Toddler Food

If you are anything like me, finding good, quick, healthy meal options for your toddler aged children is really hard. I find it especially hard living overseas where pre-prepared food and fast food (although not the healthiest) is not even an option. Keane and Gracie actually eat dinner before Ryan and do and then we put them down around 7 pm and we eat after they go to bed. So that poses another problem because I often don't have dinner completely prepared before they go to bed.

When we first returned I would make a lot of mashed potatoes, beans and vegetables and keep them in the refrigerator but often the food would go bad before I was able to use it all. Anyway, I was looking and looking for ideas for what to do to always have good, healthy food on hand for them in a way that was convenient to prepare and wouldn't go bad. I don't remember where I read it but I read about putting food into muffin tins and freezing them so that they are good sized portions for toddlers and then popping them out of the tins when they were frozen and storing them in Ziploc bags until they were needed. So, that is what I have been doing and it is WONDERFUL! Whenever I need a quick and healthy lunch or dinner I just pop a few cubes in the microwave and a hot, healthy meal is ready within minutes (often we don't have electricity and the cubes warm up fine in a sauce pan too). I have put spaghetti and meat sauce into the cubes, chicken pot pie filling, Shepperd's pie, apple sauce, vegetables and mashed potatoes. Often I take left-overs from Ryan and my dinner and put them into the cubes. It really cuts down on waste and I always have food on hand for them. I am SO thankful I found out about this idea. Hope it helps some of you!

Do you have other ideas for quick and easy toddler food that is not pre-packaged or pre-prepared? I would love to hear them!

Spaghetti and meat sauce

Chicken pot pie

A hot, healthy meal within minutes and 2 happy kids!!!