Healthy Snacks for the (Large) Homeschooling Family
Posted By Jacque on July 23, 2008
We shop once a week, and don’t buy too many snacky things. One favourite is organic fruit, but fruit of any kind can be pretty expensive. The bad thing about that is that our children love fruit! Yeah, not really bad, but because of the cost, we have always had to ‘ration it’ to a half fruit in the morning, and then a 1/2 in the afternoon or evening. In the summer, though, we do let them eat more fruit. Hopefully we will be growing our own fruit soon, and won’t have this problem.
FRUIT
We don’t just eat the regular apples and bananas all the time either. We are blessed that our children like a variety of fruit:
grapefruit
apple
oranges
bananas
pears
cherries
peaches
grapes
fresh pineapple
kiwi
nectarines
plums
A great idea is to buy fruit and freeze it. I had a friend who used to freeze grapes – I thought it was weird, but it is really a neat idea! Of course, any fruit you get out, you need to eat or it gets gross, but some of my favorite frozen fruits are: peaches, grapes, berries of all kinds, kiwi. And cherries. I love cherries.
You can buy organic apples and make applesauce and can it or freeze it too. We had a great time making applesauce awhile back, and most kids love that as a snack.
A great snack we make that is healthy and uses frozen fruit is yogurt. We buy organic and natural foods, so we make it with plain yogurt, honey and frozen fruit. A base yogurt recipe I have is one I use when our children need an immunity boost: Cinnamon Yogurt for Ailments. You can skip the cinnamon and use the yogurt to honey ratio as a base to add fruit to. This can also be eaten frozen.
We love dried fruit too. That is a special treat.
Dry Snacks
We don’t do cereal for breakfast here, so I use it as a snack. There are healthy snack cereals out there that are just like a trail mix, and those are our favorites! We love the Kashi cereals.
Trail mix is an easy make when you add your favourite nuts and sweets to cereal too. Cereals that work great are those like chex cereals, Cheerios, and granola-type cereals. Some of our favourite add-ins are:
carob or chocolate chips/M&Ms
pecans
almonds
pretzels
peanuts
cashews
sunflower seeds
dried cranberries or raisins
dried pineapple
coconut
dried banana chips
and the list goes on…
We also only do chips as a rarity, but we do enjoy tortilla chips and homemade salsa frequently. My older girls love to make it, so, hey, why not?? Tomatoes and peppers in the processor, and voila! an easy, delicious snack we all love! Another Mexican snack we love is quesadillas. We make our own tortillas and some we make spicy and put on salsa and tomatoes, some we just put cheese on.
One ‘chip’ snack we do a lot is pretzels. Some of us like them with mustard and some with ranch dressing.
I like to give my Littles cottage cheese and sunflower seeds as a hi-protein snack. It takes the edge off when they are hungry and also gives them protein, which is always a good thing!
We also LOVE popcorn! We add freshly grated parmesan cheese to it usually. I like to add Louisiana Hot Sauce to mine. We make it in our Whirly-pop maker, which was sent to me by Sisterlisa. Such a good friend!
Other snack ideas are:
carrot sticks
a few small wedges of PB&J will do the trick too, for little fingers.
bagels and cream cheese
dill pickle slices and hard cheese! Dill pickles and sharp cheddar is a great combo!
homemade french fries or potato chips.
Refreshing Drinks
Special drinks don’t have to be the open-a-can kind of drink either.
We make Lemonade from honey and fresh lemons or lemon juice.
Sun tea is a favourite too.
Fruit smoothies, Water with lemon or lime.
All delicious and refreshing anytime of the year.
We do love hot tea with honey for the chilly times.
Most of the snacks we make are homemade, and we include our children, so it is also a learning experience. 
So, there you go. Some Snacky ideas for your family, large or small!
blessings!
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These are great tips! I didn’t remember seeing this on THL. We could easily go through about 2 qts of salsa a day if I just left it out for them to graze on. Also fresh veggies cut up with a bowl of ranch dressing as dip is a hit at our house too. I will sometimes boil a bunch of eggs & put them in the frig. They like to grab & go & usually tides them over until dinner.
Dana B.s last blog post..Teenagers ~ Welcoming Them Home
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we have the same problem- but how do you say no to fruit? lol so we are always looking for tips like yours!
tami lewiss last blog post..just a few more links plus a contest
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[...] presents Healthy Snacks for the (Large) Homeschooling Family posted at Walking Therein. Also great for tiny [...]
