[alsoSarah]

In ds' class this year, each child is expected to bring their own snack to school every day.

(It's a half-day program, so they will not be eating a full meal while at school.)

I learned from last years experience that most parents send things like Little Debbie snacks with koolaid-type "fruit drinks".

(Last year, the teacher asked that the families take turns providing snacks for the entire class, so, despite the teacher-provided list of suggested, healthy-ish snacks, ds ate junk food nearly *every* day. He was thrilled! Me? Not-so-much.)

He understands, in theory, that we don't eat a lot of junkfood because it's not good for our bodies, and he doesn't complain about not having it at home, but he would never *choose* a healthier snack over junk.

I need inspiration for reasonably healthy snacks (I'm not all that crunchy), that will still seem appealing to a 5-year old when most of the other kids have donuts, etc..

I don't want healthier food to seem like a punishment, KWIM?

I'd love some snack ideas, and input from anyone who's been here, done this.

Thanks in advance!
alsoSarah

 

[Becken]

Vegan Lunchbox is one of my favorite blogs about kid friendly school food. Most of these are complete meals, but she has lots of ideas for little snacks, too. Dig through the archives and see what you can find!

 

[simple living mama]

My kids favorite healthy snack is hummus with tortilla and squeezed lemon.

If you have a gas range, fry up the tortilla directly on the burner until it looks homemade. It makes it taste much nicer.

If you don't have time to make hummus, buy a good boxed powered brand like "Fantastic" and it only takes a few minutes to make. Put a fresh lemon in your child's lunch box and let them do the squeezing. Great tasty healthy snack.

 

[alsoSarah]

Cool site, Becken, thanks! I like the food ideas on site, *plus* I've always really liked bento box type things, and I wonder if something like that might make ds' snacks feel a bit more special....

Simple Living Mama, my ds likes veggies dipped in hummus, but I had never thought to leave the lemon out of the hummus I was making so that he can squeeze it on for himself.... I know that he will dig that aspect of it! Thank you!

At home, Ds is happy with snacks like
apples with peanut butter for dipping
popcorn
veggies with hummus for dipping
yogurt
berries or other fresh fruit
veggies and colby cubes with yogurt-based ranch dip
unsweetened applesauce
fruit leather
pasta with Thai-sh peanut sauce or tomato sauce for dipping (hot or cold)
granola bars
steamed green beans marinated in vinaigrette
rolled-up sandwiches on 15 grain bread
sliced cheese on crackers

All the usual kid's stuff.... but I'm worried that, in the face of other kids eating ho-hos, he's going to feel like he's getting a bad deal....

He's familiar with junk food.... way too familiar, by MDC standards.
(We eat dessert of some kind pretty much every night, and "special treats" are not by any means rare, especially when pms craving are hitting *me!*

)
So, he can identify a brownie at forty paces, and he adores them....

I just don't want eating reasonable food to feel like a sentence, kwim?

Thank you for the great tips, and please keep 'em coming!

:

alsoSarah

 

[JaneS]

What about making your own muffins or cookies with healthy ingredients? Then you could make a few big batches, freeze some snack portions and rotate.

I'm planning to do this b/c DS can only have nut butter/flour baked things, no grains.

 

[JaneS]

Or banana, zucchini or squash snack cake.

 

[VikingKvinna]

How about some "Dandy Candy"? I got the recipe here and both DS and I love them. Infinite variations, too. They're really quite satisfying if you're craving a sweet, and yet still pretty good for you. No artifical stuff, and you can pack 'em with extras if you so choose.

Here's the original recipe that I cut-n-pasted. Credit where credit's due: it's courtesy of MDC member JanisB.

Dandy Candy

1 cup peanut butter
1 cup dry milk powder
1/2 to 3/4 cup honey
1 tsp vanilla

Optional additions:
1/2 cup carob powder or 1 cup granola, rolled oats or puffed cereal
1/4 cup nuts, chopped or seeds. coconut, wheat germ, sesame seeds
1 to 2 Tbs. water if mixture is too crumbly

1. combine peanut butter, milk powder, honey and vanilla in bowl.

2. mix with fork or spoon until ingredients are well blended.

