Fun in the Kitchen

Believe it or not, my daughter and I bake some food (usually a dessert) every day. She loves to pour ingredients, stir batter, and decorate the final product (see the birthday cake below). Unfortunately, her love of baking seems to collide with my love of eating and, ten pounds later, I’m trying to convince her that granola is fun to make while I’m on hold with Jenny Craig.

Jenny Craig did help me lose that last ten pounds of baby weight, and I did get into a good habit of packaging up any desserts we made for our dearest neighbors, but I still wanted to look for some healthier alternatives to keep us both healthy, happy, and avoiding sugar highs that somehow always managed to peak around bedtime.

Here is one of the many healthy, fun, and easy snacks I came upon:

Bagel Faces

Ingredients:

Whole wheat bagels
¼ cup Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing- Lite
4 oz. cream cheese- Lite
Every vegetable in your fridge (especially cherry tomatoes, cucumbers (cut in half circles), baby carrots (sliced in half), broccoli)
Shredded cheese

1) Mix the dressing and cream cheese and spread on sliced bagel (cheese spreaders are best if your child is in charge of spreading)
2) Use shredded cheese for the hair
3) Use vegetables for eyes, mouth, nose, ears, etc.

This is a cute snack to make with your child and the farthest thing from Rocket Science.