All parents have faced it. The lip-sealed shake of the head of your children when presented with bright green vegetables. Or maybe you’ve even gone to battle with the shove of the plate back towards the middle of the table. Sometimes that argument over eating your vegetables isn’t worth the fight, but we all know our kids still need to get all the nutrients that are present in vegetables. We completely understand the challenge of "Eat your vegetables", so we’ve tried out 4 healthy recipes full of veggies and nutrients. And your kids won’t even know that they are eating vegetables!
Plantain Chips
Make these homemade plantain chips instead of buying potato chips at the store! Plantains are high in fiber, vitamins A,C,B-6, Magnesium and Potassium- all necessary for a healthy body! They also are lower in fat and sodium than potato chips!
What you need: 1 plantain, around 2 tbsp olive, avocado, or coconut oil, and seasoning! 1 plantain will give you two servings of chips!
How to make them: Peel and slice the plantains thinly into circles. Mix the plantains with olive oil and the seasoning of your choice. We love the combination of turmeric, garlic, and cumin or something simple like paprika and sea salt! It’s easiest to mix it in a bowl or you can mix them right on a cooking sheet. Roast the plantains in the oven at 350 for 20-25 minutes! Plantains should be a golden brown and crispy! You can store them at room temperature for a few days.
Carrot Fries
Photo from Tasty.com
These are another great way to add in more colorful veggies into your children’s diet.
What you need: 4 or 5 carrots or 1 sweet potato will make about 2 servings!
How to make them: Cut the carrot or sweet potato into strips (think french fries!)! This is easiest if you do it with full length carrots, but baby carrots can work too! After their cut, mix them with about 2 tbsp of olive oil and your favorite reasoning! Bake at @425 F. for 20 - 25 minutes. Make sure you flip about half way through!
Cauliflower Rice
Photo from Minimalist Baker
Next time you serve rice with any beans or a delicious sauce replace half of the rice with cauliflower rice! It will give your child an extra serving a vegetables, and they won’t be able to tell the difference!
What you need: 1 head of of cauliflower. 1 head of cauliflower will give you about 4 servings of rice.
How to make them: Cut your cauliflower into florets. Then put the florets into a blender and pulse until it is in small rice like pieces. It works best if you put in a few florets at a time. Alternatively, you could also mince them by hand! Then steam the cauliflower and mix with rice!
Mandazi
Vegan style!
Does your kid have a sweet tooth! We tried out this recipe for vegan Mandazi and ABSOLUTELY loved! They were all eaten up in two days! Click here for the recipe!
Here are some tips we have:
- Use the same amount of flour, but half the amounts of all other ingredients. It will make about a dozen Mandazis!
- Dough will be messy and sticky, but that’s totally okay! If you would rather roll out the dough to make perfect circles, cover a wooden cutting board with flour and press out with a rolling pin or your hands-> Cut into circles with glass or knife
- Be careful with the oil when you put more into your hot pan for the next batch! It is helpful to have your pan cool between patches. Sauté them for about 2 minutes on each side.
If you have another favorite family dessert recipe that you want to make a little healthier, try out these suggestions! If you find another healthy replacement that you love, share it with us on instagram or facebook by tagging Kigali Moms and Dads!
- Replaced refined sugar with agave or pure cane sugar
- Replace regular flour with whole wheat or almond flour!
- Sauté in sunflower oil instead of frying!
- Replace butter with oil especially ones with a lot of healthy fat such as coconut oil and avocado oil or with applesauce!
- Replace eggs with bananas! One egg can be replaced with one medium mashed banana.