Many products will highlight their one or two "healthy" ingredients or try to give you the impression that they are beneficial for your health if you eat them. Here are some healthy snacks that everyone will like to eat.
Many products will highlight their one or two "healthy" ingredients or try to give you the impression that they are beneficial for your health if you eat them. Here are some healthy snacks that everyone will like to eat.
Most people are already fine with this snack and movie-watching staple but it turns out that popcorn is actually rather healthy, so long as it's not drenched in that cloying artificial butter. A single 3-cup serving of popcorn, without any additional salt or other toppings, contains 4 grams of fiber, and popcorn is also considered a whole grain. While the fiber content means that your kids will soon fill up, you are also free to add toppings like cheese, yeast, or even cinnamon and sugar, for extra flavor
These snacks are not only incredibly easy to make but their homemade counterparts give you total control over what goes into your body. The trick is to find the right healthy liquids for your diet. For example, freezing a mixture of orange juice and nonfat Greek yogurt results in a cool, tangy treat that happens to be rich in Vitamin C and calcium.
Much like with our mention of ice pops, cookies can be healthy snacks, provided you pay attention to the nutritional details involved while baking them at home. For example, it is perfectly valid to swap out white flour for whole-wheat pastry flour when following most cookie recipes. You might also want to add some rolled oats to boost the fiber content and give your cookies an extra bit of texture. Furthermore, there are some cookie recipes that work perfectly fine by trading butter out for applesauce, resulting in a cookie that is just as tasty but with a lowered saturated fat content. Pair your healthy cookies with a glass of low-fat or skim milk to create a nutritious treat that is tasty enough to satisfy anyone.
While most commercial brands of peanut butter are way too high in sugar and fats, natural peanut butter is a perfectly viable snack that offers protein and healthy fat. Serve it on some whole-grain toast or paired with whole-grain crackers and fruit.
While all varieties of cheese are incredibly tasty, satisfying, and rich in both protein and calcium, the trick with keeping cheese healthy is to consume it sparingly. For the ideal kiddie power snack, pair your child's favorite fruit or vegetable combo with a cheese stick.
Just think of a pizza as an open-faced sandwich that you bake in the oven. Once you realize this and understand that a sandwich can be as healthy or unhealthy as you would like, the possibilities for a healthy pizza just explode in your mind. Either use some premade whole-wheat dough or make mini-pizzas using whole-wheat English muffins, remember to use mozzarella, which tends to be made from healthy skim milk; and top them with healthy fares like olives, peppers, and ham, along with whichever toppings your kids crave most.
One of the easiest ways to eat healthily is to offer the chance to have something enrobed in chocolate. While chocolate is fine in small doses, dark chocolate is an even healthier alternative as it contains less sugar and more antioxidants than regular milk chocolate. Just take whatever fruits your child enjoys, hand him a skewer, and let him go to town, while you watch, of course.
Even half a sandwich is a great idea for a healthy and nutritious snack. For an extra-healthy grilled cheese, simply use whole-grain bread and slip in some slices of apple between the cheese to give fiber and a nice contrast of texture and taste.
Everyone knows about this snack due to its more popular name brand cereal name. That said, you can improve this rice/marshmallow/butter treat's health impact by adding some seeds and dried fruit to the medley and going for whole-grain rice whenever possible.
Tortilla and pita chips are the most nutritionally satisfying form of snack chip, due to their notable fiber content. That fiber content also means that they can hold up to heavier and healthier dips like hummus, salsa and black beans.
While French fries are an incredibly common favored snack for children, things get even better when you trade out the usual spuds for sweet potatoes. Not only are sweet potatoes incredibly filling due to their starch content, but they also contain many nutrients absent from regular potatoes; ingredients like Vitamin A, folate, and Vitamin B6.
While you might immediately imagine a baked good that is nothing more than a miniature cake packed with fat, sugar, and calories, that does not mean that muffins cannot be made into something healthy. The best options for healthy muffins would be pumpkin muffins involving whole oats and carrots or berries without adding a single ounce of flour or added sugar to the mixing bowl. There is a whole world of healthy muffin recipes out there, now you at least have an idea of something to look for.
Smoothies are great because they are not only easy to make but are a great way of sneaking in healthy fare without ignoring what your child loves to eat. Just add the best fruits and vegetables for your child's developmental needs, mix in some yogurt and his favorite flavors of juice and you have a drink that he will have no issue emptying into his belly. The end result is something that tastes like your kid's favorite juice but with way more nutritional benefits.
This is one of those cases where the presentation has a greater influence on what children are willing to eat. The child who might balk at a plate of fruits and chunks of cheese might be raring to eat from a "wand" skewered with that same payload of snacks. All you need to do to create this sort of treat is to grab some BBQ skewers, or even use some chopsticks if you happen to have those laying around, and run the skewer/chopstick through every piece of food. One benefit of using chopsticks over regular skewers is that chopsticks are blunt; skewers run the risk of harming especially young children. Not only does this approach allow you to pair fruits, veggies and cheeses, but it also works for getting kids to eat something like a sandwich; just cut up the sandwich into quarters or ninths and run the fragment along the skewer.
While you may have thought that raising healthy children would be a challenge, we hope that this article has enlightened you to several more ways of keeping your kids fed when they start demanding their snacks. The best piece of advice when it comes to keeping kids fed is not to judge something by its name but by its nutritional contents. In the event that the snacks your kids are raving about turn out to be grossly unhealthy for them, take a minute to break them down and see if you can make a healthier version back at home in your kitchen; chances are good that you can make a version that is healthier but also happens to be cheaper.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for professional consultation or advice related to your health or finances. No reference to an identifiable individual or company is intended as an endorsement thereof. Some or all of this article may have been generated using artificial intelligence, and it may contain certain inaccuracies or unreliable information. Readers should not rely on this article for information and should consult with professionals for personal advice.