TODDLER MEAL PREP | Hacks & Tips for Picky Eaters

In today's video, I'm gonna be sharing a full toddler meal prep and how I stay sane during the week feeding my kids, especially my one-year-old. He is so picky lately, so I'm hoping, fingers crossed, he actually eats what I make him. We're gonna start off with breakfast because, of course, it is the first meal of the day, and honestly, I find this the hardest one, and we've been in a rut of just, like, peanut butter and toast with fruit and some cheese. Like, it's not exciting lately, so we're gonna switch it up, and this is actually a recipe from the toddlerhealth.cookbook. I'm gonna link it down below. Baked peanut butter and J-Oatmeal squares. I don't actually think I've made this recipe for Oakley yet, so I'm really excited to see what he thinks about it. I actually created this recipe because my daughter, who's now four, hated the texture of oatmeal. She actually doesn't mind it now, so I decided to make it baked. That way, you can actually serve it like little, like, square cakes, and just changing up the texture and how you serve the same food in different ways to your kids, like, might make them actually wanna eat it, and this recipe's really easy to make. It's a great meal prep one because it makes a lot, and it all just gets baked in the oven, and then you can freeze it, have it for the rest of the week, and you're ready to go in the morning. First, I'm gonna mash up two bananas, and while I do that, I wanna say thank you to Aquasana for sponsoring today's video. They are the home water filtration system that we've been using. We love them, and they are definitely gonna be essential in today's meal prep. Having clean, filtered water in the kitchen while I'm prepping food is a must-have. To our mashed bananas, I'm gonna add in the rest of the wet ingredients. I have some unsalted, smooth peanut butter, eggs, unsweetened almond milk, and vanilla extract. Make sure your bananas are nice and spotty and ripe because this is where the sweetness of this recipe is coming from. There's actually no added sugar except for the natural sweetness from banana. Definitely could've used a bigger bowl, but we're gonna work with it. I love this recipe because it's all made in one bowl, which means less cleanup afterwards. So to the wet mixture, I'm gonna add in my oats, I have baking powder, cinnamon, a little bit of sea salt, and some chia seeds, which is gonna soak up all the excess liquid. And then you're just gonna fold that right in. It already smells like breakfast in here. It's kind of like overnight oats, except we're gonna bake it. And if your mixture's looking really soupy like you did something wrong, don't worry, you are on the right track. It's all gonna soak up and bake perfectly, I promise. To a nine by nine inch pan, I'm just gonna take a little bit of coconut oil. You can also use butter. And I'm just gonna grease the sides so that our oatmeal doesn't stick when it bakes. I'm gonna put some parchment paper. I also like that the coconut oil makes the parchment stick right to the pan. Transfer the batter into the pan. And then for toppings, I like to switch it up. Today I'm actually gonna do half blueberries and half chocolate chips because I think my four-year-old is gonna love the chocolate and then some hemp hearts, which add in some extra protein and nutrients and they just have a nice little texture to them. And then I'm just gonna pop these into the oven to bake while we work on our breakfast sausages. When it comes to breakfast, one of the things I struggle with the most is finding what types of protein to serve besides eggs, which my kids definitely went through phases where they didn't even like eggs, so that made it more difficult. Definitely rely on bacon, but we're not gonna have bacon every single day. And breakfast sausages is another thing I really love, but a lot of store-bought options, they're not that great. The ingredients are kind of crappy. Once I figured out how to make breakfast sausages right at home with simple ingredients that actually taste like the real thing that you get at the drive-thru, I was like, why are we even buying them from the store anymore? This recipe is also in the toddler ebook, but I'm gonna have the recipe for you guys down below in the info box, so make sure you guys check that out. So to a large bowl, I'm gonna add my ground pork. You can use turkey or chicken if you'd like, but pork is gonna give you the authentic breakfast sausage taste. I'm adding unsweetened applesauce, maple syrup, fresh garlic, and all of my spices. And then you're just gonna mix it all together to combine