What is in your yogurt?

Yogurt Beware!

You always hear about how healthy yogurt is and as a parent I always felt good about packing it in my son's lunch box. After some thought I began to wonder what is in that yogurt besides the yogurt? If it is marketed towards kids you can bet that there is a lot of sugar! Maybe more sugar than yogurt.

Greek yogurt is a great source of protein. Paired with fruit and maybe some agave syrup or honey would sweeten up the snack without adding unnecessary sugar. Check labels and know that the less items mentioned as ingredients, probably the better!

Easy Apple and Almond Oatmeal

Many Oatmeal recipes call for brown sugar. Since sugar is one of the main ingredients that children with attention issues should stay away from, I choose to use honey instead.

¼ cup Quick Oats

½ 2% milk

3 Tbs. Honey

1 pinch of salt

3  pinches of cinnamon

½ small apple  chopped into bite size

( your preference on what kind)

1/8 cup slivered almonds

Toast almonds in a dry pan on medium heat shaking constantly until they start to slightly brown and then remove from heat.

Mix oats, milk, honey and cinnamon and blend in a microwave safe bowl

Cook in microwave for 2 minutes

Add almonds and apples and sprinkle it  with a little more cinnamon

Multi-grain Cereal Bars

This is a quick recipe that is great on the go!

2 cups multi-grain cereal

1 cup of quick oats

2 cups homemade granola

 ( I say that so you can control the amount of sugar. If you used packaged, look at the label and try to stay away from the super sugary ones)

4 tps. Butter

1/3 cup honey

(local honey is known to help with seasonal allergies)

Preheat oven to 325

Generously spray a 9 x 9 square pan with vegetable spray

Measure and mix the cereal, oats and granola in a bowl.

Melt butter and add honey to the pan and mix until blended

Pour butter and honey mixture into the cereal and stir until fully combined

Pour the cereal mix into the pan and gently press down with the bottom of a glass until even.

Bake for 18 minutes

After it cools cut into desired pieces – I used a very heavy metal spatula to cut. Dragging a knife may cause the bars to break up.

Canadian Bacon Egg Squares

Canadian Bacon Egg Squares

This can be made ahead and put in the microwave on a busy morning.

4 eggs

2 egg whites

3 Tbs. milk

4 slices of Canadian Bacon

¼ of a red pepper chopped finely

½ cup low fat mozzarella

salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 375

Beat eggs and egg whites in a bowl with the milk. Add a pinch of salt and a pinch of pepper.(to your taste)

Cook Canadian Bacon until slightly browned.

Prepare a 8x8 baking dish with cooking spray

Pour in the egg mixture

Add Canadian Bacon like you were dividing the pan into 4 and press them down below some of the egg mixture

Sprinkle the red pepper evenly

Do the same with the cheese

Bake 18 minutes – no longer

Let it cool and cut into 4 squares

Keep in refrigerator and microwave squares as needed

Red pepper is a great source of vitamin C !

Breakfast Parfait

Breakfast Parfait

Who doesn’t like anything that looks like a sundae!

This recipe is for one but you could certainly make it for more.

½ cup blue berries and strawberries washed

2 tps. Agave nectar

1 cup Vanilla bean Greek yogurt

1/3 cup mueslix

Thinly slice strawberries lengthwise

Mix Agave, blueberries and strawberries together in a bowl

Assemble parfait in something you can see through.

 Start with 1/3 of the fruit mixture, then 1/3 of the yogurt, followed by the mueslix and repeat it twice.

Top with strawberries and blueberries.

 A great way to get protein into your child before school!

I have two passions - teaching young children and cooking. In this blog I would like to combine the two by creating food choices for young children that might aid and support children's attention and stamina throughout a long school day.

I am in no way an expert, but I have seen what children bring in their lunch boxes for years. There are many conflicting opinions about the effects diet can have on our bodies. My thought was why not try to give our kids a leg up and supply them with the tools to be as successful as possible in school each day?

I will be posting recipes that I have made and tried as suggestions to do just that. I hope you enjoy and I welcome your feedback!