When it is time to feed my eight school-aged children their afternoon snack, it often becomes a challenge. Finding foods that meet my criteria of being healthy, tasty, and foods that everyone will like can be a daunting experience. However, I have some tried and true ideas for you that I hope you find helpful.
Snack Number One
Yogurt and Granola. Most children love yogurt, and I like to give them a small cup of granola cereal along with it. Some of the children will eat the two foods separately, while others will dump their granola into the yogurt, making it a crunchy rather than creamy treat.
Snack Number Two
Apple Smiles with Apple Wedges, Peanut Butter and Raisins. When kids can be involved with making their own snacks, they often take more of an interest in food, and eat better too. I let the children put peanut butter on the apple wedges (the peanut butter sticks better if you dab the side of the apple with a napkin first to dry it a bit).
The kids make a “smile” with the apple wedges, which look like lips, and they stick the raisins in between to make them look like teeth. Some people do this using marshmallows for the teeth, but raisins are healthier, and I tell them if they don’t brush their teeth they will turn black like the raisins!
Snack Number Three
Smiley Face Toast. This is a fun treat! I take milk and add some food coloring to it, then “paint” the toast with the colored milk. After it gets toasted, the design or picture remains on the front of the bread! This can be fun to do with the different seasons and holidays. You can make Jack-)-Lanterns for Halloween, a Christmas tree during the Christmas season, leaves for autumn, etc. Kids love this snack! We usually put cinnamon sugar on the toast after it is buttered. Yummy.
Snack Number Four
Mini Pizzas! I have yet to find a child that didn’t like pizza. This snack is healthy and nutritious, and fast. You can heat these in the oven or in the microwave, but the oven method is faster if you have a lot of them to make, and my kids like to eat about 8 of them.
Lay out a Ritz cracker on a plate or cookie sheet. Top the cracker with low fat sausage slices (I like to use Hillshire Farm turkey polish sausage), then lay a square piece of cheese on top. Warm in oven or microwave until the cheese melts. This snack is always a big hit!
Snack Number Five
Tuna Salad Munchies. This is another high protein snack, using tuna and cheese. Much like making snack number four, you make tuna salad with low fat mayonnaise, you can even add some celery in there to get the veggies into the kids. Top crackers with the tuna salad, add a slice of Swiss cheese, and warm until the cheese melts.
Snack Number Six
Quick Peanut Butter Cookies. I seldom bake homemade cookies because they are time consuming to make, and are not real healthy. But occasionally I like to give the kids milk and cookies for snack, and when they can help me make them it’s even more productive. A good way to teach children about measurements!
A few years ago a friend told me about a recipe for making the most delicious peanut butter cookies, using only three ingredients!! I was skeptical, but these are fabulous. You only need 1 cup of peanut butter, 1 cup of sugar, and one egg.
While the kids are making the cookies, preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Mix the three ingredients until well blended, and drop them onto a cookie sheet that has been lined with parchment paper (or wax paper if you don’t have parchment). Bake them for 6-8 minutes, and watch carefully to be sure you don’t over bake them. They taste amazing! And the kids are getting are not only learning how to cook, they are getting their protein from the peanut butter.
Snack Number Seven
Peanut Butter Play Dough. Many years ago when I worked in a daycare center, the cook would mix up a batch of peanut butter play dough and let the kids play with it before eating it. Not only was it pretty tasty, it was a fun treat.
Make sure each child washes their hands thoroughly before doing this snack! Mix:
3 1/2 cups peanut butter
3 cups confectioners’ sugar
3 cups honey
3 1/2 cups dry milk powder
Mix all ingredients in a large bowl, then divide equally among your children. This should serve at least a dozen kids! The “dough” will not be sticky, and the kids can form it into worms, snowmen, airplanes, etc. Let their imaginations run wild, but be warned that although this is tasty, it is also very rich.
Snack Number Eight
Celery Stick Boats. Who hasn’t made this snack? It’s ages old, yet many children have never enjoyed the blending of crunchy celery with smooth creamy peanut butter. The old name for this snack is “Ants on a Log”. Kids enjoy it more if they think they are making a boat out of the celery!
Simply cut the celery into 3 – 4 inch lengths, let the children fill the celery with peanut butter and let the kids lay raisins in the “boat”. They can even make raisin “people” if they choose. An easy snack, and very healthy.
Snack Number Nine
Homemade Nachos. Kids love nachos! We make these using a cookie sheet. I find the restaurant style tortilla chips are the healthiest. Lay them on a cookie sheet, sprinkle shredded low fat cheddar cheese over the top, and bake until the cheese is melted. You can serve this with mild salsa or even guacamole (which is full of the good kinds of fat).
Snack Number Ten
Veggies with Ranch Dressing. Okay, I know, there are some kids who simply don’t like to eat their vegetables. And veggies are so much more nutritious in their raw state, so give them a variety of veggies and let them dip them into some ranch style dressing.
Make it colorful! You could choose broccoli, cauliflower, snap peas, carrot sticks, grape tomatoes, cucumber slices, zucchini sticks, etc. I find that diluting the ranch style dressing with just a little bit of milk makes it go farther and it’s less fattening, yet tastes just as good.
To Conclude
Snack time doesn’t have to be boring! Let the kids get involved and help prepare their own snacks. You can even give them aprons to wear to make them feel like a chef! We use paper plates to cut down on clean up time, but the kids always have a ball, and are getting healthier snacks than a bag of chips and a soda pop!
Have fun with the recipes, and may it get your creative juices flowing.
