Most Registered and Licensed home daycares participate in the USDA Child and Adult Care Food Program and follow its guidelines to serve nutritious meals and snacks. But as the number of Dallas children with food allergies and families living a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle grows, the more daycare providers are learning to accommodate special diets within the Food Program.
First, make sure your provider is willing to be flexible with her menus. If she's making lunch for infants, toddlers and preschoolers it might be difficult for her to accommodate special requests. Her refrigerator might also be too small to keep lots of special foods. If you know someone whose child has the same dietary needs as yours, you might try that provider or at least get her opinion on easy food substitutions for daycare settings.
Next, talk to your child's physician. Certain diets will require a doctor’s note, especially if they differ from the Food Program meal patterns. For example, a lacto-ovo vegetarian could have eggs, cheese, nuts, seeds or beans for protein and still follow the meal patterns. A vegan child, however, would not drink cow's milk as required by the meal patterns and would need a doctor’s note stating that soy milk is preferred. Gluten-free diets and any food allergy accommodations should also have a doctor's note.
Finally, providers depend on the reimbursements from the Food Program to offset much of their food expenses, so please try to be flexible. It is often easier for a provider to make small substitutions for a few children than to have one child bring lunch from home and make the other children jealous. So if you want a small menu change, such as organic foods, you might pay more in tuition to help your provider cover the extra expense. But you won't need a doctor's note for organics.
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