves, plus cauliflower will all help increase important levels of choline say the experts.
*Report published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal
