Favorite Foods

Tricks for creating healthy food habits

I’ve spent the week writing hard stuff – about witches and board members and mental health - and then last night, after a rough school board meeting I poured myself a glass of wine and all my best intentions to write anything at all flew out of the window. So for something that has absolutely nothing to do with schools or politics and social justice or agendas, I’m going to write about food.

1.     When my kids were teething, frozen peas were less messy than frozen blueberries, but both worked well for little grabby hands that needed something to chase around a high chair tray.

2.     Chunks of raw sweet potato (too big to swallow) were also good for teething babies, and cutting grapes in half keeps little ones safe from choking.

3.     Granola bars and fruit leather in every backpack became a survival tool when I was out and about with toddlers, and honestly, it’s still the best way to keep the hangries out of traveling teens.

4.     Busy kids rarely know they’re hungry until they’re starving. My response was always to throw raw vegetables and a little bowl of ranch dressing onto the kitchen island while I started dinner. They ate the food that was in front of them, and I could serve them a one-dish bowl of pasta later, confident that they’d already filled up on veggies.

5.     When my kids had friends over, I immediately put plates of fruit out for everyone to eat. Trader Joes does sliced apples that don’t brown, and they were a staple in my house. Occasionally I’d get fancy and add yogurt to the plate for dipping.

6.     Summertime is for smoothies. The easiest involve a couple spoons-full of frozen concentrate orange juice, whatever frozen fruit you have in the freezer, and water in the blender. Add a banana for creaminess, and change up the recipe between red (berries) and orange (mango/pineapple). Leftovers, if there are any, can be put in a plastic cup in the freezer, then eaten like ice cream after dinner.

7.     Homemade “ice cream” can be as simple as that overripe banana with the brown spots that no kid will eat, peeled and stuck in a plastic bag in the freezer. Blend the frozen banana with some heavy (or whipping) cream, and that’s it. The sweetness of the banana(s) are enough, and kids eat it with a spoon out of a mug.

8.     When I read the Enid Blyton books out loud to my kids we started an English teatime tradition that they still look back on as time with Mom. Herb tea with honey for littles, or black tea with milk for bigs, plus little toast and jam squares, or something sweet were a fun way to reconnect after school.

9.     I packed a school lunch every day. Sandwiches were easy, but they got boring, so I loved single-serving thermoses with a heavy-duty rubber band around it to hold the spoon or fork to it. I made extra servings of every dinner, then served the leftovers a day later (not the next day). This is still useful for foraging teens who don’t want to cook for themselves.

10.   A friend of ours came from a single parent home, and his mom, a nurse, did something so cool. She taught each of her boys to make 5 different meals, and each kid’s meals were different than the other’s. That way they could switch off the dinner prep, and the meals were simple enough that the boys began to experiment with different spices and ingredients. Both men are completely confident in the kitchen now, and they understand the economy of food.

11.   And along those lines, I developed a family recipe book with my versions of all their favorite meals which lives in our kitchen. Whenever a teen wanders through the kitchen when I’m cooking, I also give them a job to do (cutting/stirring/grabbing ingredients). They’re always the tasters and spice-adders, and it has increased their confidence with their own cooking.

12.   Among our favorite one-pot meals are: Carbonara, Shepherd’s Pie, Chicken Pot Pie, Coq au Vin, and Bolognaise sauce for dipping bread. I have a go-to salad dressing recipe that uses lemon juice instead of vinegar, and a chicken marinade that uses both. Chickpeas roast beautifully with tomatoes, and everything is better with bacon. I have recipes if anyone’s interested.