Salmon and Spinach "Jellyfish" Lunch

My husband got in on the animal food creations when he made lunch for the kids on Saturday. Trying to think of a way to get them to willingly eat spinach, he came up with these little jellyfish, and yes, they gobbled them all up - tentacles included!


Here's what he used:

Body - boneless, skinless canned Alaskan salmon (wild caught) mixed with Trader Joe's mayonnaise
Eyes - wild blueberries
Tentacles - rolled up spinach leaves

Tiger Cheese "Sandwich"

A cheese sandwich is even more delicious when it looks like a tiger! It wasn't long after our elephant tuna sandwiches that my boys asked if they could have tigers for lunch.


Here's what I used:

Face, ears and snout - brown rice bread, cut into desired shapes
Stripes - Tillamook cheddar cheese
Eyes - cream cheese
Pupils - grain-sweetened chocolate chips
Whiskers - cucumbers
Tongue - spaghetti sauce

Elephant Tuna "Sandwich"

My kids love animals, so they are bound to eat any food that resembles an animal (as I so happily discovered during the Easter season when they ate bunny faces and egg bunnies). My 3-year-old asked me to make him an elephant. Tuna was on the menu for lunch that day, and I decided to use the tuna in my elephant creation. Would they eat it, I wondered? Sure enough, they devoured their Elephant Tuna Sandwiches. I even replaced the "eyes" a couple of times so they'd eat more veggies.


Here's what I used:

Face and trunk - brown rice bread
Ears - tongol tuna mixed with natural mayo
Eyes - cucumbers
Pupils - grain-sweetened chocolate chips
Mouth - apple slice

Egg bunnies

We used another idea from Little Nummies today for our lunch. These simple hard-boiled egg bunnies made for a happy meal!



Here are the ingredients we used:

Body and ears - Hard-boiled egg (slice the bottom off so that the egg sits more evenly, then cut the bottom in half and use for the ears - attach ears with small pieces of spaghetti)
Eyes - pieces of oats from homemade granola
Nose - small piece of carrot
Mouth - apple peel
Whiskers - brown rice spaghetti noodles
Feet - baby carrots (attach to body with spaghetti noodles)

Easter Bunny Lunch Idea

I've been enjoying the adorable food ideas from Little Nummies, a blog that presents simple but creative recipes using stuff you'd normally have on hand (without having to run to the store for special ingredients!).

When I saw the post about Easter Bunny faces for lunch, I had to try it for my boys. Here's how ours turned out! So cute!


These are the ingredients I used:

Face - slice of brown rice bread
Ears - hard-boiled egg cut in half, yolks removed (I also dyed them with beet juice so they had a pinkish hue to them)
Eyes - cream cheese for the whites, and grain-sweetened chocolate chips for the pupils
Nose - hard-boiled egg yolk
Mouth - raw beet slice
Teeth -Tillamook pepperjack cheese
Whiskers - Tillamook cheddar cheese

Healthy Valentine's Snacks

One of my favorite things about eating more naturally is making special treats on holidays. I had so many exciting plans for Valentine's Day this year, only to have my entire family get hit with the flu this past week. (Yes, even though we eat healthy, we still get sick sometimes!) Yesterday I managed to put a couple of my plans into action, and the rest will have to wait until next year.

Tomorrow, my kids will be eating Heart-Shaped Chocolate Covered Marshmallows and Frozen Strawberry Cream Hearts.

To make the marshmallows, I used the Agave Marshmallow recipe from Volcanic Nectar, but also added a bit of natural pink food coloring, then spread the marshmallow creme onto a large, rimmed cookie sheet rather than a 9x11 pan. After they were set, I used heart shaped cookie cutters to cut out the hearts. (Make sure to wet the cookie cutter in warm water before cutting for a nice, clean cut.)

Then, I made the chocolate coating. Inspired by Lauren of Healthy Indulgences and her ice cream bar chocolate coating, I melted 8 Tbsp. grain-sweetened chocolate chips with 2 Tbsp. extra virgin coconut oil and a shake of stevia powder. (This coating is amazing!) Once it was all melted and cooled, I dipped the marshmallows in and then laid them on foil and refrigerated them until the chocolate hardened. I used a knife to gently pry them off the foil and placed them in a sealed container until tomorrow.

To make the frozen strawberry hearts, I used the recipe for "Frozen Strawberry Cream" from Jeffrey Goettemoeller's Stevia Sweet Recipes cookbook. This is one of my favorite uses for stevia. This is a quick and simple ice cream recipe (you don't need an ice cream maker to make it), but this time I poured the mixture into this cute heart-shaped gelatin mold that my mother-in-law recently gave me.

It took about 4-6 hours for the mixture to freeze, then I unmolded them and put them in a container. They'll stay in the freezer until tomorrow night's dessert! (They need to be removed from the freezer one hour before serving so that they're soft enough to eat.)

Happy Valentine's Day!

Stevia approved by FDA!

It had to happen eventually. The sugar industry and artificial sweetener industry were no doubt dreading this day, but it has finally come. As of December 2008, the FDA has "no objection" to stevia. They didn't take it further and give it the GRAS (generally recognized as safe) rating, but "no objection" means companies can now use it without labeling it as a "natural supplement" and stores can carry it in the sweetener section instead of the supplement section (some stores were already doing this anyway, at least in my city). I'm very excited about this! Hopefully this means we will start seeing more and more stevia products on shelves. I'm hoping we'll start seeing stevia packets at coffee shops and restaurants right along side the sugar packets and Splenda packets (better yet, the Splenda packed will get tossed).

Mike Adams has an article about the FDA's decision over at NaturalNews.com. He discusses some of the reasons behind the FDA's ruling (hint: it had nothing to do with health and all to do with money).

Coca-Cola is already rolling out its natural soda that contains stevia. Sprite Green will be on a store shelf near you soon. I don't know what all the ingredients are, but I'll be sure to take a look at it.

I'm reminded of the letters I sent to Coca Cola and Wrigley's years ago, asking them why they didn't use stevia in their diet drinks and gum instead of artificial sweeteners. Maybe those letters really did make a difference. It was because of big companies like Coca Cola that the FDA finaly approved of stevia, after all!