June 2, 2006
Healthy Foods Newsletter
by Leanne Ely

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Need even MORE snacks? Here you go—once again, my comments in parenthesis.

1. I mix one part vanilla yogurt and one part peanut butter for apple dipping with a dash of cinnamon. Less sticky than if it was just the peanut butter and it breaks the monotony!

2. I get cheap bamboo skewers from the dollar store and we make fruit kabobs with banana, melon, and grapes and pop them into the freezer on wax paper covered trays. In a few hours the kids have a sweet and cool treat that's super healthy too! (use your motherly wisdom and judgment with kids and skewers)

3. The favorite snack around my house is a bean burrito sprinkled with cheddar cheese. If you make them on the taco-sized tortilla, they are the perfect snack size and really fills them up!

4. My daughter loves to eat frozen corn -- FROZEN. Doesn't like it any other way, but will eat it straight from the freezer, in small batches so it doesn't melt before she eats it! (Too bad her brothers don't like it, too!)

5. Make homemade waffles and freeze extras. You can put them in the toaster, and spread with applesauce or peanut butter as a snack. (and make sure the waffles are whole grain!)

6. parboil (not boil) okra, then run cold water over it and it is not slimy. Serve it with soy sauce and lemon juice. Everyone loves it, and it is great finger food.

7. I often have fruit (usually grapes and apples) with cheddar or pepper Jack cheese (my favorite). This is Monterey Jack cheese with finely chopped jalapenos added. Yum! On the fruit idea, you can't top fresh pineapple. It beats canned pineapple hands down. Slicing off the prickly outside is well worth it to get to juicy, sweet stuff on the inside!

8. My suggestion is sort of a spin on fruit salad: Put some bite size pieces of fruit (or veggies, cheese, whatever they like that is healthy) into an ice cream cone. Put some together for the walk to the park and you don't have to worry about carrying and keeping track of containers, or looking for a trash can for garbage. (don’t you wish they had whole wheat ice cream cones?)

9. Roasted chickpeas!
3 cups of cooked chickpeas (ones you cook yourself are better because there's no salt)
3 T of olive oil
salt, to taste

Combine in a baking pan that is big enough so that the chickpeas make only one layer. Roast in a 425 degree oven for 20 minutes, or until brown. Cool and eat! They are delicious, crunchy and soft at the same time. And very healthy.

10. I have found that if you let them choose and help make the snack, they are more willing to eat it. My kids like the raw veggies with Ranch dip too. In fact they like to "dip" everything! So, we like to be creative and come up with some dips of our own. They can really have some weird ideas, but if it gets them to eat nutritiously, I'm all for it.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5