Thursday, September 23, 2010

Happy Meals

No, not THOSE happy meals. Wouldn't touch those fast food places with a 10 foot pole! But I do like my little love's meals to be happy around here. Been using cookie cutters, raisins, and anything else I can think of to make meals fun, colorful, yummy, and yet healthy for her. Got the idea for this first pic from another blog. Wish I could tell you which one, but it was awhile ago and I have no idea. But she had this cute idea to put a variety of food choices in a muffin tin or mold and call it "Muffin Tin Monday". Love it! Don't remember every Monday but do pull it out for special lunches or dinners. In it are carrots, grapes, cheese cubes, grilled chicken bites, falafel balls, zuchini strips and a ranch dip in the center. My tin is much too big so I shared this with Ruby and ate whatever she couldn't, but she really was happy with this meal. Here are a few other fun meals...
Breakfasts are my favorite. Bought a big bin of cookies cutters last year loaded with holiday themes, farm and zoo animals. Lots of fun and turns eggs and toast into a fun plate.
Simple peanut butter toast on round healthy Arnold bread with raisins. Ruby loves her Peanut butter toast!
More fun with peanut butter, toast, and banannas.
Smiling blueberry pancakes. 
Yellow and green themed bfast... a yogurt bar.
A good idea in theory, but too many toppings. She ended up dumping them all in there and then wasn't too thrilled to eat it that way! So I think I'd lose at least 2 of the choices and put less in each cup.
The Bento Box. I love it.
Found all these great ideas online and came up with a few on my own. Was all excited to pack Ruby's lunches for school only to find out they don't do lunch early like in summer camp.  She is home for lunch and doesn't yet need all the lunch box, bentos, ice pack, and thermos I bought. Oh, well, we will have them for day trips. Plus Bentos are equally fun to use at home!

Speaking of happy meals...I've got a Norwegian apple tort in the oven and it's smelling good. Time to pop it out and see!

6 comments:

dawn said...

Bento is so much fun. My girls call it "prizes". When they ask for prizes for lunch they want bento.

Maci Miller said...

Oh, that is so cute? What do you put in yours? I'm all up for ideas from one health nut to another! :-)

Mireille said...

You are creative!! I know this great website http://bentozen.wordpress.com/ these are super ideas for bento boxes, but maybe she needs to be a bit older to eat things like this, but you can definiteley get some inspiration.

Maci Miller said...

Wow, Mireille! That is a GREAT site! So many cool ideas. You'd be surprised what Ruby will eat. Saturday when we went to a Japanese restaurant, she begged me for some of my sushi. I let her have a tiny taste cause we go to this place often and know it is good and fresh. She LOVED my yellowtail crunchy roll. Go figure! I can't imagine liking sushi at her age! She is something else!

Jessica said...

That's funny, Jen, because as corny as it sounds, I've been thrilled about getting to start Muffin Tin Mondays. Although I think my muffin tins are in a sad state as a result of too many cupcakes. We might just have to do muffin liner Mondays.

Yours look yummy!

Chris and Terri said...

Oh... ok... now I feel like a bad mom! LOL Not really - these are very cool creative ideas! Love them! And I will steal them as soon as football season is over!