3. for fudgy candy, add carob powder.

4. for chewy candy, add granola or oats.

5. for crunchy candy add puffed cereal. These are a little harder to roll, so you may prefer to pat this mixture into a pan.

6. chop nuts if oyu like.

7. shape into balls or a log. Roll in coconut, wheat germ, sesame seeds or a combination of all three.

8. cover or wrap in plastic wrap and put into refrigerator to chill for about an hour.

If you made logs, slice into bite size bits after chilling.

 

[alsoSarah]

Great ideas!

I'll admit, it rarely occurs to me to make healthier versions of dessert-y foods.... Usually, I'm more of a "let's see how many forms of chocolate (and how much butter) we can get this dessert to hold" kind of girl.

But, I think that adding some healthy snacks that have the same sort of "feel" as the other kids' snacks will really save the day, in this situation.

*And,* I can expand my own dessert/snack-making horizons a bit, too!

This is going to rock, Mamas, thank you!

Let's see, in my current arsenal, I have:
Dandy Candy (Thanks, Kvinna!)
Carrot Walnut Muffins
Banana bread/Muffins
Zucchini bread/Muffins
Cocoa/zucchini muffins
Pumpkin Pecan muffins
The tastyrific apple cake/muffin recipe that I made up when I couldn't find one that was "apple-y" enough

Fruit crisps/crumbles

I have no tried-n-true healthy cookie recipes so far, though.
I've always been afraid that they'd be either hard, or too "cakey" and bland, for some reason.

:

If you mamas have healthy cookie recipes that you adore, please send 'em my way!

Off to do MDC cookie searches,
alsoSarah

 

[VikingKvinna]

Quote:

Originally Posted by alsoSarah Usually, I'm more of a "let's see how many forms of chocolate (and how much butter) we can get this dessert to hold" kind of girl.

I knew I liked you for a reason. heh.

 

[serenetabbie]

Hey AlsoSarah, we are in the same boat

Although, my 5yo is more the type to try to sway opinions and impress everyone with how cool and cultured she is with different snacks.

My 8 yo is the one who wanted junk like all the rest of the kids have, and begged for Lunchables/bologna sandwiches on white bread/fruit roll ups/gummy "fruit". Blech. I let him try a lunchable at MIL's and he ate three bites before turning to me and saying "You were right, these ARE gross!"

Somethings that worked with my 8 yo;

fruit salad with yogurt "dressing" on the side
oatmeal cookies made with 1/2 whole wheat flour and molassas
a variety of muffins (which I se you have listed! I make most of mine up as I go based on what I have

)
carrot cake cookies
sliced or whole berries with a little raw sugar on top
rice pudding
crackers and slices of cheese

And... not really OT but, you want a really really fantastic "more butter, more chocolate" recipe??
So not healthy and so bad for you? I got it.

 

[melissel]

Quote:

Originally Posted by serenetabbie And... not really OT but, you want a really really fantastic "more butter, more chocolate" recipe?? So not healthy and so bad for you? I got it.

Erm, I don't know about Sarah, but I sure do!!!!

:

Mama, as soon as I can switch computers I'll be back to post our favorite apple muffin recipe. I make it almost entirely with stone ground whole wheat flour and a ton of grated apples, and the girls LOVE IT. Also, my older DD loves a bowlful of thawed mixed berries (Doles has great ones, though not organic) with a drizzle of real maple syrup (sometimes over vanilla yogurt). Mmmmm...

 

[alegna]

At that age sometimes fun shapes are a hit:

peanut butter and a banana rolled in a tortilla
pb & j rolled in a tortilla
a simple sandwich cut with a cookie cutter to a fun shape
cheese and crackers with the cheese in fun shapes

 

[alsoSarah]

Quote:

Originally Posted by serenetabbie And... not really OT but, you want a really really fantastic "more butter, more chocolate" recipe?? So not healthy and so bad for you? I got it.

Oh, I think you *know* that I do!

alsoSarah

 

[melissel]

OK, here's my contribution. They're so sweet, they'relike apple cake

Apple Muffins

(I generally "double" it and freeze a bunch for fast breakfasts and snacks. I get 18 medium sized muffins from the doubled recipe, they are fairly dense.)

