Unusual Toddler Snack Ideas Needed

How about tortilla roll-ups. You can just mix cream cheese with taco seasoning, shredded cheese and add some crushed pineapple and you can even add some veggies. Spread it on the tortilla and roll it up. You can make them the night before. You can even have salsa on the side for dipping.

I've used sun dried tomato tortilla shells and garden vegtable cream cheese and made roll ups. My kids love them and they normally hate vegtables. I use tooth picks to keep them shut. Kids love that too. It's good for both kids and adults.

We love jicama! Serve it raw with a dip. Most people have never had it. Most people can't even pronounce it! (It's hee-kah-mah)

You can buy it pretty much anywhere. Try it!

http://www.sixwise.com/newsletters/06/08/16/jicama-the-he...

D. in milwaukee

My 17 months old all the way up to 20 year old love these two ideas (not sure if they're "different" enough --we eat pretty "normal" stuff, too. Then again, every family is different and what one finds normal, another may think is strange! LOL) Either way, they are healthy.

For the first, take a box of fat free vanilla pudding (just the powder) mixed with fat free cool whip. Put a dollop of the mixture on top of a low-fat cinnamon graham cracker and top with a slice or two of strawberry. You'll want to assemble them once you get to class so the crackers don't get soggy. My kids (and husband) beg for these!

The second idea is maybe too "simple" or "normal", but I thought I'd throw it out there anyway. (Hey, yogurt might be a new food to some kids!) Cinnamon graham crackers dipped in strawberry yogurt is a great, low fat, and very easy snack to make.

Good luck!

Take a round loaf of sourdough bread, and scoop out the inside, so you have a hollow bread bowl. Fill the bread bowl with spinach dip, and cube the bread that you scooped out and serve it alongside the bowl. For the kids, you could do mini ones with hard sourdough rolls. (Tip: This should be prepared with a couple of hours of serving, or else the bread bowl will get soggy.)

You could also do fruit & cheese kabobs. Take toothpicks, and alternate "exotic" canned fruit like mandarin oranges & pineapple with cheese chunks.

Make mini tacos by taking a large tortilla and cut out circles using a round cookie cutter. Fill the mini tortillas with a teaspoon of taco meat and a pinch of shredded cheese.

We have made fruit sushi. We make it with peanut butter, but you could come up with something else.

Take a tortilla, spread on peanut butter (or whatever), jelly and then a slice of banana(sliced the long way). Then roll it up and cut it into pieces, when turned sideways (like pinwheels) it kinda looks like a sushi roll.

Try avacado or guacamoli and chips. You can do graham crackers spread with cream cheese and topped with fresh fruits. Do a ham spread on crackers. How about cucumber sandwiches- heard of this but have not tried it yet. Do bran muffins. Good luck

Try bringing edemame sprinkled with a little sea salt. Edemame is soy beans in the pod. Target sells it in their generic brand packaging (in the frozen section) and it isn't too expensive. My kids (4 & 6) love to get the beans out of the pods, but you could also try mukamame which is the same thing but the beans are already out of the pod. Again Target sells this in the freezer section. Just make sure the kids know not to eat the pods! :) Good Luck!

I've seen a lot of great ideas and quite a few for hummus. I have a quick and easy recipe for edamame hummus instead of using garbanzo beans.

EDAMAME HUMMUS
serves 14

Ingredients
2 cups Edamame, shelled and cooked according to package directions
1/4 cup Soybean oil
3 tablespoons Lemon juice
2 teaspoons Garlic, chopped
3/4 teaspoon Cumin, ground
1/2 teaspoon Salt

Directions
Puree edamame, oil, lemon juice, garlic, cumin and salt in food processor for 30 seconds, scraping sides twice, until almost smooth. Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Have fun!!

What about hummus with veggies. Drain 1 can of Garbanzo beans and puree in food processor or blender with a small garlic clove, a little lemon juice, sprinkle of cumin and a little olive oil salt and pepper. You could also bring pita bread for dipping. Or Cucumber Yogurt Dip, Plain yogurt mixed with as much peeled and de-seeded cucumber as you like, salt and pepper and a little lemon juice.

How about hummus and pitta bread or veggies? This is great for both adults and kids. If you make it your self it can be pretty inexpensive.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Extra-Easy-Hummus/Detail.aspx

fruit or veggie pizza made with the refrigerated cresent dough could be fun for kids. There is probably a recipe for that on all recipes as well.

I'd suggest a variety of fruits. Kiwi, pineapple, mango, star fruit, etc...anything that would be just a little different. Keep in mind that "most" kids probably eat only bananas, apples, maybe grapes? Even veggies like eggplant, zuchinni (bread), carrots (many kids don't eat these often at home). You can microwave zuchinni slices and sprinkle cheese on top, mmmm. Another thought might be to make some oatmeal based cookies and add various dried fruits - maybe not as "healthy", but at least in the right direction! Have you ever thought about stopping at your local health food store/natural market, or even ethnic food store and asking for some suggestions of what kids might eat for a snack?? I bet they'd have some neat ideas! Even "animal crackers" purchased from the mexican food store would taste a little different and you could talk about what the bag says, etc...

