When you encourage your child to make their own snacks (with supervision and guidance as needed), you’ll satisfy their need for independence, build their pride and confidence, foster kitchen skills, and cultivate more adventurous, engaged eating. Getting involved in the kitchen will also help your child build other important life skills, such as teamwork; shopping and meal planning; organization and clean-up, and the basics of food safety.
Getting Started
Let your child do as much as they can on their own. You can supervise your preschooler while they wash fruit before they eat it, or show them how to use a butter knife to cut soft foods or spread peanut butter. Keep a watchful eye on them, but after demonstrating skills, let your kids take over. You can also encourage them to become more independent about getting their own snacks by keeping the fixings at the ready. Stock a dedicated drawer of the refrigerator with choices that are already in preschool-size portions. Find another place (a kitchen drawer, shelf, or bin) to load up with snackable dry goods, such as pretzels, dried mango slices, crackers, whole grain bread, or nut butter. Kids over 4 years old can add raisins and whole nuts to the lineup. When your kids say they’re hungry, encourage them to choose something on their own from the snack drawer. Giving your child agency in selecting from the dedicated snack area, as well as letting them get it for themselves, builds your child’s confidence, excitement, and interest in the food they eat. Let them experiment, too—even if it makes a bit of a mess. That will give you the chance to teach them how to clean up! “Playing with their food” encourages them to develop their food prep skills, tastes, and imagination. Here are 10 simple, tasty, and nutritious snacks your little chef can make on their own (with a little help) to enjoy at any time. Use a mini whole-wheat tortilla for the crust (small tortillas will make eating the finished product easier). Then, let your preschooler spread cream cheese on the shell. Provide fruit toppings, such as strawberries, raspberries, banana slices, and kiwi. Having your child assist with cutting up the larger fruit teaches them cutting skills in a safe way. Plus, they might be more likely to eat the fruit when they’re the ones who sliced it. Inspire your preschooler to add their favorite fruits and/or veggies. Whatever combinations they come up with should be encouraged. When they’re all done, they’ll have a mini pizza to enjoy. Have fun with it by encouraging them to name their creation—who knows, the kiwi berry special could be a hit! Have your child grease a baking sheet and place the crust, followed by tomato sauce, cheese, and preferred toppings. Let them help grate the cheese, slice the veggies and meats, and layer on their desired ingredients. Pop it in the oven and bake at 350 degrees until the cheese bubbles and turns golden brown. They could also spoon a serving of nut butter on their plate and dip the apple slices before each bite. Celery, pretzel rods, and crackers can be swapped out for the apple slices for a little variety. Eventually, they’ll get a little neater with their efforts. Practice really does make perfect when it comes to basic cutting and spreading skills. Help your child gather the ingredients, then let them choose what they want for their sandwiches. Assembling these mini-sandwiches is a great way for kids to experiment with different flavor and texture combinations. Alternatively, you can have your child make a mini salad using the ingredients above, greens, and anything else you have on hand that your child likes. The possibilities for yummy, creative salads (think potato, taco, chicken, steak, fruit, or noodle) are endless. Salads also help your child learn about how to combine ingredients, flavors, and textures to change a dish’s taste.
Chocolate chipsDried fruit, like apples, papaya, or cranberriesWhole-grain cerealMini-pretzelsNuts, like almonds, cashews, or walnuts (for kids over 4 years old)PopcornRaisins (for kids over 4 years old)Sesame snacksSunflower seeds or pumpkin seeds (for kids over 4 years old)
While you want to give them the freedom to decide what goes into their trail mix, encourage them to experiment with different flavor and texture combinations. Try adding some whole-grain cereal to the container first and let them build on it. Fill small containers with carrot sticks, celery sticks, broccoli, cauliflower, cherry tomatoes, cooked mini potatoes, and/or cucumbers. Add little tubs of hummus, ranch, or other dips. Store everything together in the refrigerator. The next time your child wants a snack, encourage them to grab some veggies and dip. When the stash needs to be refilled, they can work on replenishing the supply (with some help, if needed!) Offer strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, and any other fruits your child likes. Some kids might also enjoy a little peanut butter or a drizzle of Nutella. Let them pick the order and quantity of the items that they want to go in the middle. Lastly, top it off with another layer of yogurt. Let them sprinkle the top with a little bit of granola or whole-grain cereal to add a little crunch. Be sure to keep the blades out of reach (while making the smoothie and during clean-up). Your child will get lots of hands-on experience—from dropping the items in the blender and putting on the top to pushing the buttons. Let them choose the ingredients for their smoothie. If they need inspiration, old favorites such as strawberry banana, mango pineapple, and mixed berry will likely be hits. You can also experiment with incorporating veggies. Avocados, cucumbers, and carrots make delicious additions to a fruit smoothie. They can’t really go wrong with ingredient combinations. The same goes for yogurt, juice, and ice pairings. Let your child play chef to come up with their smoothie masterpiece. Classic cheese and crackers can be more exciting if you expand your notion of a cracker. Anything can be used—graham crackers, rice cakes, pretzels, slices of bread, dried fruit, even apple or pear wedges. Use any type of cheese that your child likes (from cheddar to mozzarella), as well as spreadable toppings such as cream cheese or cottage cheese. Raisins, other dried fruit, veggie slices, olives, or fruit slices can also top off this snack. Let your child experiment with combinations that appeal to them.
Fill the celery stalk with hummus. If your child is four years or older, give them chopped up vegetables to make the ants. Small chunks of colorful peppers or carrots also work well for older kids.If your child isn’t a fan of celery, use a piece of banana or a carrot stick as the log. Slices of pepper, cooked sweet potato, or cucumber also make great logs.Use cottage cheese to fill up the logs. Then, let your child top each log with chopped up fruit or veggies. You can also fill up the logs with guacamole. Then, use black beans to represent the ants.
To make, wash and dry a few stalks of celery (or other veggies) and cut it up into pieces that are about three inches long. Assist your preschooler with these steps until they are comfortable doing so independently. Let your preschooler spread the filling on each stalk. Then, add a few raisins or other toppings to represent the ants on a log.
