FEATR’s The Lunchbox episode with Isabelle Daza: Healthier substitutes for your kids’ foods
When you become a parent, your kids and their welfare become most important to you than yourself; they’ll mean the world to you. You’ll develop unconditional love and instinct toward their health, safety, and emotions, among others, as they grow. And so, you try hard to influence their growth positively. It includes preparing healthy foods for kids and more.
A challenging yet fulfilling task for parents
Being a parent has a lot to do with nurturing children. From the day kids are born, you provide them with nutritious foods. You endure the pain of breastfeeding to give them enough milk and a good latch. When they turn into toddlers, you deal with their usual behavior, which is being finicky eaters.
Maintaining kids’ healthy being by feeding them is indeed one of the hardest stages of being a parent. Preparing healthy and appetizing meals in itself is challenging. More so, convincing them to eat enough healthy foods and choosing them over prepackaged and processed ones.
It’s easy to give kids packed foods from the market, especially if you’re tired of offering the same thing frequently. You can do a little experiment to change the bad habit and choices you make for them.
FEATR features Isabelle Daza in The Lunchbox Episode to share surprising healthy foods for kids. These substitutes can help you decide the best for your kids.
FEATR’s The Lunchbox episode with Isabelle Daza: Healthier substitutes for your kids’ foods
Salmon katsu
Instead of buying a bunch of expensive packed fish sticks from your local market, why not try an easy and healthier substitute? You want to be a wise and super parent at the same time. Aside from preparing food, you also spend your time and money on other things. So you want to make the most out of everything.
With this substitute, you can be in charge of the dish to make it suit your kids’ preferences while filling them with enough nutrients. You do not have to exert much time and effort because they will come out naturally delectable.
Fish sticks are on every single menu around the world. Whether in a restaurant or at home, it is always available to serve your kids. However, even though they are reliable and tasty, you want your kids to understand and experience that fish comes in different sizes, flavors, and textures.
It doesn’t have to be salmon all the way. There are a lot of different fishes that are available in the Philippines that you can try. Or you can observe their favorite fish. A little reminder: foods for little ones should not be intimidating. Therefore, be careful with sizes.
Chicken nuggets and veggie fries
As a parent, you know too well that if you turn anything into a nugget, your kids will eat it. Nuggets are probably one of the first foods you introduced because kids can manage to pick up, dip, and munch on by themselves. These impressions are also applicable to French fries.
Health-wise, we are aware that deep frying isn’t the healthiest way to cook foods. It’s another way around. This FEATR’s The Lunchbox episode of Isabelle Daza will make parents use an air-fryer in cooking nuggets and fries, so they come out less oily.
Most of us don’t know what’s in the store-bought nugget and fries. But we know they’re not good for kids, especially in large volumes. So, it would be better to prepare them from scratch. As for nuggets, you can choose from vegetables, fish, and the most popular of all – chicken nuggets. It’s easy to do it. For the French fries, you can use vegetables that your kids prefer the most, like carrots and sweet potatoes. It’s that easy!
Veggie bolognese pasta
Sweet Pinoy Spaghetti is one of the most comforting foods for all ages, especially young ones. It’s passed on from generation to generation, and they get so much better as time passes by. Therefore, a lot of kids love it. However, the issue with Sweet Pinoy Spaghetti is it has too much sugar and insufficient nutritious ingredients.
It’s delicious, for sure, and it’s easy to serve your kids. You don’t have to be a cheerleader before you convince them to eat it because it perfectly suits their taste buds. But you also want to play the best mom by feeding them nutritious foods. So, this FEATR’s The Lunchbox Episode by Belle can turn you into one.
You don’t have to change much in the original recipe. All you need to do is remove hotdogs and reduce the sugar in them and sneak in vegetables by cutting them into small pieces or grating them. Don’t forget to put a lot of cheese on top. Easy peasy, boss mommy/daddy!
Flank steak and golden fried rice
Children usually get bored when they consume the same foods every day. However, rice is a staple in Filipino meals. It gets hard to eat a full meal without rice.
In this Lunchbox Episode of Belle, there’s no limit to creativity and flavors with rice recipes that you can cook to tempt your kid’s taste buds. But before heading on to your version of healthy rice, here’s Belle’s.
Plain rice turned into a golden, veggie fried rice that will tap your kid’s curiosity to try it. The key to it is egg added to your rice to make it golden in color. You can opt for healthier rice, such as Tinawon, and add some of your kid’s favorite veggies.
Instead of partnering bacon with rice, a healthier version you can choose is flank steak. It’s as delicious but more nutritious. It doesn’t have the usual thin and crispy feeling that kids love, but it has higher protein and quality meat.
