A nourishing diet fit for children 
The first 1,000 days in a child’s life are vital to development and the products available across this range have been specifically designed to ensure that children are well equipped to grow and live healthy lives. It’s also a period when healthy habits develop. This range aims to assist parents to ensure their child gets a healthy start to life. 

We understand that babies and infants require different nutrients at different stages of their development, for example, whilst our range is organic up to 12 months, we have decided to fortify our range from one year onwards, recognising toddlers’ needs for iron to help support their development. That’s why each product in the Little Ones range is designed specifically to meet these changing needs. To guide parents, our products clearly state the targeted age group its intended for. 

Products from our Little Ones range can be found here.

How does Little Ones differ from other products?

Sugar and salt:

Throughout the range we have not added salt to any of our products unless needed for technological reasons e.g. salt in cheese. We have also not added any refined sugar in any of our products, and only used juices and purees where it would be normally found in the recipe or where it gives the flavour profile e.g. apple juice on our apple rice cakes. Babies have an inherently sweet tooth, but unlike other products this range doesn’t mix fruit concentrates with single veg recipes as a way to improve the taste. Our ‘first taste’ savoury pouches simply contain single vegetables to help babies develop a liking for their veggies and support a veg-led weaning approach. 

We set ourselves the challenge of limiting the number of sweet foods we offer to ensure that there is a good balance between sweet and savoury across the range. 

We also didn’t develop snacks for babies under 12 months that would contain unnecessary amounts of added sugar, such as baby biscuits or juices. In fact, we’ve decided not to launch any sweet snacks, juice drinks or biscuits aimed at children under 12 months at all. 

Exploring the taste of fruit and vegetables:

We’ve put a lot of thought and effort into encouraging infants to develop familiarity with vegetables as they progress through our range. Research suggests it may take between 7-10 exposures – so don’t give up if they reject a new food after the first couple of times. We are helping to support this by offering vegetables across our range for the different ages.

We believe that encouraging children to enjoy fruit and vegetables from a young age is vital to supporting the development of healthy habits early in life. We want kids to fall in love with vegetables so that’s why the first ones they taste with our range are carrot and parsnips – two vegetables that they’re sure to love. And from 10 months, all our Little Ones meals also deliver at least 1 of your 5 a day for fruit and vegetables.

Responsible portion sizes:

Although all babies grow at different rates, a diet that contains too many calories in early childhood isn’t conducive to their health. That’s why we’ve invested a huge amount of time and effort to create recipes that support healthy portions for young children, with clear labelling indicating which age range a certain product is suitable for.

Fortified with iron:

To avoid iron deficiency which is common in young children, all products aimed at children over 12 months in this range are fortified with iron. Likewise, to ensure that our little ones receive enough fibre in their diets, we use wholegrain sources in these products to boost the fibre content. 

Parents naturally want the very best for their children and Sainsbury’s Little Ones range ensures they can help give their children a great start to life. 

The UK government currently recommends that complementary feeding is introduced at 6 months, this is in line with the World Health Organisation. For more information, visit: https://www.nhs.uk/start4life/baby/