Cuisinicity – Delicious & Healthy Meals for Kids, Healthy Snack Recipes for KidsMeals for Kids RecipesLet’s be honest: Kids don’t like fancy-schmancy food (what I call “tra-la-la” in French!). They like what they know. They love what they are most familiar with: Cheese Pizza, Chicken nuggets, hamburgers, macaroni and cheese, spaghetti and meatballs, cookies, rice-crispie treats and so on. Eventually of course, when their taste adapts to a more wholesome diet, the options are limitless, but first, I recommend working with what we know they love now! Ultimately, there will be no need to be “deceptive” with the kids. My Corinda was reminding me how much fun it was to play the game “what’s the secret ingredient in this dish?” with all noisy 7 of us around the dinner table! Each of them, even my littlest ones, would inevitably shout out the usual “suspects” –flax seeds, lentils, beans, nuts…and sometimes, much to their disappointment, there were no secret ingredients, just because there was nothing to hide, and they just loved it, plain and simple! BUT, I have to say (ha-ha!) none of them EVER guessed the hidden cauliflower in their favorite macaroni and cheese nor the avocado in their absolute top hit cheese pizza (not even sophisticated Daddy!).
Allrighty, then! Presenting good ol’ favorites, Cuisinicity style, that your kids (and you) will LOVE! Even my kids’ friends who were not necessarily raised to like healthy food LOVE LOVE LOVE Mama Katz’s cooking!
The secret is to do it without changing the appearance, the texture and really much of the taste for them. Make it appear just like what they know and love, and leave the rest to Mama Katz!I won’t belabor here how I ameliorated and upgraded the nutrition of each and everyone of these dishes, because I do so in the actual recipe. Suffice it to say that the common theme throughout my stealthy ways is always to try to sneak in vegetables, fruit, whole grains, beans, seeds, nuts or legumes that kids would otherwise turn up their nose at. The net result is to increase fiber content, lower the sodium and sugar content, maximize vitamin, minerals & antioxidants, lower the saturated fat content or eliminate it all together and replace it with healthy fat….all while preserving deliciousness of course!
I think a top favorite is my Crispy Chicken Tenders Perfectly crispy on the outside, tender and juicy on the inside. Kids devour these! Just don’t tell them they are eating their wholegrain cereal doing it. I use the same chicken cutlets in a simple store-bought marinara sauce (with no added sugar!) to make Chicken Parmesan.
Another top hit winner is my finger-licking delicious Honey Glazed Chicken -- an absolute kid favorite- WOW so good!
Then there is the classic Italian Turkey Meatballs kids always ask for! You would never know these wonderfully moist meatballs are not made with ground beef! That’s because of the puréed lentils that I sneak in there!
Another family favorite are my Turkey Burgers. No one will ever know these are so good for you! They hide puréed lentils and sautéed mushrooms which not only make them fabulously nutritious but also make them moist like a regular beef burger! They may also love my Mini BBQ Turkey Burgers, also filled with pureed lentils that you would never know are there. I have created a Vegan Version that they may well love too!
Sneaky Macaroni & Cheese -- unbelievably fantastic! You got to admit–getting your little finicky one to devour cauliflower is a feat, right?!Discover Cuisinicity's wonderful breakfast and snack recipes -- your kids will absolutely LOVE them!Power Chocolate Banana Shake
Whole White Wheat Pancakes
Simply Oatmeal
Simply Porridge
Peanut Butter Banana Chocolate Chip Panini
Snacks and Treats:
Katz Flax Crisps
Bake Chocolate Custard
Dark Chocolate Cake
Chocolate Zucchini Muffins (Vegan)
This is a place to start, if you haven’t already started on your own. If you already have, good for you and please continue to be relentlessly creative! The outcome is a lifelong gift to your kids of good health, years added to life and life added to years! What more could a loving parent wish for!
Cuisinicity® is about love, first and foremost. I didn’t realize it then but Cuisinicity was born when I fell in love with my husband a lifetime ago! He, Dr. David Katz, has gone from the aspiring Preventive Medicine resident I met back then, to a world renowned expert in nutrition and disease prevention. We met in an epidemiology class I was auditing at Yale – and the rest, as they say, is history. A whole lot of history!
Medium-Heart I am a French-born-and-raised foodie, and lover of luscious cuisine. But I am also a scientist, earning my PhD in neuroscience at Princeton University. So, when David presented me with the challenge of his very demanding nutrition standards, we realized that his passion for health and my love of French cooking also needed to be wed! And so our “marriage” of priorities resulted in 20 some years of methodical experimentation – but in our warm, lively home kitchen, rather than any neuroscience lab. Over those years, David and I have raised 5 beautiful healthy children together – Rebecca, Corinda, Valerie, Natalia and Gabe (I stopped working as a neuroscientist after Natalia was born) – and all of us have benefited from our shared passion for loving food that loves us back.
Watch my cooking classes here and get my free recipes. Cuisinicity – Love the food that loves you backwww.cuisinicity.com