everything. I'm probably gonna have to go in there with my hands, but I'm just gonna start with the spatula first. We're gonna switch to hands. Took my rings off. Now, I'm gonna make these into sausage rounds, like the style you would put in a breakfast sandwich, but you could do sausage links. You could do really any shape that you feel like's gonna be easiest for your child to eat. You could even do little meatballs. It's whatever you like and whatever is age-appropriate for your child. My little guy is almost one and a half, which I don't wanna talk about, but he does well with a really flat, thin disc, so he'll just pick it up himself and eat it as is. But my four-year-old would probably love this in a breakfast sandwich. Meanwhile, this is looking good. Timer just went off. We're just gonna check them, but I can see the edges are nice and golden, so we're gonna set this aside to cool. My pan is heated with some avocado oil, so I'm just gonna lay them all. And I like to do this in a couple of batches so that you don't overcrowd the pan. I'm gonna cook them for a couple minutes, flip them, and then cook them on the other side just until they're golden and cooked through. The kids are just downstairs playing, so I'm actually making a little snack plate for each of them. Oakley had his nap already, so both of them usually have a snack in the afternoon. This oatmeal bake has been cooling in the pan. I'm gonna slice it, give some to Oakley for his snack time, but also this is gonna be perfect for breakfast tomorrow morning. Look at how delicious and super moist they are. Perfect way to eat oatmeal for breakfast. Is it good? Guys, he has been so picky lately. I'm just trying to figure out new things to serve him, and because we've been traveling for the last couple months, it's nice to be back home in my kitchen having all of my tools and ingredients available to me, because variety is key when you're trying to get your kids out of the picky eater stage. This guy's like double fisting. Thumbs up. Next, we're gonna be making a beef stew. I have been making variations of this recipe for years, even before I became a mom. I love it, especially for my one-year-olds, because I can mix in a bunch of veg. He doesn't even know what's in there, but he's getting all the nutrients. So today, I have some cabbage, some celeriac root, and of course, our basics, a carrot and a celery. You can never go wrong. I also love recipes that you cook for a long period of time, because you can use more affordable, budget-friendly cuts of meat. This is just stewing beef, and when you cook it for a long time, it literally melts in your mouth like filet mignon, and it's delicious. Every time I share this recipe on social media, my DMs are filled with recipe question mark. Truth is, I kind of just make it up every time I make it, but I am gonna have the exact measurements I'm using linked down below in the info box. So I'm gonna finish washing and chopping my veggies, and then we will get cooking. You guys know I like to keep a pretty non-toxic home, and one of my favorite things about our kitchen is that we have filtered water coming right out of our kitchen faucet. We have the Aquasana Clarum Direct Connect installed underneath our sink. It is so easy to set up. You don't have to worry about drilling any holes in your countertop or having a separate faucet. It connects right to the cold water line, so every time you're using your faucet, you have clean, filtered water. Their filters reduce 78 contaminants in the water, things like lead, mercury, even microplastics, which I know everyone is really concerned about right now, and chlorine, which I don't know about you, but I can taste the difference of tap water versus filtered water. We actually even tested our four-year-old and did a little water taste test, and she definitely noticed the difference of the filtered one from Aquasana versus regular tap water. Her face expression said it all. But what I love is that they actually keep the beneficial minerals, things like magnesium and potassium that you do want in your water. We are a water-drinking household. My kids really only drink water, so having clean, safe water that is filtered and actually tastes good for myself and my entire family is a top priority, and I'm so happy that Aquasana has filters that make it accessible and convenient to have it right in anybody's home. Even if you're renting or moving homes like we did recently, it is so easy just to uninstall it and reinstall it into your new home. Start drinking cleaner, healthier water today by scanning the QR code on the screen or click my link down below