Healthy Valentine Recipes Your Kids Will Love

We love Valentine’s day at The Organic Cookery School. Partly because it often falls in our February half term (so extra time for kids’ baking classes!) and because it’s Lucy’s wedding anniversary (awww!) on the 14th.

So whether it’s a weekend or school hols activity, Valentine’s is a perfect time to get hands on in the kitchen with your little ones.

Here are some our our favourite health(ier) recipes for Valentine’s.

These raspberry yogurt mousse pots from Eats Amazing are super quick and lower sugar than your average dessert.

Peanut Butter fans will go crazy for Healthy Little Foodies  Raspberry Peanut Butter Freezer Bites     

More than Just Carrots have also rethought the Jammie Dodger, with a strawberry chia jam and wholemeal hazelnut biscuit.                                                                                                                            

Frozen strawberries work perfectly in these healthy Strawberry Breakfast Bites from My Kids Lick The Bowl with oats, coconut and sunflower seeds.

All About Kids have reinvented the traditional Jammie Dodger with raspberry chia jam. Yum!         

And if hummous is your thing, you can’t go wrong with this Beetroot Hummous recipe from Baby Gram

And Valentine’s is one time when breakfast balls needn’t just be for breakfast! Healthy Little Foodies’s Raspberry and Coconut ones look delicious and are perfect for little hands to roll.

Lucy and Clare over at The Happy Weaner have plenty of ideas for cute Valentine snacks

But one of our favourites has to be these super cute Valentine apple love bugs from Grace at Eats Amazing Who could resist?

We hope that’s given you a little inspiration for 14th February and we’d love to hear if you try any of the above.

Seven Healthy Halloween Treats to Make Your Kids Scream

The countdown to Halloween has started early for The Organic Cookery School, with themed sweet and savoury cookery workshops running all through October half term.

But for those of you planning parties at home, we’ve compiled some of our favourite healthier Halloween treats. They are super simple to make, so get the kids involved and enjoy the festivities.

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GHOULISH GREEN SMOOTHIES

What you need:                              

1 cup spinach  

2 kiwi fruit

½ cup white grapes

1 banana

What to do:

Peel banana and kiwi and add to blender with rest of ingredients. 

Add a cup of water and blend to desired consistency. 

Decorate cups or bottle with ghoulish googly eyes, and serve.

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STRAWBERRY GHOSTS

What you need:

Strawberries

Plain or vanilla yogurt

Choc chips or currants for eyes.

What to do:

Pour yogurt into a cup and dunk strawberries by their stem. 

Arrange on greaseproof paper and place in freezer for 5-10 minutes. 

Remove from freezer and repeat. 

After second dunk add chocolate chip or currant eyes.  

Refrigerate until ready to serve.

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SPOOKY NANAS

WHAT YOU NEED:

Bananas (halved)

Plain or vanilla yogurt

Dried coconut flakes

Chocolate chips 

WHAT TO DO:

Dunk banana halves in a tumbler of yogurt. Roll in coconut .

Stand on platter and add chocolate chip eyes. 

Refrigerate for at least 10 mins before serving

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SPIDERS ON LOGS

WHAT YOU NEED:

Peanut butter

Celery cut into 5 cm lengths

Plastic spiders

WHAT TO DO:

Using a small table knife, fill celery logs with peanut butter.

Decorate each log with a spider.

CHEESE MONSTERS

WHAT YOU NEED:

Babybel or similar

Googly eyes in various sizes

Small sharp knife

WHAT TO DO:

Carefully cut out funky monster teeth from wax outer. Decorate with googly eyes.

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CLEMENTINE PUMPKINS

WHAT YOU NEED:

Clementines or other easy peel citrus fruit

Black Sharpie

WHAT TO DO:

Draw pumpkin eyes, nose and mouth and leave to dry.

