Recent Eats and Sneaking Veggies into Mac and Cheese

Hey guys, what’s happenin’?

We have been enjoying some nice weather over here (sorry East coast). By “nice” I mean like, 25 and sunny. Yay! It’s like, basically spring here.

Do you wanna build a snowmaaaaaan? Name that movie!

Anyway, let’s talk about food.

 

Food understands me.

 

I think it’s fun to see what other people eat throughout their day. Is that weird? It can’t possibly be weird given the popularity of sharing food pics on instagram and every other mode of social media. I personally think it’s fun because it gives me fresh ideas. I’m sure we all find ourselves in “food ruts,”so gaining food inspiration from others is a great way to break out of the rut.

In the spirit of sharing meals, I thought I’d share some of my recent ones today! First up: breakfast!

Those Flap Jacked Mighty Muffins! I love ’em. I’m eating one right now. They aren’t the cheapest breakfast on the planet, but I love the taste AND the stats: 20 grams of protein, 6 grams of fiber, 6 grams of sugar, about 220 cals. Not too shabby. They’re great on days when I’m kind of in a hurry (they’re ready in 35 seconds!).

Normally, we eat eggs for breakfast, specifically scrambled eggs with spinach. Sometimes, when I’m feeling particularly cray-cray, I add cottage cheese.

My scrambled eggs, spinach, and cottage cheese!

The cottage cheese thing sounded a little funky at first, but if you add it while your eggs are cooking, it melts a bit and is yummmmy. That being said, my husband doesn’t like it, so may not be for everyone. I love that adds even more lean protein to the eggies. Can’t go wrong with that.

On to lunch!

This obviously could have been breakfast, but it was lunch on Saturday: scrambled eggs with honey smoked salmon on top of some spinach (with sriracha, duh).  I bought this honey smoked salmon from Costco and it is amazing. I see it at the regular grocery store too so I think it’s sold most places.

Shredded Salsa Verde Chicken! Super easy and versatile too. I just throw some frozen chicken breasts in the slow cooker and cover it with a jar of salsa verde. I cook it for about 6-8, then shred and let cook a little longer. You could do this too with regular salsa or something like Rotel-whatever your heart desires!

This is great to have in the fridge throughout the week! I usually eat it on a salad with black beans, corn, cilantro, cheese, and salsa. My husband loves to make quesadillas with it so you can use it in different ways.

Lightened up chicken salad! I love this stuff. I especially love throwing some Enlightened Roasted Broad Beans on top-they’re sooo good!

Snacks!

Pink lady apple with organic, natural peanut butter. So simple and so good. It’s almost a “throwback” kind of snack because it’s so easy I sort of forget about it, but I’m bringing it back.

I try to drink a green smoothie every day (at least lately). This baby was spinach, frozen banana, cottage cheese, peanut butter powder, some ice, water, and protein powder.

Today, I made a green smoothie with frozen banana, spinach, little cucumber, ginger, cherries, cottage cheese, and protein powder. As you can see, I’m on a bit of a cottage cheese kick.

I blend the smoothie up before adding the protein powder so I can give some to my kids. These little ones need all the fiber they can get (see below) so I think the green smoothies are a good way to eat their greens.

Dinner:

Ribye baby! We rarely eat beef so this was sort of a treat. It was a delicious treat too. I ate the whole damn thing too.  We served it up with some roasted red potatoes and mashed cauliflower.

Homemade pizza night!

I’ve made pizza-crust and all- twice in the last month.  It’s actually pretty easy, just need to make sure you have a decent chunk of time. It’s pretty amazing too (duh).  I made it with whole wheat flour and added spinach so that means it’s healthy :).

Dessert:

This is now my nightly dessert: cottage cheese, banana, peanut butter, cinnamon, and a little honey. I love it!

 

On to the Mac and Cheese!

So, both our kids have suffered from constipation. My three year old is actually much better than she used to be. It only effects her every once and a while now (usually when we’re traveling). My one year old, on the other hand, struggles with this daily.

I feel like the kids eat a pretty good diet. It’s certainly not perfect, but I get some healthy foods in there AND (I think) plenty of fluids. It is the worst thing ever though to see that baby struggle with this and then cry when she finally goes. I really want to help her.

My 3 year old loves her mac and cheese so tonight, I decided to make some of the usual but ADD something that is a little more nutrient dense: butternut squash!

I happened to have a bag of frozen butternut squash in the freezer so I microwaved that up, then pureed it in the blender.

I added almost 1/2 cup of squash to the mac and cheese then served it up to the kiddos!

You can definitely taste the squash-so heads up. My advice would be to slowly add some and taste along the way. If the taste will turn off your kids, maybe add a little less. If they won’t notice, add all of it!

I really want to start thinking of other ways to sneak in vegetables. I give the kids smoothies each day too so they get good veggies/fruit there. For breakfast, I’ve recently been giving them oatmeal with raisins or banana.

 

Any suggestions on ways to get kiddos to eat more veggies? I’m also taking advice on dealing with baby/toddler constipation! 🙂 Thanks friends! Happy Hump Day!