to get 55% off all systems, $49 and up, plus free shipping. Cheers. We got a stew to make. Oh my god. Good thing I worked out yesterday. The nice thing about a stew, everything just kind of gets smaller and melts right in the longer it cooks. And I forgot I had some potatoes downstairs, so we're gonna add those in. That's like a traditional thing that goes in a stew anyways, and it's gonna like melt all the flavors together. To a large pot, I'm just gonna add in some olive oil. I'm gonna let that finish heating up and then I'm gonna add in my beef first so I can sear it and get that nice caramelization on the sides, which is gonna add a lot of flavor to the stew. When I get them all spaced out evenly so they're spaced to brown, and you can just season it with a little salt and pepper. So I'm just gonna remove the meat. You can add in the onions and saute that with a little bit of tomato paste. And deglaze the pan, and then we'll add this back in with all the rest of the veggies. Normally, this is the stage where I would add in some red wine just to deglaze the pan, but if you don't wanna use red wine, you can also use a vinegar. I have balsamic here. You can also use like a red wine vinegar, and it's still gonna give you that flavor without the alcohol. It's just a little dash. And it's just gonna lift up everything at the bottom of the pan. I've got my mushrooms, my garlic. I don't add the garlic in right away in case it burns. Add in all your veggies, all the colors of the rainbow. Add some fresh thyme. You can use whatever fresh herbs you like. I think I'm just gonna add that in like that. You can season it now as well with any of your favorite seasonings. A little salt, pepper, a little paprika, and I always add a bay leaf. Add our meat and juices back in, either homemade or store-bought bone broth. I'm using beef. I'm just gonna give it a nice, good mix. Filtered water from our tap. I'm just gonna add a little bit more. You just want it to sit at the top so that nothing dries out, but more liquid's gonna come up as the veggies start cooking and releasing that. I'm gonna let that come to a boil and then bring it down to a simmer, and it's just gonna cook for a couple of hours, and it's gonna be ready for dinnertime. Adding in some frozen peas. I took out some of the liquid, and I'm gonna add in some arrowroot powder and just whisk that in. This is gonna help give our stew that glossy, thick consistency. We're gonna add this to the rest of it, and take out the thyme and the bay leaf. I'm gonna let it cook for a little bit longer to thicken, and then it'll be ready. I probably could've cut the cabbage a little smaller. I'm not gonna lie, but I'll just chop those up before serving it to him. It's the next day, and it's about Oakley's lunchtime, so I'm gonna heat up the stew, and I wanna show you how I actually serve it because I know you're probably like, how is a toddler gonna eat that stew? Let me show you. All right, I just heated up the stew. I'm gonna let it cool for a second. I'm gonna shred up the beef and deconstruct it a bit. Okay, I already have a plate here. I have some fruit on the side, and I'm basically gonna take some of the beef and just shred it up because it's been cooking for a long time. It's super tender. And sometimes I'll even add some of the sauce on top. Okay, then I'm gonna take some of the bigger veggies like the carrot and the potato, and I'm just gonna make sure that they are a good size for Oakley. And the peas, mushroom, and cabbage, I'm just gonna kind of mix into the meat. That way, he doesn't even know what's there. He'll just like want the meat. He's really been liking his food in bigger pieces lately, so I don't wanna cut it too small. And this is all super soft. I also don't wanna overcrowd his plate because if it looks overwhelming, he's gonna be like, absolutely not. I don't know what's on here, and say no to it all. Watch him actually not eat anything. He's in a full-on picky eater stage right now, so who knows what he's gonna eat. What the heck? Things shut down, things shut down. Good? Is that good? Yeah? This next one is my broccoli dino pesto. It's really easy. I just have some steamed broccoli ready to go that I just cooled off with some cold water. And then I have one of these little food processors, which I love for small jobs like this. This is just a really fun way to add new flavors into your kid's pasta instead of just doing the regular tomato sauce or butter noodles, which I know every kid loves. Pesto uses obviously basil as a star ingredient, which is gonna give a punch of freshness and flavor. You'll be surprised. Your kids might