My 20 month old loves avacados, but that's not a "normal" thing for kids to eat I don't think. You could make fresh guacamole with whole wheat tortilla chips or cut up pita and bake them to make homemade pita chips. My son also loves hummus as others have suggested, the eggplant one is milder and the roasted red pepper one has a bitmore flavor. Those would be the ones I would suggest. Can serve with the pita chips and/or cut up veggies!

You could make your own trail mix with toddler-friendly foods -- oyster crackers, golden raisins, dried apples, rice snacks, etc. Or, you could buy mini rice cakes in different flavors with a couple different flavors of light cream cheese.

Here are a couple of ideas:
hummus and crackers, pretzels, and/or cut-up veggies
yogurt with berries and granola (if you can find a nut-free one)

Have you looked at the international aisle in your local grocery store? Particularly on the Japanese side there are alot of interesting rice cracker type snacks that are flavored or that are less flavorful but go well with dips/cheeses/etc...

I'm fond of wasabi rice crackers, but that's likely a bit too spicy for the little ones. ;-)

Or how about yogurt covered raisins? Love those, and they're aren't that expensive in bulk.

A fun one for the kids is pretzel sticks with peanut butter. Then put fish crackers in a cup and they can "go fishing".

My toddler loves edemame (soy beans). You can steam them or serve them cold. I suggest no salt and the ones that aren't in the pods. And they arent messy and my Gabe loves them so much!

veggie sushi if your grocery store carries it, its different for most kid, there are about 9-12 pieces in a box and veggies are pretty tame( and are usually the cheapest ones).

My picky 2 year old loves red, yellow and green peppers. I've taken to cutting them into thin strips and giving them to him for a snack. An assortment of those will be a very colorful and nutritious snack --- you could easily bring dip too.

How bout Japanese rice crackers? Those should be relatively cheap, store-bought, different, comes in a variety of shapes and sizes and flavors, etc. Easy for you, and meets the requirements. Trader Joe's should carry them.

How about hummus & rice crackers. You can get or make a couple different flavors of hummis to cover different tastes.

I would go to a health food or ethnic store and look for something you think is interesting or different -- find one thing that you think is interesting and build your snack from there -- you could even ask the people who work there for ideas.

But you could also just go to your regular grocery store with fresh eyes. Walk through the aisles slowly and look at all the different things you usually rush right past: olives, edamame, artichokes, star fruit, kumquat, endive, even snap peas or zucchini or summer squash might be "different" enough for snacks. How about a roasted red pepper or curry-yogurt dip for some interesting veggies.

My kids like soy beans. I buy them frozen and let them thaw. Kids might like edamame too, which are also soy beans but come in a pod and you pull the beans out of the pod with your teeth. (They might be salted though, which wouldn't be good for tots.)

Sounds like everyone is putting too much thought into a simple snack. It shouldn't have to be so extravagant for children, or they will expect to have this all the time! You could make your own snack mix with dried fruit and cereals/pretzels, etc. Or have the kids help make a fruit salad for a snack. ??? There are things that are "normal" that are fun and nutritional. At our playgroup we usually have grahm crackers, goldfish crackers, or some type of dry cereal, with some juice. (and the grown ups eat what the kids eat - if they're hungry) We have a lot of little ones at our group so usually the mushier foods can be a little too messy!

That sounds very strange to me. I don't think you should have to fret over what to bring for a snack, much less have to spend extra money to buy brie cheese! Every family is different and eats different things ~ who defines "normal"??? Are you supposed to send a questionnaire out to all the families asking what they eat? Wow. Why don't you just make banana bread? I tend to sent that along when it's our turn, and all the kids love it.

Try hummus and crackers,bread,pita and/or raw vegetables. Call it 'bean dip' if others are afraid to try it.

You can go to the craft store and buy the small popsicle sticks and cut banana's in half, dip them in yogurt and then freeze them on a cookie sheet with freezer paper or parchment paper on it. It is a banana yogurt pop.

Here is a website with a recipe for homemade fortune cookies. Those would be fun and different. You can also buy them in the store, but they're alittle pricey.

www.thenibble.com/REVIEWS/main/cookies/cookies2/fortune-c...

I was excited to see your post, as we also do snacks at our ECFE class. And I'm going to try some of these for home. I just wanted to suggest that before you make something homemade to take as a children's snack, be sure to check with ECFE. Our children's snacks have to be store bought (we can bring homemade snacks for us though). They also told us if we bring fruit, we need to bring it "whole" and that the staff needs to cut it up (bananas, oranged, etc.). When it was our turn for snack, I bought freeze dried apples (from Costco). Everyone loved them, even the teacher and her aide wanted to know where I got them so they could go get some. I haven't figured out what I'll bring next time it's our turn, but I think I might do the hummus thing for the adults and maybe the mini rice cakes for the kids.

Hummus! Dip carrot sticks in it! yum! Also, avocados would be great. My son loves them!

Fortune cookies and cartons of white milk would be something. I also think chow mein noodles in a little dixie cup are nice. How about camel humps? That is slices of muskmelon/cantaloupe separated from the rind but cut up in little squares and served with toothpicks. Or I guess you could use little umbrellas. I ate that as a kid all the time. Another thing is jam on a saltine.