Healthy Tots!

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Grilled Peanut Butter & Apple Sandwiches 

• 4 slices of bread
• 1/4 cup natural peanut butter
• 1 teaspoon pure maple syrup
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 apple, thinly sliced
• coconut oil for grilling

Mix the PB, syrup and cinnamon together and spread 1 tablespoon on each slice of bread. Put half the apples in one sandwich and half in the other. Grill with a few teaspoons of coconut oil over medium heat.

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Fruit Dip

I ate this for dinner last night, and I will probably eat it for dinner again tonight. It’s that good.

• 2 cups plain coconut milk yogurt
• 2 cups fresh or frozen strawberries
• 1/2 cup tofutti cream cheese
• 2 tsp. fresh minced ginger
• agave nectar to taste

Throw everything in a food processor or blender until smooth. Refrigerate for at least an hour before eating.

You could subtitute a different fruit for the strawberries if you wanted. I think blueberries or mangos would be equally delicious.

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Homemade Applesauce

If you’ve never had homemade applesauce you are missing out big time. It tastes so much better than the stuff at the grocery store.

• 6 large Fuji Apples, peeled, cored, and diced (you want a naturally sweet apple so you don’t have to add any sugar)
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 3-inch cinnamon stick

Put everything in a thick bottomed pot and bring to a boil. Immediately reduce to a simmer and cover with a tight fitting lid. Cook for 20-30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until apples begin to break down and become soft. Remove lid and discard cinnamon stick. Allow apples to cool then mash them to desired consistency with a potato masher. If the applesauce is too thick add a little more water.

This applesauce is great for snacking or baking.

Tiny Tot! Variation: Place cooked apples in a blender and blend for about a minute until completely smooth.

Dessert Variation: Add agave nectar or maple syrup to taste and sprinkle with cinnamon.

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Tropical Smoothie

• 4 cups of ice
• 1 large banana
• 1 1/2 cups of fresh pineapple
• 1 (6 ounce) container of plain coconut milk yogurt
• 1/2 cup 100% pomegranate juice

Throw everything in the blender. Blend until smooth. Makes four small servings, or one greedy mom-sized serving and one toddler-sized serving.

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Cherry Peach Cobbler

So this may or may not be the second cobbler I’ve made in two days. After making this one, I decided I needed to test it out with different fruit for research purposes. And when I say research purposes, I really mean that I love cobbler and needed another one pronto.

Just follow the previous recipe, except instead of blackberries use 2 cups of frozen sliced peaches and 2 cups of frozen sweet cherries. 

As you can see, my new sugar free diet is off to a great start.  

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Blackberry Cobbler

Filling:

• 1 (16 ounce) bag of frozen blackberries*, thawed and liquids reserved 
• 2 T. raw organic sugar
• 1 T. cornstarch 
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Place thawed berries, plus any liquid, in a bowl. Add sugar, cornstarch, and cinnamon then set aside and prepare crust. 

Crust:

• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 2/3 cup old fashioned rolled oats
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1 flaxseed “egg”
• 1/4 cup pure maple syrup
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce

Combine dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately, then slowly add the dry to the wet, stirring until just combined. It’s important not to over mix. 

To assemble cobbler:

Pour berry mixture in a greased 6x8 inch pan. Carefully spread crust mixture over the berries. Bake for 30-35 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

*I used frozen berries because that’s what I had on hand. If you want to use fresh berries, mix them with the sugar and let them sit for about an hour, stirring occasionally, so the sugar begins to break them down. 

Note that you can use any fruit for this cobbler and the crust recipe could easily be cut in half. I made extra because I like a greedy amount of crust. 

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Quick and Easy Breakfast Idea:

• 1 mini whole wheat bagel, topped with peanut butter and bananas
• grapes, or any other fruit you have on hand

It’s quick and easy, allowing us to get out the door in plenty of time on school days. 

Remember, you can always swap out peanut butter for almond or soy nut butter. You can even drizzle a little agave nectar or pure maple syrup on top if your kiddo wants something tad sweeter. 

Also, when buying peanut butter, make sure the only ingredient is peanuts. If it has added sugars and preservatives, skip it. 

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Let’s talk fruit cups for a minute. They’re not healthy. Stop buying them. (Yes, even the ones that are sweetened with 100% fruit juice.)

What happens is they take perfectly healthy fruit and cook it down to the point where it loses most of it’s nutritional value, then they pack it in wasteful containers and fill it with “fruit juice”, which has also been cooked down to nothing. Basically, fruit juice is just glorified sugar water. Throw it in your hummingbird feeder and the birds will thrive. Your toddler on the other hand will be left with rotten teeth. 

Instead, make your own fruit salad. Just use whatever you have on hand. I used pears, grapes, pineapple, and oranges. You can then divide them into individual tupperware containers. 

Tiny Tot! Variation: Steam the tougher fruits for a few minutes to soften them up, them cut into itsy bitsy pieces.

Problem solved.