Spock, 91, joined colleagues in the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine in calling for demotion of two of the basic food groups to condiment status on American tables.

Milk and meats, say the group's new proposed dietary guidelines, should no longer be part of the national daily diet. Instead, the doctors would move meats and all dairy products into a new "optional" category, not recommended for daily consumption.

Spock's landmark parenting guide, "Dr Spock's Baby and Child Care" (Pocket Books), does not reflect his dietary conversion. The next edition, he promised, most certainly will.

"In the seventh edition, Spock endorses a low-fat, plant-based diet for children due to rising trends in obesity and Spock's own switch to a macrobiotic diet after facing serious health issues."

"In the seventh edition of Baby and Child Care, published a few weeks after he died, Spock advocated for a bold change in children's diets, recommending that all children switch to a vegan diet after the age of 2."

The late Dr. Benjamin Spock, arguably the most influential pediatrician of all time, has left children and their parents with a surprising and rather demanding legacy: advice that they stick to a vegetarian diet devoid of all dairy products after the age of 2.

In the seventh edition of his world-famous book, ''Baby and Child Care,'' issued last month by Pocket Books just weeks after his death at age 94, Dr. Spock recommends an approach to childhood nutrition that many experts, including his co-author, Dr. Steven J. Parker, consider too extreme and likely to result in nutritional deficiencies unless it is very carefully planned and executed.

''We now know that there are harmful effects of a meaty diet,'' the book says. ''Children can get plenty of protein and iron from vegetables, beans and other plant foods that avoid the fat and cholesterol that are in animal products.'' As for dairy foods, Dr. Spock says, ''I no longer recommend dairy products after the age of 2 years. Other calcium sources offer many advantages that dairy products do not have.''

Starting with the first edition of his book in 1946, Dr. Spock always recommended meat and milk products as part of a child's diet. Dr. Spock's revisions of what had been his most recent advice — to include small amounts of lean animal foods in children's diets — stemmed from a switch he himself made to an all-plant diet in 1991, after a series of illnesses that left him weak and unable to walk unaided. His wife, Mary Morgan, said that after he made the dietary change, he lost 50 pounds, regained his ability to walk and became healthier over all.

''It enabled him to revise his book before he died, which was his most important goal,'' Ms. Morgan said.

Dr. Neal Barnard, president of Physicians for Responsible Medicine, an organization in Washington that advocates strict vegetarian diets for everyone, said that he had drafted the section on nutrition in the new edition but that Dr. Spock had edited it to give it ''his personal touch.''

PICTURE a childhood without ice cream or the occasional hot dog or burger at a birthday party or ball game. Picture in their stead organic applesauce, peanut butter and soy patties.

The latter are the kinds of foods children should be fed if they are to grow up lean and healthy, states the most influential book on bringing up children, Dr. Benjamin Spock's ''Baby and Child Care'' (Pocket Books). In a radical shift from previous versions, the seventh edition of this bible of child-rearing advises parents to provide an all-plant, or vegan, diet for children after age 2.

Dr. Spock, who died in March at 94, just weeks before this edition was published, had become a strict vegetarian in 1991, a change that his wife said greatly improved his health and enabled him to complete the revision of his world-famous book, which has guided parents through child-raising for decades.

But what an ailing man near the end of his life is willing to eat (especially when a devoted wife is willing to spend hours a day preparing his meals) is not necessarily what children and their overworked parents could or would readily adopt.

The dietary change recommended would mean getting all protein from plant foods like beans, nuts, tofu and other soy products and seitan, a protein concentrate made from wheat. It would mean relying on vegetables, fortified plant foods and drinks and a daily vitamin-mineral supplement to provide needed amounts of essential nutrients like calcium, iron, zinc and vitamins D and B-12 that are most readily available from animal foods like meat, poultry, fish and milk.

It is not that this way of eating is unhealthy -- quite the opposite. Avoiding the saturated fats and cholesterol in animal foods and consuming lots of fiber and nutrients from vegetables and fruits could go a long way toward reducing problems with heart disease, obesity, high blood pressure, gallbladder disease and even some cancers later in life.

But parents who decide to adopt Dr. Spock's advice should know that it requires careful meal planning and professional guidance to insure that the children will not be shortchanged on nutrients. Parents should also realize that it will not always be easy to prepare vegan meals for all occasions or to get children to eat them. Children do not like to be different from their friends. Even the most self-possessed youngsters may balk when friends comment negatively about what they eat.

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