Introducing Wholesome Blends: a new ‘real food’ option for tube fed children

When Mum Sarah Thomas was told her son Lewis needed a permanent feeding tube, she knew that there was no way she would be feeding him artificial foods. This is when her blending world started.

Sarah’s son Lewis, an identical twin, had a major stroke when he was three resulting in right sided hemiplegia, a form of cerebral palsy. Whilst Lewis defied the doctors with his recovery, the muscles in his throat, along with the meds he was taking, made it difficult for him to chew and swallow.

“I had always given my children healthy food options, so to go from that to a high sugar artificial diet in his feeding tube really didn’t sit well with me” she says. “I told the gastro and stoma team there and then I wouldn’t be feeding Lewis artificial foods, that he would be having a blended diet of real food instead”.

Luckily my son had no food intolerances, so this was an achievable situation for our family’.

The lack of any natural food for the blended community was heartbreaking for Sarah to discover. “I wanted to buy this for my son for when we were travelling, staying in hospital or just for convenience when I was too tired to blend.”

Luckily, Sarah has had a lifetime of working within the Australian food industry and across the world. 

After getting in touch with a friend who had a degree in Nutrition Science and is a qualified chef, along with a supportive senior dietician, Sarah put together healthy recipes that were easy to blend and were high in calories. From here, Wholesome Blends was born.

“Its been a long tough road to get to this point” says Sarah, “But its something I am so passionate about not only for my family, but for others in our situation as well.”

Providing healthy options for everyone is so important in the Wholesome Blends story.

“We have just launched our first product, a pork and sweet potato blend, and it’s been received so well by our bended foods community. I have more recipes that are in development, with a vegetarian option coming soon.”

Wholesome Blends is being delivered across all of Australia, and there are plans to distribute to New Zealand soon as well.

Sarah adds, “The support for this from the enteral feeding community is huge. We all want our families to eat what we are eating, healthy options, no added nasties.”

You can follow the Wholesome Blends story here on Facebook, or order directly from the website www.wholesomeblends.com.au