Healthy snacks for kids

Buttonmoons

DD if she is "super starving to death" will have some toast with butter, fruit, a jelly pot, mini breadsticks, on occasion something maybe like a croissant - depends what day of the week it is as sometimes we arent home till 6 - her from afterschool club and me college, so those days we generally dont have a proper meal - it will be falafels, tuna wraps, pasta, etc - but smaller portions of these would be a good snack.

System

porridge, fruit, raisins

Uphill

It is usually fruit but sometimes pickled onions/beetroot/gherkins, cheese slices and maybe the odd bag of crisps.

WantToBeSE

My 2 boys (14 and 10) never stop eating. Especially the oldest one.
I buy a LOT of fruit which can work out very expensive.

Can someone please give me ideas that are cheap and healthy which will fill them up?

Katzen

HM flapjack? Lots of calories but not a problem for growing boys

WantToBeSE

Thanks for replying, Katzen

For some bizzare reason i have never been able to make flapjacks. I have tried loads of time, using loads of different recipes..but to no avail.

I am not too keen on the amount of sugar in them either.

gayleygoo

Flapjacks are hit-and-miss here too! Some of the sugars can be replaced with apple sauce or fruit puree, honey, dried fruit etc, which gives extra sweetness without the white sugar. As long as they brush their teeth properly twice a day the sugars shouldn't be a problem, they will burn off the calories quickly and there will also be slow-release carbohydrates from the oats. They are maybe going through growth spurts and fruit might just not have enough calories to sustain them for long.

Have you tried...
- cheesy biscuits/cheesy pastry twists
- crackers with cheese and cold meats
- toasties (those toastie bags are brilliant if you don't have a toastie maker appliance)
- sausage rolls
- HM pies
- pasta salads
- baked potatoes (can be cooked, then put in the fridge for microwave heating as a snack with cheese, beans or tuna etc)
- HM bread things like cinnamon rolls, doughnuts, pizza rolls etc

If they do have a larger snack in the afternoon, they might eat their dinner a bit later. This would be fine as it could stop them munching quite so much in the evening, I don't have teenagers myself but from talking to other parents I have heard that evening snacking can get expensive!

Do your boys have much cooking skill? Now might be a good time for them to lean, even just scrambled eggs on toast, or pancakes etc

Broomstick

Beans on toast; hm popcorn with cheese grated into it; eggy bread; tinned fish sandwiches with sweetcorn or cucumber or other salad bits; dippy eggs with toast. They can easily make all these themselves. Cook extra cheaper foods to make leftovers from the previous meal, eg extra potatoes which can be fried up the next day as a 'snack'.

B x

Seanymph

Mine eat lefotvers - so I make extra dinner. and make yorkshire a lot, dumplings, add bread or baguette to meals.

Toast is popular (pate, beans, scrambled eggs etc).

It wears off eventually.

[Deleted User]

Do they like dips and things to dip in them? you can make a lot of hummus from 1 tin of chickpeas and plain l/f greek yoghurt is a cheap and easy base for lots of dips, just add the flavourings they like maybe tomato ketchup, worcester sauce and some celery salt and chop up lots of carrots and celery into sticks to dip in , it will fill them up nicely. The other really cheap thing that fills is pizza made on a scone base. You can make it with whatever toppings they like so you could use l/f cheddar instead of mozarella and just tomato puree from a tube is fine as the tomato layer, a bit of onion and there you go.