We are blessed with fruit trees so summer snacking is as easy as walking out in the backyard and picking a peach, pluot or whatever is in season at the moment. If you know someone with fruit trees, maybe you can work out a trade. Of course, they may be glad to just give it away since there is so much. With 6 kids still at home, we don’t have much leftover, but smaller families might have fruit to spare. It is our kids’ favorite snack, hands down. Well, ice cream is their favorite, but we can’t get an ice cream tree to grow here.
Roses last blog post..Carnival of Homeschooling
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I thought it would be wise to point out that popcorn kernels can be popped in the microwave. A quarter cup of kernels* in a lunch bag, three minutes, and you have a whole bag’s worth of healthy, dry popcorn! Sometimes we add a tiny bit of butter and popcorn salt, sometimes not. It’s still healthier than store bought popcorn and much, much cheaper!
*one serving, but plenty for my 5 and 3 year old girls.
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May 18th, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Hi Anna~
We don’t use the microwave for any of our food, because it is not really a safe cooking source, from what we have researched. Microwaving changes the chemical makeup of food as it shoots the micro-rays through it, and we have just gotten away from cooking that way. We just cook everything the old-fashioned way!
But thanks for your tip!
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Hi Dave-
No, I don’t think I am interested in that. I have social blog networks I subscribe to so I can keep in touch with family and homeschooling friends across the world, but that is my goal, not being popular and having a large following.
Thanks for the info though.
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[...] back Mother Dear received a question on what snack foods to buy for homeschooling families, on the go or at home, and she inspired this week’s theme. There are so many different kinds of [...]
[...] back Mother Dear received a question on what snack foods to buy for homeschooling families, on the go or at home, and she inspired this week’s theme. There are so many different kinds of [...]
[...] Memoirs – Take 7 Awhile back Mother Dear received a question on what snack foods to buy for homeschooling families, on the go or at home, and she inspired this week’s theme. There are so many different kinds of [...]
[...] back Mother Dear received a question on what snack foods to buy for homeschooling families, on the go or at home, and she inspired this week’s theme. There are so many different kinds of [...]
[...] back Mother Dear received a question on what snack foods to buy for homeschooling families, on the go or at home, and she inspired this week’s theme. There are so many different kinds of [...]
We eat our popcorn with some Bearitos taco seasoning and nutritional yeast sprinkled on it. I have gotten many compliments on it when I take it anywhere.
And btw don’t worry about what all those people say about a third party vote. My husband said to one person “You say I voted for Obama cause I didn’t vote for McCain… (paused for a moment) … but what do you think Obama supporters can say?…(more pausing)… they can say “By not voting for Obama you are voting for McCain” That was the end of the discussion.
babymakerss last blog post..Comfort For Conservatives
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Oh, and I know you are not accusing people. And even if you were, which I believe you when you say you are not, I could understand that too. This was a horrible election. Horrible. And Baldwin was a write in in Pennsylvania. I was a little surprised.
babymakerss last blog post..Comfort For Conservatives
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Great tips! Just be careful when eaten frozen fruit, *especially* grapes, because of their size and shape. Think about the iconic child with his tongue stuck to a flag pole in winter? The grape can freeze to the inside of your throat like that and choke you if you are not careful. They are so yummy when you eat them right at the slushy stage, tho!
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May 18th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
Thanks Christy. Great reminder. We don’t give any of our Littles whole grapes, frozen or thawed, so I didn’t think about that.
Yup, I’m the mom who cuts up all the grapes and many other things, before serving them to my young children!
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May 18th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Yep! Most welcome
When mine were smaller, I cut up everything, too. The frozen grape incident happened to a grown man, amazingly enough, which is why I always try to post a friendly warning when I see people talking about frozen grapes for a snack.
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May 19th, 2009 at 1:42 am
Thanks for the warning. That is good to know.
I am LOL, I was going to ask if you cut all the fruit up before you put it in the freezer. Which I did figure that would seem best. Then I saw the comments. Even though we don’t have a large family, I love to have snacks that are healthy around cuz my hubby is like the equivalent of 2 or 3 kids. We are working on controlling our appetites, eating times and what we eat. After 30+ years of not paying too much attn there are some habits that are hard to break. So we are prayerfully working on or I should say, letting God work on us to eat healthier and more sensibly!
Thanks for the info sis, I always love reading your blog…I need to get mine going again!
jen
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