Making healthy holiday treats with children
Published 12:41 pm Thursday, October 29, 2015
Seven-year-old Sophie Stultz focuses as she puts together a snowman kabob made of bananas, apples, grapes, pretzel sticks, miniature chocolate chips and a walnut piece.
Story and photos by Sarah Stultz
Baking with children for the holidays doesn’t have to be messy, and it doesn’t have to be unhealthy. There are scores of possibilities for healthy Christmas treats that your little ones will jump at the chance to make — and devour.
To make things easier, have the adults do the prep work. Then show your children how to put the pieces together, and let them have fun. Keep in mind every child has his or her own personality, so everything doesn’t have to be the same — and the end result doesn’t have to be perfect!
Your children just care about having fun and getting to taste a few samples, as well. There’s nothing wrong with taste-testing while you’re creating these projects.
Snowman Kabobs
• bananas, cut into thick slices
• apples, cut into slices and then halved
• mini chocolate chips
• walnut pieces
• grapes
• pretzel sticks
• bamboo skewers
The snowman kabobs can be a little sticky, so tell your children to have some patience when they’re creating this project.
Place three banana slices on a bamboo skewer, followed by an apple slice and a grape at the top.
Position two pretzel sticks into the sides of the middle banana slice for the snowman arms. Place two chocolate chips on the front of each of the lower two banana slices for buttons. Place two chocolate chips in the upper banana slice for as eyes. Place a walnut piece on the upper banana slice under the eyes for the nose.
This project can get a little sticky with the bananas. Make sure not to slice the bananas too thick or they may easily slide off of the skewers. Advise your children to take it slow as it is easy to push the bananas off the skewer.
Watermelon Christmas Trees
• watermelon
Fancy up some watermelon this season by using a cookie cutter to cut out a Christmas tree design.
• Christmas tree cookie cutter
These trees are an easy way to dress up fruit for your children.
All you have to do is buy a watermelon, cut it into slices and then use a Christmas tree cookie cutter to cut out the shapes.
It is probably the safest idea to have the adults cut the watermelon slices. Then hand over the cookie cutters and let the children go to town.
Make sure the bottom of the tree is on the rind and the top of the tree is in the pink part of the watermelon.
If you don’t have a tree cookie cutter, any other cookie cutter will do. This would be a good one to try in other seasons as well.
