Mit esznek a brit királyi családban a babák és kisgyerekek?

When royal babies are born there is afternoon tea and bubbly laid out in the Lindo Wing of St Mary’s in Paddington for the new parents – but what about the newborn? We all know that royal babies are born with a silver spoon in their mouth – but what’s in that spoon? Ever troubled yourself with the burning question of what do royal babies eat? Here’s what royal babies can expect.

Breast is best?

Not for royalty – or at least not until the 20th century. Breastfeeding was taboo, and was seen as repulsive, inconvenient and downright dangerous. Upper class women appointed other upper class women (though not as upper class as themselves, obviously) as wet nurses to feed the baby.

They weren’t allowed garlic, spices or alcohol in case these affected the flavour of their milk. What an exciting diet that would have been. In the 18th century, babies were suckled on a range of pointy objects like horns and pickled cow nipples, which sounds a bit painful and not very appetising. They were given cow or goat milk rather than human milk or, alternatively, honey and sugar water for the first month; then thin oatmeal porridge or flour or cereal mixed into a hot broth. Thank goodness powdered milk came along in the 19th century.

Attitudes had changed by the 20th century, so the Queen, Princess Diana and Kate are all believed to have breastfed their babies. However, as every exhausted mother knows, just because you breastfeed your first child doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll breastfeed your subsequent ones. Five a day Darren McGrady, a former royal chef known as, er, ‘The Royal Chef’ has reportedly said that Princes William and Harry were fed fruit and vegetable purees. OK, so all babies are fed fruit and veg purees – but this was no ordinary supermarket baby food. The nanny would select a ‘daily menu’ and send it over to the kitchens, often consisting of apples and pears from the Queen’s Sandringham estate, steamed, mashed and sieved twice to remove the lumps. As the babies got older, one chef in the palace kitchen would puree chicken, lamb or beef; and another would do the same with cooked vegetables such as peas, carrots and cauliflower – and then the two would be mixed together. The new royal baby is likely to be fed on organic produce championed by Prince Charles.

As another former royal chef, Carolyn Robb, has pointed out, much of it may come from the gardens and orchards of the royal estates – for instance, lamb from Highgrove and milk from the cows kept there. Although Kate, who’s fond of eating healthily, would have some input into the baby’s diet, the nanny would have the upper hand. Kate is less formal and more hands-on than previous royal mums, so she may in fact have fewer chefs and nannies and rely more on her mother Carole Middleton’s advice. Whatever the new baby eats, they’ll be introduced to a wide range of flavours at an early age in order to prepare them for a lifetime of travelling and eating adventurously around the world.

source: metro.co.uk

Baby vocabulary. Can you match the words and their Hungarian meaning?

Key

1. d. 2. a. 3. g. 4. b. 5. c. 6. j. 7. e. 8. i. 9. f. 10. h.