Seeking Food Ideas

My kids love pasta so I try to do different things with that. One of their favorites is Macaroni and broccoli. They call it macaroni and trees. I put butter and garlic salt on it and they love it.

Not sure what else your giving them but I made the family Shepards Pie one night that I needed to leave for a party. I layered the meat, corn and mashed potatoes. My DD came into my bed when she woke up and the first thing out of her mouth was, "I love Shepards Pie, Mommy!" I was floored. She also likes all soups. Ih ave been looking up all kinds of recipes all over, try Kraftfoods.com and familyfun.com they both have great recipes to keep the whole family happy. What I do is try new ones throughout the week and the ones that are a hit, gets written down in my personal cookbook with their initials at the top of the page.
Hope I've helped!

I'm with you. I am in the process of putting together an E-book with that in mind. I have two boys, 4 and 5 years old. We are always struggling for ideas in my house. I would love to hear what everyone has to say as well and if anyone would like to add their recipe idea to my e-book, just let me know. I would be glad to include it and give the submitter the credit, including your business info if you own your own business.
I would love kid friendly recipes that kids can help make and they love to eat.
Good luck!
____@____.com

Hi N.-
I have two boys, one on a special diet GFCF and another that loves chicken nuggets. He eats all kinds of meals, but Chicken Nuggets and grilled cheese are his favorite. To get him to try new things I made chicken nugget parmigaine one night. He loved it. I hid a few kinds of veggies in the pasta sauce and he ate it all up.
American Chop Suey is a good one too. Fish sticks is good to. It just seems we get in a cycle of breaded fried food.
One day I baked Cod with a little bread crumbs and butter (a little more than usual) but I diced up veggies. I put Season Salt from Tastefully Simple on it and he loved it all. The veggies again just absorbed he flavor of the main course.
I became a Tastefully Simple rep so I could use there products to make fast meals for he rest of the family not on the GFCF diet. There are some really good, easy(2 or less ingrediants), fast products you can use t make a great meal kids love. Feel free to check out my website.
www.tastefullysimpl.com/web.mwhalen
We also do pizza tacos and misc. it can be whatever they like on a pita or wrap. Peanut butter and banana sandwiches, or ground hamburger with ketchup and shredded mozzeralla.
I've even made a grilled peanut butter sandwich....my favorite!

We've found some great kid's cookbooks at our local library. Most of the ideas we still have to make (my son is 4 also) but he loves to look at the photos, talk about the foods, then eat them. It's especially great when you can get it to look just like the photo.

Hello N.,

I have a twelve year old son that I am still trying to get creative with just to get him to eat. My rule is you have to try everything. One area not to fall into is the salt, sugar, sweet cycle. Try not to salt their food at all if possible. If you feed them a starch make sure it is worthy of the meal. If this is going to be their only lunch then make sure it has fiber in it. Read the cereal boxes and weed out any that reach higher than 10g of sugar per serving or lower than 4 grams of fiber per serving. Clifford crunch is a great fortified cereal that my kids love that falls in the range of healthy but not too uber healthy cereal.

The smart taste by ronzoni is great. The fiber is 6 grams per cup with only 1 gram of sugar. It tastes great without that card board look and feel.

Bake their veges like carrots and sweet potatoe with a little olive oil. The vitamins are not boiled away. The natural sugar in the baked vegetables make them sweet.

A nutritionist from Hopkins told us to always have a starch paired with a protein. So for breakfast try not to give just a pancake. Also give an apple with a side of peanut butter to dip it into. For dinner mac and cheese (although it says there is protein in it) the amount does not constitute a meal requirement. The Trader joes brand or Annies mac and cheese have 10 grams of protein, 4 grams fat with 2 grams of fiber. It is healthier than most and tastes great.

If your running and have to grab a meal and they like milk shakes try a small pack of vanilla protein powder by spirutein (GNC) with 10 oz of really cold milk, banana or any berry your kids like in a blender. My kids prefer this on their way to sports. They can sip it and feel full on the car ride.

Choose healthy snacks. For example. Toasted english muffin pizza's. My 5 year old likes to put on the sauce and cheese. Then I toss them into the oven to melt the cheese. Have fun and good luck doing the dance.

-jo

I have a 3 year old son, and he loves quesadillas! I have a quesadilla maker (sort of like a George Forman grill) and it will cook them in under 5 minutes. I get whole wheat wraps, spread some salsa on one, layer with some shredded cheese and add some cut up chicken breast (or canned chicken breast if strapped for time) and voila! A wholesome satisfying meal and he can even eat it with his hands!

My daycare kids love mini meatball subs. I use cooked dinner rolls and then sliced meatballs with sauce. Its nice and small so its easy to fit in their hands. :) They also love tacos, pasta with cooked cut up sausage, kielbasa and mini hamburgers/cheeseburgers -using the same dinner rolls.