Snacktime

Our first Healthy Mommy, Happy Family get together didn't go quite as planned, but Michele and I had fun talking about healthy snack foods for our kids.

Here are a few suggestions:

~Plain Yogurt (recipe to follow) - Starting with plain yogurt and then adding fresh fruit or whole grains is much healthier than buying the flavored stuff in the store.
~Applesauce (recipe to follow) - When buying applesauce, be sure it does not have anything in it except apples and water. Most jars in the store have extra sugar added. Apples are so sweet on their own, you just don't need the extra sugar.
~Raw veggies - Raw is healthier than cooked, but if your child is too young for a crispy veg, steam them just for a moment. Steam, don't boil. The more water you use, the more nutrients you lose. Another version of veggies that we do quite often for snacks or lunch is frozen vegs. Just the cheap bag of mixed chopped veggies. When I buy a bag, I pour a serving into small containers and put them in the freezer. That way, when snacktime comes, all I have to do is pull out a pre-made bowl, stick it in the microwave for a minute and it's done!
~Guacamole is a great dip for veggies and crackers.
~Hummus is also a great dip for veggies and crackers. (See recipe in previous post.)
~Nut butter on apple slices or celery sticks.
~Fruit smoothie - You kids will think they are having desert, but it can be totally healthy if you do it right! Just blend together fresh or frozen fruit along with some plain yogurt. Add some pure fruit juice if necessary (I love V-Fusions because you can throw some veggies in there, too without anyone ever knowing!)
~Low-fat cheese sticks - This is a great fix for a snack attack in the grocery store. Instead of reaching for the Animal Crackers, reach for some cheese. It's even got protein to help reduce cravings later.
~Dried fruit - This is one of our favorite snacks at the moment. I'll put out a couple different fruits and some whole grain cereal and my Baby Dude just munches while he plays.

I love making my own yogurt. It is so easy; It is such a money-saver; and I know it is all natural. Here's my recipe:

Pour 8 cups of milk (I use 4 cups whole, 4 cups 1%) into your CrockPot. Turn it on LOW for two and a half hours. Turn it off, but leave it as is for another three hours. Take out two cups from CrockPot and mix with half a cup of already made yogurt. Pour mixture back into CrockPot and stir together. Cover with towels to keep heat in and allow to sit for 8 more hours. Then it's done! Yes it takes a little while, but most of the time you don't have to do anything to it. It's super easy.

My newest super easy CrockPot adventure is homemade applesauce. This couldn't be easier. I made it simply because I had several apples that were going to go bad before I had a chance to eat them. Here's the "recipe":

Slice, core, and peel apples. (I used 7. Use as many as you want.) Throw apples in CrockPot. Add approximately 1/4 cup of water for every 4 apples. Add a squeeze of lemon juice, approximately the juice from one lemon for every 4 apples. Turn CrockPot on low for 4 to 6 hours. My apples were plenty mushy by 4 hours, but it will depend on your CrockPot. They should be soft enough to just mush them with a fork and there you go! Could that be any easier? I'm not sure that you actually need the lemon juice, but I used it. And the applesauce is so yummy! It is so much tastier than the loaded with sugar stuff that you get from the store. Fresh, Natural, Pure. Yum!

Do you have any other great snack ideas?

On another snacktime note: Be sure to have set snacktimes. If you allow your child to snack throughout the day then they are not likely to be hungry to eat the nutritious meal you have cooked.

Most books recommend two snacktimes, one morning, one afternoon. Personally, this doesn't work for us. If we snack that much we aren't hungry for lunch or dinner. The meals end up being another version of a snack. Typically we either do breakfast, snack, late lunch, dinner; or breakfast, early lunch, snack, dinner. Find out what works best for your kids and stick to it. Snacktime is very important especially when it comes to little ones.

What do you eat for snacktime?