My mom gave Sadie Kraft Dinner (Kraft Mac N Cheese) for lunch yesterday. Not cool. I would prefer my daughter stay away from the fluorescent orange food groups.
That said, it’s kinda my fault. We haven’t really provided a lot of options or told my mom what to feed her. My mom knew I’d be angry and said that she’d meant to “hide the box”. In a really messed up way I feel better knowing that she was being deceptive (Granny felt bad for Sadie eating the same things over and over, gave her a treat) vs. poor judgement (Kraft Dinner is an actual food option for a toddler).
I think that we have rotated through enough of the same foods and are at a point where I need to figure out a meal plan. The problem is compounded by the fact that we do not have a routine for cooking at all, not even for us. Since Sadie has been born our trips to the grocery store have turned chaotic and unplanned. D, the primary food preparer, is home later now that she’s commuting and that leaves dinner up to me and I can’t cook (let alone cook and watch Sadie). Therefore we eat out and order in A LOT and we’re not feeding that crap to Sadie as leftovers.
Right now Sadie eats a variety of steamed veggies, fresh fruit, yogurt, pasta and tomato sauce, meat ravioli (not canned), eggs (including omlets), bread products (mostly with cream cheese, sometimes grilled cheese), meatballs (extra lean turkey, chicken and beef), chicken breast, turkey breast, perogies, and brown/white rice.
I’ve been looking online for sample day care menus and to be perfectly honest some of them are SCARY. Would anyone like to share a quick toddler meal idea with us? We need help!
I personally see nothing wrong with Kraft Dinner every now and again. Sure, it's not the healthiest food but I am not strict about that sort of thing. I grew up with KD and I still love it. It's kind of like every now and then having chips or whatever.
ReplyDeleteMeal ideas...
Pizzas. You can make them on pita or those little thin burger buns. Try pesto as a base sauce and goat's cheese. Your kid might like it.
Chili
Tacos. I use veggie ground round, shredded cheese and soft taco shells.
Soup! A favourite in our house, especially minestrone soup which has lots of veggies and beans.
Sheppard's pie.
Pancakes.
Egg salad sandwiches.
I guess it depends what your kid likes to eat. You can try new things and if it's a hit, great. :)
Spanikopitas (spelling?)
ReplyDeletequiche
I just thought of something too. Amy's organic makes a KD type food. It's still boxed mac and cheese but healthier. Might be an option for you to consider.
ReplyDeleteLet me guess, Sadie loved the KD, right? :)
ReplyDeleteWe give our kids KD too. They now have a "Smart" version where the noodles are made of cauliflower so we buy that. Still not the healthiest but better. I hate the stuff but it's a kid-friendly food and it's easy. Ian got KD a lot earlier than Erik did because with the second, they want what the first is having and you're not as stressed out about it. He had lots of things way before Erik did. I draw the line at pop, though. Erik gets pop once in a while for a treat and sometimes Ian wants it but I get him juice instead.
I personally love the crock pot for work days. You start it in the morning and it's ready when you get home. Unfortunately Erik is really picky now so it's not working out for us anymore, but when he wasn't so picky we often made homemade beef stew or curry chicken and veggies in the crock pot. We've also done roasts in there.
Like Stacey said, we also do pizzas on pitas and get the kids to help. They can put what they want on theirs and they like that.
We also often do "breakfast for dinner" which the kids LOVE. We make French toast (gets some protein into them because of the eggs) with fruit and syrup, or pancakes with ham.
One of Ian's favourite foods is pea soup, which you could also make ahead of time if she likes it. When I was growing up my mom often made pea soup and pancakes for dinner. We'd have the pea soup first, then have pancakes after. I loved it.
Pasta is always a big favourite around here too. Homemade mac and cheese or spaghetti. I put tons of veggies in the sauce - I throw peppers, zucchini and sometimes carrots in the Tupperware chopper and chop them into teeny pieces so they're not chunky. Erik seems to think he hates cooked vegetables so I have to be a bit sneaky.
I also do breaded fish with sweet potato fries sometimes. Erik loves, of all things, the breaded haddock from M&M, but I've also made it myself when there's time.
