Do you have a favorite recipe for cookies, bar cookies, or other sweet snack for kids that's easy to make, not too sweet, and doesn't have pricey ingredients? Now that it's summer it seems like we have kids over a lot and I'm trying to come up with ideas for treats that are healthier than store-bought.
Thank you for all of the suggestions! I've had a summer cold this week so haven't had the energy to try anything new, but I'm going to try some of these ideas soon.
Store bought, but awesome: Z Bars by Clif Kids. Organic, low fat, fiber and nutrient rich. Oh, and YUMMY!
http://www.clifbar.com/food/products_clif_kid_zbar/
Here is a recipe for granola bars that is yummy.
Line at 8"x8" pan with foil, letting it extend over the edges; spritz it with vegetable oil. In a large bowl, mix 1 cup low-fat granola, 1 cup rolled oats, 1 cup finely chopped dried apricots and cranberries, and 1/2 cup whole-wheat flour.
In a small bowl, whisk together 1 egg, 1/4 cup honey, 1/4 cup canola oil, 1/4 tsp. cinnamon.
Stir into granola mixture, then pat batterin the pan. Bake at 325 for 30 minutes or until browned. When cool, use foil to lift from pan. Cut into bars. Store at room temp for 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months.
The granola and dried fruit are a little on the expensive side, but you can make more than 1 batch with what you buy. Also, we replaced the apricots/cranberries with cherries/dates and that was also really good. Easy for the kids to help too. Enjoy!
Try something easy like fresh fruit. No baking. Natural.
Perhaps you could gather lots of different fresh fruits and let your children help you make a fruit salad that would be perfect for small portions with lots of tastes. It would be a great way to explore different foods in a fun way and the children would be part of the planning.
Perhaps you could also add some learning to the fruit salad. You could do colors with the 2 year old, how many pieces in a ... with the 5 year old, and check out where the different fruits are grown with the 9 year old. The 5 year old could also make a pattern with different fruits after the 9 year old makes the first one. Another learning idea would be to decide whether the fruit is sweet or sour. That's just the tip of the iceberg for all kinds of learning you can do with foods and solve the snack problem with natural foods. Cookies are great and you can also do many learning projects with them, but the fruit is far healthier.
How about muffins?
I'm a big fan of banana oatmeal and blueberry oatmeal muffins. Sweet, yummy, with some healthy stuff in it. I also love oatmeal raisin cookies.
Pre-make popcorn, mix in different stuff like dried fruits? or have those separate...
Koolaid for a sweet drink--get the packets that only require sugar. I add a bit less than the cup. I think this is better than highfructose corn syrup. And you can use it for popsicles like the other person said!
Oatmeal is cheap and healthful...cut down on the sugar in the recipe and you could even use applesauce instead of some of the butter..Adding raisins or chocolate chips or even mini marshmallows or a few M& Ms will add variety...Or a bit of orange juice & rind or sliced apples...Be creative and give them a catchy name ...like mom's Surprise cookies...Sometimes make them tiny, other time bigger and once in a while make bars that you cut like brownies...In fact, you might even experiment with Cocoa to make an oatmeal brownie...Aviod the frosting since it is empty calories....carrot shavings or blueberry cookies...Evn oatmeal muffins would be tasty..Good luck!
If you do want to bake them sweets, use the good-for-you substitutes. When I make cakes or brownies, replace all the fats & oils with natural applesauce. (I hear canned pumpkin works just as well for an even better nutritional punch, but I haven't tried it yet.)
I also make "diet soda cake" Take a cake mix and only add a can of diet soda (no eggs or oil). Bake like normal. My favorite combo is white cake with orange soda. Tastes amazingly great!
Rice crispy treats with about half of the called for amount of butter & marshmallow is pretty good, too.
My kids love making trail mix.....we start with a box of Cheerios (I like the Honey Nut or Multigrain best) add 1 box of raisins, 1 bag of M&M's, a pkg of sunflower seeds and sometimes we add nuts (peanuts usually).....other dried fruit, mini pretzels, etc.....the possibilites are nearly endless. This is all mixed in a large pot then bagged in sandwich bags for easy pick up and go.....great for taking along to the ball park for those little league games.
My kids love smoothies and smoothie popsicles. I use fresh and frozen fruit for them. A favorite is strawberry, mango and banana. Sometimes I'll put some vanilla rice milk in there to give it a creamier consistency. Mainly my kids eat fresh fruit as snacks. Frozen grapes, cut up melons, fresh pineapple, apples, cherries, etc. They also like baby carrots and cucumber sticks.
My kids also love regular lite yogurt - like yoplait lite vanilla. They'll toss in some blueberries or raspberries for extra flavor.
They also like trail mix, although we've never made it ourselves, but that is a great idea. I try not to bake as much in the summer.
Edited to add: my kids love rice crispy treats - which are no bake. We drizzle them with melted chocolate chips. Sometimes, we mix a little peanut butter in with the chocolate. You can also use Honey Bunches of Oats instead of Rice Krispies.
J.,
One of our favorite things to do in the summer when our kids were little was to freeze juice in the ice cube tray.
SWEET, COLD, & YUMMY.
You may have enough ideas for now, but in case you'd like some more, here is a resource that seems to have some good suggestions...
http://www.askdrsears.com/html/3/t030800.asp
Best wishes,
J.
