Snacks-what do you give your 4+s?

amandada

"something from the fruit bowl and if you don't want that you can't be very hungry"

gingin_2

amandada wrote: »

"something from the fruit bowl and if you don't want that you can't be very hungry"

Lol! Ditto, word for word. Mine don't eat snacks as rule either, but if they are hungry, I will make an earlier dinner.

Twink's hobnobs seem to be an MSE favourite and very cheap to make, plus can be adapted in may ways to add fruit, less sugar, etc.

bylromarha

My littlies are 5 and 3. 3 yr old DD troughs her meals and eats far more than 5yr old DS.

Humzingers are like fruit bars, but 100% fruit.

Lots of ideas on here-thank you.

Lunar_Eclipse

skysky69 wrote: »

She likes the strawberry, raspberry and raisins. She thinks they are like sweets.

That's because they might as well be sweets; they are just as sweet.

My children do eat dried fruit, but ideally with other food as part of a larger snack or meal. This is because dried fruit is really bad for your teeth; it's prone to getting trapped between teeth and thus causing decay. The sugar content is extremely high; much higher than in fresh fruit. Raisins for instance have 8 times more sugar than grapes.

Also, beware the sugar rush in sugar sensitive children. If I give mine dried fruit as a small snack, I try to accompany it with cheese (Babybel) or another item of protein to minimise the blood sugar spike/crash.

Just thought I'd post that in case anyone didn't know; information being king and all that.

ETA:
Humzingers, whilst being 100% fruit with no added sugar, contain 34.7% sugar. There's one teaspoon of sugar (5g) in every tiny bar (15g). In contrast, bananas contain 16.6% sugar and a Mars bar is 52% sugar.

Gingham_Ribbon

bylromarha wrote: »

Humzingers are like fruit bars, but 100% fruit. .

So are these ones. Frutina

Like I said, we buy in bulk so they're quite cheap.

Gingham_Ribbon

amandada wrote: »

"something from the fruit bowl and if you don't want that you can't be very hungry"

Mine help themselves to the fruitbowl too but they'd clean the bowl if I didn't give them something else too!

If I'm giving them more expensive fruit, I usually chop up an apple or add some grapes to bulk it out a bit.

Lunar_Eclipse

Gingham_Ribbon wrote: »

So are these ones. Frutina

Like I said, we buy in bulk so they're quite cheap.

We've had those, but my kids don't really like them.

They also have twice the sugar content of Humzingers; 11g of sugar in every 15g bar (the Apple one). That's just over 2 teaspoons of sugar in a bar.

I'd rather take my sugar in chocolate.

Gingham_Ribbon

Lunar_Eclipse wrote: »

We've had those, but my kids don't really like them.

They also have twice the sugar content of Humzingers; 11g of sugar in every 15g bar (the Apple one). That's just over 2 teaspoons of sugar in a bar.

I'd rather take my sugar in chocolate.

It's pure fruit and it doesn't have anywhere near twice the sugar content of Humzingers. Frutina - 340cals per 100g; Humzingers - 274cals per 100g I'm guessing it depends on what fruit is used as there are several varieties of each.

Of course there's lots of sugar in them. They're made of dried fruit. But it's not empty calories like in chocolate.

Edit - just compared the 2 and humzingers seem to use artificial flavourings which may account for the slightly lower calorie content.

Maddie

Also the sugar in fruit is very different to the type of sugar you'd get in chocolate, aside from the fact that chocolate also contains lots of fat, and as GR says, is lacking in nutrients somewhat!

Lunar_Eclipse

Gingham_Ribbon wrote: »

It's pure fruit and it doesn't have anywhere near twice the sugar content of Humzingers. Frutina - 340cals per 100g; Humzingers - 274cals per 100g I'm guessing it depends on what fruit is used as there are several varieties of each.

Of course there's lots of sugar in them. They're made of dried fruit. But it's hardly empty calories like in chocolate.

According to their packaging (for Apple & Strawberry vs Humzinger Original), they do have twice the sugar, not calorie, content.

More interestingly I do find them empty calories; far less filling than chocolate (or fresh fruit), hence I don't eat them. I'm not trying to put people off dried fruit, I just know that many people do not realise how high their sugar content is. Same goes for cereal bars.