AD – Whip up Delicious and Healthy Meals for Your Child in No Time

Getting ready to feed your kids can be a challenging task, but following these tips and tricks will make it easier for you.

Being a mommy is tough. Especially if your kid is a picky eater. They would eat anything in the world except the good stuff. In such cases getting nutritious food into their diet is a hassle. Not only does it take up a lot of valuable time and energy, but it can also create a bad impact on your kids if forced to eat.

On most days, it’s not possible to spend 3-4 hours in the kitchen, planning and preparing meals. Moreover, you need to save energy for all of the other things you have to get done. In a scenario like this, the only way to deal with it is to work smart. We have listed some useful tips that will make the task easier for you.

Planning

You need to make a clear plan of what you want to do for the week ahead of time if you don’t want to spend hours in the kitchen every day. The best thing to do is to grab yourself a pen and paper and write it down. Here you need to write down all the food categories and everything you want to pick up from the supermarket under this category.

You can also list the dishes or meals you want to prepare throughout the week. This makes it much easier to organize. If you are out of meal ideas or can’t think of any new ones, you can check PickyEaterBlog for many interesting and delicious recipe ideas.

Grocery list

To avoid the stress of having to get groceries every day, you need to make a grocery list and try to limit your shopping trips to once a week. Here are some of the things you can consider stocking up on to make nutritious meals all week long: pasta, pasta sauce, canned beans, canned tuna fish (packed in water, not oil), canned vegetables, canned fruits, rice, couscous, packaged mixes for dishes like tabouli, lower-fat, lower-sodium soup, cereal, bread (preferably whole grain), peanut butter, pancake mix, and nuts (make sure to check for allergies first).

Things to pick from the refrigerator or freezer section: ready-to-eat fruits and vegetables (getting pre-washed and pre-cut will save you a lot of time and energy), tomatoes, carrots, salad greens, eggs, yoghurt, cheese, chicken, dairy, salad dressings, frozen pizza, pre-made pasta, soup, seafood, etc. If you have these things on hand, you can easily whip up a nutritious meal in no time.

Appliances

Using the right appliances can make a big impact on your cooking game. They can minimize time and energy consumption significantly. For instance, cooking rice can be tricky sometimes. If you don’t cook it long enough it will be grainy, but if you cook it too long or add too much water, you will end up with porridge. The only way to cook it right is to keep a close eye on it.

However, you can minimize the cooking time and save yourself from the tiring job of watching it by using a rice cooker. These devices have very specific rice and water ratios and timers. You just fill the bucket with the right amount of rice and water as directed and turn it on. The machine will cook the rice and turn it off automatically when it’s done. You don’t need to stand next to it, monitoring the doneness. You can just turn it on and get the laundry done as it gets cooked.

Some similar devices are an air fryer, microwave, and grilling oven. These can make your life a lot easier. Air fryers are not only time savers, they provide nutritional benefits too. They use very little oil but give almost identical results to a deep fryer. Not having to fry in small batches and deal with the sudden spills and splatters of oil is also a plus. The same goes for the grilling oven. Just throw on a rotisserie chicken and get other stuff done while it cooks. (The chicken is also very healthy done this way.)

Involve DIYs

Many hands make light work. You can use the same strategy while cooking some delicious meals for your ever-so-active kids. Involving some DIYs is the best way to do it. This way they won’t get bored while you cook, they will learn a lot about the different ingredients, and they will be more interested in the meal. You can search online for interesting DIY kid’s meal ideas.

An interesting DIY kid’s snack idea could be ants on a log. You can let your child put the ants/raisins on the log. You can even let them spread the peanut butter if they are old enough. This is a fun activity and results in a pretty nutritious snack. Another interesting idea is DIY Lunchables.

Lunchables are very popular these days. And the excitement will be even more if they get to do it on their own. So instead of buying them pre-packaged, try making your own. These healthy options are usually packed with protein and healthy additives. The things you will need are crackers, carrot sticks, celery sticks, hummus, a few varieties of cheese, and grapes. You can even add raisins and nuts if you like.

Lastly, DIY sour candy is very popular these days. As you know, sour candy is loved by almost every child, but they have a crazy amount of sugar in them. But you can cut that sugar out without depriving your kids of it by making the DIY version at home. To make this treat you will need some grapes, lemons, and lemon jello powder.

First, put your washed grapes in a ziplock bag and add plenty of lemon juice. You can hand over the bag to your kids and ask them to shake it for you. After shaking, you just open the bag and dump some jello powder in and give it a final shake. Then it is ready to enjoy. This way they get to enjoy a healthier version of their favourite candy.

Make-Ahead

This next tip is not just for moms. Anyone who is busy with their lives and doesn’t have enough time to cook every day will get benefits from this tip. Not all days are the same; some are busier than others. Busier days mean less time to spend in the kitchen. However, weekends are the best time to polish your cooking skills. If you can use this time to do some preparation, this will give you a great head start on the week.

Though you can’t cook everything ahead of time, some things can easily be done beforehand and used throughout the week. You can even try meal prepping if you like. This is slowly gaining popularity all over the world. In this technique, you cook up different meals on the weekend and pack them up in small containers for each meal. In this system, you get the freedom to get all creative and make varied meals for the week.

For instance, you can cook a large amount of pasta and pair it with different sauces for each day. This way, your kids won’t get bored with the meals if

they are having the same things all the time. You can do the same thing with rice and pizza.

Just cook up rice for multiple meals and serve it to your kids with different sides. You can even add some toppings and stir fry it to make quick-fried rice. Do the same with pizza. Just add different toppings and freeze them. When you need it, a quick defroster, and you are ready to bake.

If you are meal prepping, there are a few things that you need to keep in mind. It is not ideal to freeze food for a prolonged period. Try to keep it as short as possible. And a few things are best, not frozen, like eggs and salad.

Mix and Match

Sometimes cooking food is just not enough; you need to get your child to eat it as well. In this case, what you can do is to switch things up and make them appear interesting. For instance, if you are serving grilled chicken with a salad today, try to add a side of rice or mashed potatoes for the next day. You can even shred the meat and make pasta or burritos with it. This way every meal will be interesting to them.

To Sum Up

If it still fails to please your child, they may have developed a taste for a different type of food or a preference for a certain food. This could be a normal development phase for them. If your child refuses to eat for a long time, it could be time to seek the help of a healthcare professional.

*This is a collaborative post