February half-term is often hard for families as the weather is bleak and cold. And this year, while still at home, we need to work even harder to entertain our children and make it feel different from the rest of the time.
One of the things that can keep them occupied is to spend more time in the kitchen with them, helping to develop their cooking skills while making a glorious mess (and also learning about clearing it up!).
When it comes to good nutrition and a healthy diet, I always try and keep this simple. And my main food mantras boil down to cooking from scratch and eating as great a variety of fresh good quality ingredients as you can. This may sound obvious, however many of us have got into a rut with our cooking, relying on packets of convenience food more than ever. But in half-term, you actually have more time to cook, so it’s a great opportunity.
Since shop-bought food tends to be high in sugars, white flour, refined oils, preservatives and flavourings, and low in healthy omega 3 fats and key immunity minerals such as iron and zinc, this is why it is good to cook and prepare more meals and snacks at home.
Here are my top swaps to help build in some healthier habits at home. Getting the kids helping in the kitchen and engaged in the process will mean they are more likely to carry on making these themselves (with a little help depending on their age) going forward:
Breakfast – swap sweet cereals for porridge, pancakes, waffles or even simple buttery scrambled eggs. Top wholemeal toast or stuff wholemeal pittas with cream cheese or peanut butter with squished berry or banana slices.
Snacks – bake some biscuits or muffins or make some no-bake energy balls – this means that you can help to limit their sugar intake, use different flour and ground almonds and also supercharge their snacks – we grate courgette into brownies and carrot into muffins. Try the beetroot brownie Eton mess recipe below for the ultimate half term healthier treat. I always have a stash stored in freezer bags, and they defrost super quickly.
Lunch – make vegetable and bean soups from the stock from your Sunday roast chicken – this is a brilliant way to get veggies into kids who don’t like their greens. Cut up lots of crunchy veg and make brightly coloured hummus and dips. Plan to eat heated-up leftovers. Wholemeal wraps work well for a speedy lunch.
Supper – this is usually the easiest meal of the day and families are eating together more in lockdown. Our three children are all cooking one supper a week and they are loving it. Even if yours are a bit fussy with their food, cook something you know they like and then also cook something extra/new for them to try. I did this when mine were small, and these little tastes of different salads and vegetables really helped to build in variety and helped them expand their food repertoire.
Lucinda Miller is the clinical lead of NatureDoc and runs a team of UK-wide nutritional therapists specialising in women’s and child nutrition as well as running an online health food shop . She has been practising as a naturopath for over 20 years, qualified in Functional Medicine and is author of the bestselling cook book The Good Stuff. She has three children and lives in Wiltshire.
Brownie Eton Mess
If you can resist eating all these brownies on their own, they are wonderful dressed up with Greek yoghurt and berries as an Eton Brownie Mess.
There’s a surprise secret ingredient in here. My philosophy with food is to always try and add in more goodness to recipes, rather than taking the taste away. And when it comes to good nutrition, it’s the variety of food ingredients that counts. Not many kids voluntarily choose to eat beetroot on its own, but add it to a brownie and they’re happy to gobble it up. And this should help their taste buds adjust to the idea of eating beetroot.
This recipe also packs in magnesium-rich buckwheat and calcium-rich almonds. Easy to make, dairy-free and naturally gluten-free. Suitable from 12 months plus.
Makes 16 brownies
Preparation: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 25 minutes
200g butter
100g milk chocolate, or dark chocolate if you prefer
125g coconut sugar or light muscovado sugar
4 eggs
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
85g buckwheat flour
60g ground almonds
2 beetroot, small, ready cooked with no vinegar
100g white chocolate chips
200g Greek yoghurt
200g strawberries
50g blueberries
Heat your oven to 180 degrees non-fan/160 degrees fan.
Break up the chocolate and melt this with the butter in a saucepan on a gentle heat. Stir from time to time until it makes a thin chocolate sauce.
In the meantime, crack the eggs into a separate bowl and mix well with a hand or electric blender. Add in the coconut sugar, beetroot and vanilla, and blend well again so that it makes a light bubbly mixture.
Then mix in the buckwheat flour and ground almonds.
Then add in the chocolate-butter mixture.
Stir in half the chocolate chips.
Grease and line a square 8 inch x 8 inch brownie tin with some baking paper.
Pour the chocolate mixture into the lined brownie tin, pressing it well into the corners.
Sprinkle on the rest of the white-chocolate chips.
Place into the oven for 25 minutes until cooked all the way through.
Cool on a baking rack and then cut into 16.
Slice up the strawberries so they are to hand, and get the Greek yoghurt and blueberries ready.
Take a generous glass for each person, and break up two brownies each, arranging the bits roughly mixed with strawberries, Greek yoghurt and blueberries on top.
I’m sure you can think of a good home for any spare brownies! Store in a cake tin for 4 days or in the freezer in a container for 3 months.
Cook’s Tips:
- If you don’t have buckwheat flour swap to spelt, rice flour or gluten-free flour.
- Dairy-free: Use dairy-free spread or odourless coconut oil, use dark chocolate instead of milk and dairy-free chocolate drops.
- Egg-free: Swap the eggs for 4 tablespoon of ground flax seed and 8 tablespoons of water OR 6 tablespoons of whisked chickpea water (known as aquafaba).
- Nut-free: Swap ground almonds for 60g ground-up sunflower seeds.