3/4 c. whole wheat flour (I use 1 1/2 C)
1 c. flour (I use 1/4 C)
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 c. milk (I use skim)
1 egg, well beaten
1/3 c. oil
1/2 c. brown sugar (used less today, still very sweet!)
1 whole peeled, cored, grated/chopped apple

Preheat oven to 400° F. Mix together flour, baking powder and salt. Combine milk, egg, oil and sugar. Add this mixture along with the grated apple to the dry ingredients. Stir just until moistened. It will be lumpy. Fill greased or paper lined muffin pans 2/3 full. Bake for 20 minutes. Makes 12 small muffins, or 9 medium sized (my size

) ones.

---

I made these this morning and added more apple than I used to (used to be 1 whole apple, today I used 1 1/2). It came out great, although you definitely still have lots of apple slivers (which doesn't bother me at all, might bother some).

HTH!

 

[serenetabbie]

Ok, but be forewarned, it is NOT healthy, and really has no place here on MDC at all in any way, shape or form... but it is sooooo good. It is from Jill Conner Browne's book The Sweet Potato Queen's Book of Love.

~Chocolate Stuff~

2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
One stick real butter (NOT unsalted)
2 fairly heaping tablespoons of Hershey's Cocoa (in the dark brown box)
1 running over teaspoon of vanilla
Optional: a whole bunch of pecans, chopped up fine

Beat first 3 ingredients. Add salt. Add melted butter and cocoa. Then add vanilla and nuts if you choose. Pour The Stuff into a greased loaf pan, set the loaf pan in a pan of water, and stick the whole business in the oven set at about 300 degrees for 40 to 45 minutes. Take it out when the top gets crunchy. You can't undercook it since it's good raw, but you don't want to overcook it and lose the gooey bottom so crucial to the whole texture experience.

 

[NannyL]

Ooh - my mom makes some great "trail mix" cookies. Lots of dried fruits and peanut butter and wheat germ etc. They are seriously good, and very nutrient-dense. (Around my house, we called them "hoof arted" cookies, as each one has a gram of fiber...)

She's sending me the recipe and I'll post it tomorrow.

 

[alsoSarah]

The apple muffins sound good, and probably less apple overload than mine!

thanks, Melissel!

The Chocolate Stuff..... well, I probably won't get to the stroke of midnight without succumbing to *that* little siren song!

alsoSarah

 

[melissa17s]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JaneS What about making your own muffins or cookies with healthy ingredients? Then you could make a few big batches, freeze some snack portions and rotate.

I have been doing something very similar for my ds because he is starting kindergarten. I have been making one batch of snacks each day this month to get a good start. Only thing is, we have had a problem with family members wanting to eat the snacks now instead of leaving them for ds for later...

Another thought... send little pizza pockets, spring rolls, dim sum, or samosas

 

[serenetabbie]

You have to come back and let me know how it was Sarah! I made it for a pot luck and everyone liked it a lot (except one woman who told me my brownies were horrible... but she is derranged anyhow so I discounted that

). There was not a scrap left over.

 

[NannyL]

TRAIL MIX COOKIES

Chop together in the food processor:
1 cup raisins
½ cup dried apricots
¼ cup sunflower seeds

In a medium size bowl, stir together:
1/3 cup nonfat dry milk powder
¾ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
1 cup rolled oats or oatmeal (old-fashioned, not quick cooking)
¾ cup whole wheat flour
½ cup wheat germ

Cream together:
½ cup peanut butter
½ cup butter or shortening
1 egg
1 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Stir the dry mixture and the chopped fruit into the creamed mixture. The batter will be stiff. Spoon the mixture onto cookie sheets, making 36 cookies about 25 grams each. Flatten the cookie slightly, it will be about 2 inches in diameter. Bake in a 350-degree oven for 8 - 12 minutes. Let cool on rack and store in a tin. These cookies stay very fresh for several days and freeze well.

Nutritional analysis per cookie: 124 calories, 3 grams protein, 17 grams carbohydrates, 6 grams fat, 40 mg. sodium, 2 grams fiber.