actually love it. So I have some basil, lemon. I got some fresh Parmigiano. Add garlic, olive oil, even hemp hearts. I love ways to add in extra nutrients that don't change the flavor of the dish. I love that there's already veggies built into this recipe. So I'm gonna add everything to my food processor, whiz it up, and get it into a nice, smooth consistency. I'm gonna actually just whiz it up for a second because it's a little full. Just break it down, make some room. That didn't do anything. We're gonna use some lemon juice and zest. I don't know if it's just my wonder world, but he loves to eat lemon straight up. Is it not sour for them? I don't know, but if he sees a lemon, he's like, give me, I need that. I added some olive oil, garlic, and now I'm just doing some salt and pepper. Get that all in there. Scrape the sides, and then you have that beautiful green pesto packed with veg and flavor. And then in the meantime, I'm gonna get some pasta cooking to mix with our pesto. I took half the recipe and I just filled it into these little heart silicone molds so I can freeze it, pop them out, and just have them ready to go when needed. I can even add it to some meat or something if I wanna do like pesto chicken. And then with the other half, I'm gonna actually just stir it into pasta for lunches this week, and it'll be fine in the fridge all week long. So next we're gonna be making my chewy go-go granola bars. These are such an easy, delicious granola bar recipe. Your kids are going to love them. Great for school, although if you wanna make them allergy-friendly, I would just swap out the peanut butter for a sunflower butter, something that is nut-free or safe for the school that your kids go to. But if your kid has allergies, I wanna introduce, this is the first time I'm talking about it, so I'm very excited. I have just created the allergy-friendly health nut cookbook for kids. We are doing pre-sale orders right now, so you can pre-order a copy. And when you pre-order a copy, you're actually gonna get a free copy of this recipe here, the allergy-friendly version of it, and you're gonna get early bird pricing and save 20% off. I was inspired to create this cookbook because of you guys asking me for allergy-friendly recipes. So all the recipes in this cookbook are free from the top nine food allergens. I spent months creating and developing the recipes that are in this book, because fun fact, creating baked goods that don't have eggs, gluten, everything in them is kind of hard, and also make it taste delicious and ones that your kids are gonna actually wanna eat, yeah, I did that for you, you're welcome. Go pre-order a copy down below. You're gonna get this granola recipe straight away to you, and then you're gonna save 20% off, and then you only have a few more weeks to wait for the actual copy of this e-book. I'm so excited just to finally be able to start talking about it. Yeah, I wanted to get it out sooner, but you know what, mom of two with a little guy, it's just a lot, and that's why we're meal-prepping and making life easier. So I'm really excited about this cookbook. I'm passionate about it. I have a niece and nephew with severe allergies. My little guy had a milk intolerance when I started breastfeeding, and all of that inspired this cookbook, which I am so excited to get in the hands of so many families that I know need these types of recipes in their home. Okay, enough chatting, let's make this recipe. It's really easy. You need a food processor, and basically a bunch of pantry staples. Once again, a ripe banana is gonna sweeten this all up and make it come together deliciously. I got the oven preheated. We're gonna add the oats and just pulse them a little bit. I like to do that with certain recipes because it just, it breaks them down a little bit, so they're actually chewier when they get baked, and they're not just like these big pieces of rolled oats. So we're gonna take our oats and just pulse them for about five seconds just to break them up a little bit. I like the texture it gives, and it's just gonna make them bake up faster in the oven, but also give them this really nice chewy texture. So in a separate bowl, I'm gonna mash up my banana, unsweetened applesauce, whatever nut or seed butter of your choice, and a dash of vanilla. Add in our oats and the rest of the dry ingredients. Unsweetened shredded coconut. Here I have some baking powder, salt, nutmeg, and cinnamon, chia seeds. I'm just gonna give that a mix. Once again, probably could've used a bigger bowl, but we're gonna make it work. I'm running out of dishes. For the dried fruit or mix-ins, you can really