Our kids' daycare has a really healthy menu that follows the Canada Food Guide. I have a sheet of what Ian ate last week and I wanted to do a blog post about it so I'll try to do that later today and you can have a look. Today they were having homemmade chicken strips, brown rice and veggies for lunch.
We give Ryan whatever we are having. We hardly ever make him anything special or different. His favorites include pancakes, any kind of sausage, grilled cheese, meat cooked in gravy/sauce (read: stew, chicken soup, meatballs). I'm not a fan of boxed mac n cheese, but he has had it. We also keep cans of healthy soup in the house for those "uh-oh-what-are-we-gonna-feed-him" moments. :)
ReplyDeleteWe're having similar problems with keeping the food interesting for L. He just started eating more (a LOT more) and all of a sudden I feel like we need some new ideas. I *occasionally* give him Amy's organic whole wheat shells and cheese. I'm stealing some of your ideas! We just introduced L to peanut butter, and he seems like to turkey sandwiches (Applegate Farms makes organic, nitrate free turkey). Good luck!
ReplyDeletejust thought of another huge love for our kids. hummus. you can dip pita, pretzels, carrots (for the younger crowd try cooking them first to make them softer--also, cooked carrots are better for kids because they absorb it better.)
ReplyDeleteI confess that we do let her have kraft dinner now and then. I'm running into a dilemma trying to figure this out, too, though we eat together (thus the same food) most of the time.
ReplyDeleteSome favorites: egg (scramble in a bowl, add some milk and/or cheese if you want, microwave for ~50 seconds), toast with peanut butter, soup, broccoli (microwaved), pancakes, waffles, pasta (plain, with butter, or with sauce). That's just off the top of my head. Good luck - this is hard!
I was just thinking of something else we do that helps on busy work days. On Saturday or Sunday we make a meal plan for the week and grocery shop to make sure all the food we need for those meals is in the house. We stick a list of meals for the week on the fridge and in the morning I can just look at it and know how much time I need to prepare dinner later (working from home helps but many days I don't have time to start dinner until 5:00, and if that's the case I just choose something easier from the list of meals.) It's a lot easier to prepare meals when you're organized rather than realizing at 4:00 that you haven't thought about what to have for dinner yet. You could also maybe take some time on Sundays to prepare a few things for Sadie for the next few days to keep in the freezer/fridge. And chop up veggies as soon as you buy them, before you put them away. Saves you time when making a meal. (I never actually do this although I always wish I had. LOL.)
ReplyDeleteTHANK YOU for all of the great suggestions! I'm feelig A LOT better about the KD now. It's not THAT bad bur I'm going to try the organic stuff.
ReplyDeleteWe're going to try to use Grocery Gateway (order groceries online) so we can plan better. I always get super cranky at the supermarket.
We're heading off to Whole Foods now an I'm going to pick up some Hummus!
Getting groceries on line rocks my world. I don't have time to shop and don't like it anyway.
ReplyDeleteBee eats what I eat. We eat together so I don't have any suggestions other than plan healthy meals for all of you and to eat together. Except oatmeal. I hate it she loves and it is a staple in the house for her.
Peter eats a mix of ho-made and Plum Organics. I make him macaroni and cheese, I use pastina which I simmer in organic chicken broth, then I make an organic cheese sauce with whole wheat flour in the roux. I loosen it up with chicken stock. He eats bananas and blueberries with ground flaxseed, or apple sauce or some other pureed fruit, Some I make- some I buy. I have to buy prunes because I can't find organic ones. He loves grits. I also give him "ziti" but I use pastina and again simmer the pasta in broth because that is more nutritious than water. He gets yogurt( with more ground flaxseed), he likes chicken soup, I have not tried the hummus yet but it is in our fridge. I have made him beef stew-but he did not care for it. I get discouraged when I go to the trouble of making him food only to have him refuse it.
ReplyDeleteI use the Baby Love cookbook. No KRAFT, too much salt and chemicals. I like Annabel Kormel too. I have her baby food mill which is perfectly adequate for Peter.