I know some parents who complain about the pickiness of their children when it comes to diet. I haven’t much had that problem with my son. But perhaps that’s because I introduced him to a whole variety of foods right from the beginning.
I also didn’t give him much choice. He ate what my wife and I prepared and if he got “full” i.e. didn’t like it, then he was allowed to leave the table. However, there was a caveat. If he was hungry later he’d get his same plate of dinner to finish. I think this is in large part the reason to his enjoyment or at least tolerance of many of the “yucky” foods like brussels sprouts.
Now don’t start with yer bellyaching that this is child abuse or I’ve just created an eating disorder. Not at all. The servings were modest and large enough to fill you. So cleaning the plate was not going to create excess calories.
And more than that I’d only give hime a handful of brussels sprouts for example.
Let me put it more plainly. I love brussels sprouts. I eat them often as a side dish plain. I think picky eating is a learned trait. In that kids get away with it early on and continue to embrace it as a power struggle with their parents.
Anyway, this is not about how to raise vegan children nor is it about my philosophical ideas on raising vegetarian children either. What I actually want to offer you today is some easy vegan kid’s meals that are quick to prepare and that most kids will love, even the picky vegan kidliwinks out there.
Let’s start with a warm up round of vegan recipes for kids that are easy.
- Bread with PB & J
- Bread with marmite (if you’re in the UK it’s got vitamin B12 too – though folks are picky about marmite – I love it)
- Toast with jam
- Vegan nutella sandwich
- Vegan sandwich of mixed greens, tomato, vegan mayo, vegan deli slices and some vegan cheese
- Sandwich with strawberry jam and vegan cheddar cheese (trust me, this is delicious)
- Baked beans on toast
- Vegan tuna salad sandwich
- Sandwich of any nut butter and maple syrup
- Vegan ALT (Avocado, lettuce and tomato)
- The sandwich I call the vegan A.P.B. (All Points Bulletin or Avocado, chopped Peanuts, sliced Bananas)
- The vegan BLT (fried vegetarian bacon, mustard, mayo and friend mushrooms all piled high on a bun, sandwich or bagel)
And with all of the above you can get creative if you have cookie cutters and cut out the sandwiches into monster shapes and all sorts of fun things.
That’s 12 different sandwiches that I’ve tried and I love them all. The key is to play around with ingredients. Experiment. Food should be fun and vegan food especially. There’s not yucky blood and guts to mess things up and poison anyone with salmonella and his ill begotten friends like E.coli etc.
Use rye bread, whole wheat bread, multi grain buns, everything bagels, sprouted grain bread, crisp bread crackers and on.
Vegan nutella chocolaty butter spread
This tastes better than the real thing. I kid you not. The key to making this as smooth and creamy as the real thing is in your food processor. Did you cheap out? Then this vegan nutella will still taste great but it won’t be creamy, it will be a little more gritty.
1.5 cups roasted hazelnuts
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup confectioners sugar
0.25 cups cocoa powder
0.25 cup canola oil
0.25 cup plain soy milk
Add the hazelnuts to your food processor and blend until it is as smooth and creamy as your food processor will likely get it.
Then add the rest of the goodies and keep blending until the whole mixture of vegan nutella butter is smooth and creamy. If you need to add more liquid, add in tablespoons of soy milk until the consistency is how you like.
Your kids will love this chocolaty spread… Mom, can I have more please.
Other vegan kids recipes include vegan mac n’ cheese with the recipe below. Perhaps one of the most loved vegan meals for kids of all time. You can also offer up vegan chicken tenders with plum source and mashed potatoes and corn. That seems to be a big fan favourite amongst vegan children.
Snacks like apple slices with maple syrup are healthy and yummy. As is what I call pirate’s booty. Coins of sliced banana with a dollop of nut butter and a drizzle of maple syrup.
Oh no, the vegans have hacked into the cheese aka vegan mac n’ cheese
Some of the vegan recipes out there and this includes those for vegan mac n’ cheese are obtuse and unrepentantly difficult to reproduce. As I mentioned earlier in my vegan Christmas recipes post, I want to make vegan cooking easy. No need to have your certificate from Cordon Bleu in order to cook great tasting vegan meals.
Okay, so I’ve got 2 easy recipes for vegan mac n’ cheese depending on how you wanna roll.
Version 1
1 cup shredded cheddar Daiya
1 cup plain soy milk
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp onion powder
2 to 3 Tbsp all purpose flour
salt and pepper to taste
Okay, no macaroni? WTF? Seriously, I shouldn’t have to tell you how to cook macaroni, follow the instructions on the package 😉 This is for the sauce.
Chuck everything into a saucepan over medium heat and stir consistently until it is all smooth and creamy and has a thick gooy texture like syrup. Add extra flour if consistency is not as thick as you’d like. Sprinkle in the flour a teeny bit at a time as you stir so that it mixes fully into the sauce.
Spill over your macaroni and enjoy.
Version 2
This is for those of you who want to make vegan mac n’ cheese the old school way with nutritional yeast.
0.5 cup nutritional yeast flakes
0.33 cup of all purpose flour
1.5 cups of plain soy milk
1 Tbsp soy sauce
0.5 tsp garlic powder
0.5 tsp onion powder
0.25 tsp paprika
sprinkling of basil and oregano if you’d like
salt and pepper to taste
Toss everything into the saucepan except hold back about 0.5 cup of soy milk. Stir over medium heat until you reach the desired thickness. If it is getting too thick add in some of the soy milk you held back.
Serve piping hot over cooked macaroni.
Please mum, can I have some more?