Low Fat Dinners that kids will love as well - receipes please?

Juliav_2

Hi,

I have two young children, 4 and 2. I am also desperately trying to eat healthily. I thought it may be really helpful to start a thread where we can all share some healthy - family friendly receipes!

Would love to hear from you all?

moanymoany

In my experience children love roast chicken dinners, shepherds pie, spaghetti bolognese, oven cooked wedgies (pre-boiled and drained, shake with 2 tablespoons oil, makes lots) with grilled or oven cooked - good - fish fingers and frozen peas.

All these can be cooked the low fat way. My children loved mashed potatoes, I leave some of the cooking water in the pan and mash with a food mixer. The blades make creamy mash without adding fat.

They loved stews. If children don't like vegetables, it's worth cooking them till soft, whizz them to a puree and add them to mincy stuff. I wouldn't use 'strong' flavoured veg.

Funny thing, my children would often eat raw vegetables they refused cooked - so they had them raw while I prepared the meal.

lil_me

Couple of things this thread make me think

Children need fats in their diet to be healthy

Children will eat most things depending on their taste, the amount of programmes I see about childrens health, where the biggest issue seems to be cooking the kids 'kiddies food', then it makes me think 'when do they wean them onto proper food' from pizzas, fishfingers, chicken dippers, funny shaped things etc...oh then you get programmes like 'farm of fussy eaters'. School dinners are much more 'normal' food now and some children have had such a struggle coping with that.

Never be fearful to give the children what you would maybe class as adults food. My son adored the morocaan beef with cous cous I made last week. He's nearly always eaten whatever we have, curry, chinese, italian, mexican etc few things he's tried and didn't like but there are things I dislike aswell. Grab yourself some recipe books (I usually use the library and write out ones we like, or recipes online inc on this website) and just pick a page at random, give it a try, you never know they might eat it. If they don't like it most food can be frozen so you can keep it for another day.

Penelope_Penguin

Have to agree with Lil_me. Children of 4 and 2 really shouldn't be on a "low fat" diet. They need full fat milk and other foods so that they can grow properly, and have plenty of energy for running around

Penny. x

Uniscots97

Julia it's easy enough to make the same thing but keep yours low fat. i.e. mash follow the idea above and blend your portion of potatoes while the potatoes for the children can be mashed with milk and a little butter. If serving steak pie or a pie with puff pastry give the children their normal portion and you have yours but with less pastry (the calorific bit is the pastry). For tomoato based pasta dishes, portion out yours before adding cheese (you can always add a little sprinkle of parmesan to yours for flavour without adding lots of calories). Little changes like this would mean you can eat the same but you get the low fat meal but the kids get the nutritional value they need.

Cornishpixie_2

My kids love my home made burgers, just minced meat, egg and bread crumbs. Floured surface to shape in to burgers, do under grill. Also home made pizza they like to help. Can use anything for base, my kids use naan bread which they make packet mix, can use crumpets or tea cakes as bases. Mash also favourite. Make banana cake, yoghurt cake. Pasta tomato and veg sauce. Also like pitta bread, crunchy raw carrots and raisens, dried fruit etc. Good luck. Usually trial and error. Nighmare feeding 4 and hubby at times. Thou more he works less fussy he gets about what he eats! Lol.

Shoey1610

I'm in complete agreement with lil_me that children should avoid low fat diets (unless medically indicated of course). To me eating healthily is giving my 2 year old a wide variety of food, homemade as much as possible or well chosen where not. She eats exactly the same as us for meals, which is all the usual stuff really - curry, shepherds pie, stirfry, risotto, stew and so on.

bertiebots

I also agree that kids usually eat whatever you eat. If your making things from scratch then thats a major starting point as your already cutting out all the bad stuff that we dont want our children to have! So I would go with what everyone else has said and just cook good homemade food thats suitable for everyone. I have 3 kids and we all eat a variety of foods and with the help of os I am getting more adventurous with my cooking and the kids love it..... check out the indexed collections as there is loads of stuff on there for you to try, and enjoy I am sure your kids will love getting involved !

Juliav_2

There are many of us on here trying our best to lose weight. I thought it would be a great idea to start a thread listing low in fat, but tasty receipes, especially a full three course meal?

Anyone interested?