#tanlinesgoingcrazy

I spent a week in Florida with family

Of course, my nephew wanted to hit the beach, swimming pool, and play some baseball and video games so my week was full. What are young 7-year olds interested in eating? More importantly, are they willing to help? My students often return from holiday breaks and weekend gatherings and share stories of what they ate. One key detail I never hear is how they contributed to the meal.

 I know that isn’t the case for my nephew since my sister cooks and he loves experimenting with slime, erupting volcanoes, and anything messy he can get his hands on. I figured we could make ice cream to eat after being out in the heat all day. This is smart for a few reasons- 1. We can control what we are eating by preparing what we want fresh. 2. We can control the costs while enjoying the treats we like. 3. Servings can be portioned ahead of time, so we aren’t tempted by our sweet tooth and reduce what is wasted.

What’s on the menu?

In a week, my nephew eats different combinations of these items

Breakfast 

Turkey sausages, yogurt, waffles, fresh fruit. I wanted to make cute, bite-sized waffles to freeze for the future, and there wasn’t much else we could modify in his routine that he could help with. 

Lunch

Peanut butter and jelly, grilled cheese, pretzels, goldfish crackers, raisins, yogurt, homemade chicken tenders. To experiment, I wanted to make a dip for the pretzels, prep some apple slices for peanut butter and raisins, and play around with a grilled PB&J sandwich.

Dinner

Fish sticks (Trident only), chicken, homemade chicken strips, peas, broccoli, green beans, salmon, corn, rice, and croissant. To be helpful, I wanted to pre-marinate some meats and fill up my sister’s freezer with prepped food. I’m on my summer break and have fulfilled all of my professional obligations in addition to my personal extended learning goals so with this trip I wanted to have fun, but also be useful. 

Dessert

My nephew can have the occasional cookie, ice cream, or piece of candy. The good thing is we can make all of those. I wanted to stick to simple recipes with minimal ingredients. I had the following ideas for dessert: 

 1. Peanut butter cookies, 

 2. Homemade ice cream since we’d planned on being outside A LOT, 

 3. Oatmeal raisin cookies (something healthier)

What we actually did

Check out the videos below to see how everything turned out!

Breakfast- we didn’t modify anything lol. He still ate his rotation of muffins/yogurt or waffles/sausage with bananas on the side. 

Lunch- we had toasted peanut butter and jelly which he enjoyed. We also added in Tuna wraps with mozzarella sticks.

Dinner- we had marinated thighs with roasted sweet potatoes and Brussel sprouts. He had a side of pineapple and ate quite a bit. On a different night we had chicken tenders coated with poultry seasoning and panko with potato wedges on the side all prepared in the air fryer.  

Dessert- we made strawberry ice cream, peanut butter cookies, and chocolate chip cookies because I forgot we were supposed to make oatmeal raisin cookies. The chocolate chip cookies had a combination of semi-sweet and chocolate chips, so they were not super sweet. We wanted to make rice Krispie treats for his school orientation as a gift for his teacher, but we decided on the chocolate chip cookies since they turned out perfect! Unfortunately, we left the bagged cookies on a table when we left for school. The peanut butter cookies were a lot of fun because my nephew had never heard of or tasted peanut butter cookies so that was exciting.

Click here for the videos

Strawberry ice cream

Chocolate chip cookies