Once you have prepared some hard-cooked eggs, it will be a snap to work with your children to help them create the following snacks or light lunches.
“The nice thing about these ideas is they’re straightforward, they’re simple and they’re manageable and so it’s nothing really intimidating at all. They can be done quick and easy and so you feel like you’ve had a good bit of quality time with your child and they make a healthy snack,” says Carol Harrison, a registered dietitian and spokesperson for the Egg Farmers of Ontario.
Egg Flowers
By simply slicing hard-cooked eggs and placing them on a platter in a circle to form a flower, adding some cucumber stems and a cherry tomato centre, you can make an edible garden. Let the kids do the creating with their favourite fruits and veggies to add some colour to their meal.
2 hard-cooked eggs, peeled
1 small cucumber, cut into 10 slices
1 piece (2.5 cm/1 inch) string cheese
2 cherry tomatoes
5 ml (1 tsp) low-calorie Ranch salad dressing or your favourite dressing or dip
1 piece (2.5 cm/1 inch) yellow sweet pepper, cut into strips
1 piece (7.5 cm/3 inches) celery, cut into 3 strips
1 strip green pepper (7.5 cm/3 inches long and 2.5 cm/1 inch wide), cut into 2 leaf shapes
2 broccoli florets
10 ml (2 tsp) prepared hummus or additional Ranch salad dressing
15 ml (1 tbsp) sprouts
Use an egg slicer to cut the hard-cooked eggs into even slices quickly and easily or let your child cut slices with a plastic knife.
Place slices on a plate or platter in a circle to form flowers (see photo).
Add sliced cucumber to create additional flower petals. Use string cheese, cucumber, cherry tomatoes or sweet peppers and veggie dip or hummus as the centre of the flowers.
Add celery sticks for the flower stems and green pepper and broccoli for the leaves. At the base of the flowers, place a dollop of your child’s favourite dip or hummus and sprinkle with sprouts to resemble grass.
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Makes 1 serving.
Nutrition information per serving (based on use of vegetables shown in photo): 230 calories; 13 g fat; 18 g protein; 11 g carbohydrate; 2 g fibre; 350 mg sodium.
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Egg Salad Creatures
Make silly creatures or faces with a mound of egg salad and some imagination. Use whatever edibles you have growing in the garden or extras in the fridge to fashion sprout hair, olive eyes, pickle noses and maybe even a cucumber moustache.
Set out the garnishes and let the kids get creative by making their own variations on the faces and body parts of the little creatures.
4 hard-cooked eggs, peeled
30 ml (2 tbsp) low-calorie mayonnaise or salad dressing
5 ml (1 tsp) prepared yellow mustard
Salt, to taste
1 small cucumber, cut into 10 slices
2 cherry tomatoes
1 baby carrot, cut into thin matchstick pieces
1 piece (2.5 cm/1 inch) string cheese
2 raisins
2 slices gherkin or small pickle
2 slices olive
Ideas for Egg Salad Creature Garnish
Hair: Grated or string cheese, grated carrots, sprouts or curly lettuce
Eyes: Olives, cucumber, pickle slices or raisins
Nose: Slice of gherkin, pickle, pieces of carrot
Mouth: Wedge of cherry tomato, carrot or celery stick or piece of cheese
Ears: Cherry tomato or sliced cucumber
Whiskers or antennae: Carrot or celery sticks or sweet pepper strips
Peel and finely chop hard-cooked eggs and place in a large mixing bowl. Add mayonnaise, mustard, and salt; stir gently together until combined.
Using a large serving spoon mound egg salad in two round scoops on individual plates.
Using pieces of vegetables, cheese, olives, pickles, etc., make features or body parts, create silly creatures or faces. (To make the creature and face in the photo, use cucumber slices for ears or body scales; a wedge of cherry tomato for the mouth; pieces of carrot for whiskers or a tail; a piece of string cheese for a tuft of hair; raisins and sliced gherkins or olives for eyes; and a cherry tomato or small piece of cucumber for the nose.)
Serve with crackers.
Makes 2 servings.
Nutrition information per serving (based on vegetables shown in photo and not including crackers): 220 calories; 14 g fat; 15 g protein; 8 g carbohydrate, 1 g fibre; 410 mg sodium.
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Egg and Tuna Schooners
Make some edible sailboats, the perfect snack for a day spent by the water. These energy-packed, bite-sized treats will give your kids the vigour they need to play all day.
You can substitute salmon, chicken, crab or egg salad filling for the tuna.
5 hard-cooked eggs, peeled
1 can (170 g) tuna, drained
45 ml (3 tbsp) low-calorie mayonnaise or salad dressing
30 ml (2 tbsp) finely chopped celery
Salt, to taste
10 tortilla chips (triangle-shaped)
Drain canned tuna and place contents in a mixing bowl. Break up tuna with a fork.
Cut eggs in half lengthwise. Carefully scoop out yolks and place in small bowl. Set whites aside. Mash yolks with a fork.
Add yolks, mayonnaise, celery and salt to tuna and mash together.
Fill egg white halves with tuna salad mixture.
To make each “sailboat,” place a tortilla chip in the tuna mixture to resemble a sail.
Makes 10 sailboats.
Nutrition information per sailboat: 70 calories; 3.5 g fat; 7 g protein; 2 g carbohydrate; 0 g fibre; 150 mg sodium.
Source: Egg Farmers of Ontario, http://www.eggfarmersofontario.ca.
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