use whatever you want, like dried blueberries, cranberries, raisins. I'm using Medjool dates I've just pitted, and I'm finely chopping. You can also use chocolate chips. Like my four-year-old, I think, will eat anything with chocolate in it, so if I want her to eat some granola bars, add some chocolate. Transfer the mixture into a prepared eight-by-eight baking pan. I just have it lined with parchment paper. I even just like to use my hands and get it right to the edges. All right, I'm gonna pop these into the oven to bake until golden, and we got one more recipe, and my kids are very hungry for dinner, so we gotta do this quick. Guys, I just went through the dinner rush making sure both the kids were fed, and totally missed the timer for the granola bars. I'm lucky I didn't burn down the house. Let's just say that, but a little too crispy. They're not chewy anymore. They're not chewy granola bars. They're like crispy, very crispy. Okay, we're gonna have to remake these. I don't know, mom brain, it's a real thing. That's really annoying. Next day, this is what they're actually supposed to look like when they come out of the oven. All right, this is what they look like. I just chopped them up into little granola bars, and I'm gonna let them cool before I pack them up. Hopefully we'll have these as a little afternoon snack when he gets up from his nap. So this is a fruit sorbet I make all the time for my kids. It uses a variety of frozen fruit, which I love because that means I can make it anytime. In the recipe, I mentioned you can use a food processor, but you can also use a high speed blender. So if you have one of these big guys, you can definitely use it. This one is very well loved. You can tell because you can't even see through it, but I promise it's clean. I'm gonna throw everything in there. I also have this little tamper guy, and this is what's gonna help me mush it down because you don't wanna add too much liquid because you're gonna lose that ice cream consistency. My kids love to enjoy this straight as is, or we'll make little acai bowls and add fun toppings like hemp hearts, chia seeds, shredded coconut, even some fruit. You can really have fun with it, but I'm also gonna be making some popsicles. So I haven't actually made this recipe into popsicles, but I feel like it's gonna be fine. And my little guy's teething right now, so anything cold on his gums is gonna be really helpful. I love the shape of these because they're short and chubby, so they're really easy for babies to use. You don't have to worry about them breaking off. So we're gonna fill this up. Sage is probably gonna want hers just regular. They want what each other has all the time, so I'm definitely gonna make some extra popsicles for her to enjoy too. In a high-speed blender, I'm gonna add in all my frozen fruit, the yogurt, the milk, and then we are gonna blend for a while until we get that ice cream consistency, and when it comes together, it's like magic. It tastes honestly so good. This is the texture you want. It literally looks like fruit sorbet. That was delicious. My kids go crazy for this. It's like they've never had real ice cream, but they eat both, okay? 80-20 rule. I got my little ice cream scooper, and we're just gonna fill up our popsicle molds. We're gonna pop these into the freezer. Don't even, it's so messy. We haven't organized since we got back from Florida, but do not judge me. We're just gonna blur it so you can't see, but those are gonna freeze, and they'll be ready for tomorrow. And I'm gonna put the rest of it just in a container, and we can have this after dinner today. Okay, it gets into the freezer. All right, it's the next day, and I'm just gonna show you what they look like when they're frozen. They're like the perfect size. The amount that I set aside, we finished up for dessert yesterday, and you can just get one of these silicone molds on Amazon. I'll link them down below, but I'm gonna put these back in the freezer, and Oakley can also have these for his afternoon snack time. Ooh. You want that? I knew you were gonna see those. Ow. Oh, he just wants the big oatmeal, okay. And grabbing him water straight from the sink because I know it is filtered and clean. There you go. Oakley, thumbs up? Thumbs up. Don't forget to check out Aqua Sauna and their water filters. Like I said, we have the Clearum Direct Connect. I'm gonna link it down below. You can also scan the QR code on the screen. Get 55% off all systems, $49 and up, plus free shipping, and start drinking cleaner, healthier water today. Is that good? I'm thirsty. Where's my water? Cheers. That was a long prep day. Cheers.