1st Fun Friday

In our house, like many, we are trying to cut back on sugar.  We have yogurt or fruit for dessert.  (Grilled peaches were a huge hit this summer.)  We are trying to make our own recipes with less sugar and encouraging healthier snacks.  So far, we've been pretty successful.  That being said, we are realistic and understand that a special treat once in a while is a good thing...a really good thing.  So, we are carrying on our tradition of giving Molly a special "Fun Friday" treat.

Our main entree is a banana bread sandwich.  We tweaked our original healthy banana bread recipe by removing the brown sugar and using 2/3 cup of quick oats instead of the 2/3 cup whole wheat flour. (We kept 1 cup of whole wheat flour)  It isn't very sweet at all but the flavor is delicious.  It is much more dense and will keep Molly satisfied longer.  We spread light cream cheese and peanut butter (by request) on the banana bread then cut it into smaller sandwiches.

Our vegetable side is a pickling cucumber that has been cut with a crinkle knife.  These are incredibly crunchy and have such a fresh and clean flavor.

Our fruit side is two clementines.  These are much smaller than the varieties that we are used to, but the flavor is much sweeter.  Molly had some of these with her dinner tonight and requested them for her lunch tomorrow. We also added some dried cherries (in the tiny container) just to give her a little extra food.  She said that she ate her lunch today and was still a little hungry so we were happy to add a bit more for her.

Our dairy side is a colby-jack cheese stick.  We figured that Molly could use the extra protein to help fill her up and get her through the day.

Finally, our Fun Friday treat is a Little Debbie Fall Tree Cake.  Molly's Daddy loves the Christmas Tree Cakes by Little Debbie so he was very excited to see this new product. He even convinced me to purchase them by saying that they would make a great Fun Friday treat.  Daddy's a tricky one. ☺

A Little Bit of Everything

Today, we decided to just toss together a few of Molly's favorites.  Molly, her brother and her sister would eat pasta everyday.  Whether it be macaroni and cheese or just about any other type of pasta with a little bit of butter and Parmesan, they would eat the stuff all day long.  Molly really likes pasta salad so hopefully today's lunch will indulge her pasta cravings.

Our main entrée is pasta salad.  This pasta salad is made with choo choo wheels pasta, pepperoni, string cheese and light Italian dressing.

Our vegetable side is a baby spinach salad with light Italian dressing on the side.  Molly might be getting back into a salad kick. ☺

Our fruit side is an Empire apple that has been cut into slices.  Molly asked for caramel dip to go with it but we didn't have any.  Time for a trip to the store.

Finally our dessert is a mix of some of Molly's favorite things.  We have mini marshmallows, dried cherries and peanuts.

Nothing Green Lunch

As so many times before, Molly has requested breakfast for lunch.  And as so many times before, we are having an issue with fitting in a vegetable.  The cucumber worked fine last week but the more and more I thought about it, the more I would've omitted it.  I think that the veggies go great with a savory breakfast but we are doing a sweeter breakfast so the veggies just don't fit.  Guess we will be having  a few extra veggies with our dinner tomorrow night.  As long as she gets them somewhere.

Our main entrée is a whole grain waffle sandwich.  We flavored some whipped cream cheese with maple syrup, spread it on each side of the extra crispy waffle and layered thin slices of apple in the middle of our sandwich.

Our fruit side is a clementine and some pomegranate seeds.  This will help boost Molly's vitamin C level.

Our final side is a great combination of multi grain Cheerios, peanuts and dried cherries.  The main part of this mix is the peanuts to add protein to Molly's lunch.