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POPCORN HANDS

WHAT YOU NEED:

Popcorn

Jelly sweets for fingernails

Clear food grade gloves

Loom bands or small tie to secure

WHAT TO DO:

Drop a jelly sweet in each finger, then fill gloves with popcorn. 

Make sure the popcorn fills each finger and secure with a loom band or small tie.

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We hope your little monsters scream with delight when they see what they are going to be making . And we’d love to hear your ideas too! Comment below with your favourite Halloween treats and recipes, we read every comment!

Every Halloween party bag or lunchbox needs a ghoulish joke or two! 
Enter your email below and we'll send you a free printable of our best ten spooky Halloween lunchbox jokes.  

Organic Week at Lidl - the ten ingredients we're stocking up on this week

We love Lidl  - they always stock a great range of organic and fairtrade goodies, and a couple of times a year they run their Organic Week promotions. This week is one of those weeks (running 3rd August to 9th August inclusive).

Here are out top ten storecupboard essentials to stock up on whilst on promotion.

Organic Grains:

 Organic Bulgur Wheat (£1.99 for 500g)

 Organic  Spelt (£1.99 for 750g)

 Organic  Buckwheat (£1.99 for 500g)

 Organic  Amaranth (£1.99 for 500g)

There's also this very affordable muesli, which works brilliantly in flapjacks, homemade granola  bars:

5) Organic  Wholegrain Muesli (£2.19 for 500g)

Next up organic pasta at just 99p for 500g. (Check out their basic organic tomato pasta sauce too)

Followed by three storecupboard bargains:

Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil (£2.99 for 500ml)

Organic Tomato Ketchup (£1.29 for 450ml)

Organic Coconut Oil (£3.99 for 500ml)

Add this to organic smoked salmon, tons of organic fruit and veg choices, eggs, milk, yogurt and more and you're sure to save a few pennies at Lidl this week.

What will you make?

BAKE IT OFF! Five ways to reduce exam (SATS) stress by Cooking with your Kids

It's SATS week for 10 and 11 year olds across the UK, and after months of practice tests at school, most Year 6 pupils are feeling pretty tense about this week. As a former primary school teacher, I'm feeling pretty aerated by the unnecessary pressure these tests put on our little ones (and they are still little!), so I've come up with some relaxing afterschool activities for my 11 year old. We've made slime, done cartwheels (her not me!), played on a giant piano in the garden, and next up it's cooking.  

But why cooking? Well obviously I'm biased, but of all the downtime activities I can rustle up with little effort and expense, this hits a lot of positive buttons. And guarantees smiles (lots of them!)

Here are my five top tips:

1. Choose a recipe: planning the recipe together is an important stage - leaf through some cookery books or browse some blog posts/pinterest for easy, tested recipes which appeal. Ask them to make an ingredient list and read it out whilst you check which ingredients you already have/need to get in. This teaches your child about planning and prep and builds the excitement about the time you are going to spend cooking together. Result - #buildsexcitement - and give them something to look forward to.

2. Stress can inhibit appetite - which in turns affects performance and concentration. Baking something delicious together will relax your child and stimulate their appetite. I’d recommend a healthy failsafe muffin or batch of wholefood cookies (see examples below) - sneak in some veggies or dried fruit for added fibre (as stress can affect digestion too). Other great ingredients for exam time are oats, eggs, and seeds. Result - #feelingnourished

3. Set aside time - cooking together is quality time that can’t be rushed (please don’t rush it or you’ll defeat the object) and illustrates you want to spend time with them and you value their company. Result - #feelingvalued  - another great stress buster

4. Cooking is social and, when shared, involves teamwork, taking turns and collaborating. Decide together who is doing what, and make sure they know which jobs they are solely responsible for (and if you veer towards control freakery, hold back and let them do it themselves!). Result -  #feelingindependent - and elevating the importance of non academic skills

5. Cookery is a sensory, tactile and whole brain experience - and will help balance out the exhaustion many children feel during test week. They’ll use the left part of their brain following instructions, and weighing and measuring, the right for creative flourishes, and evaluating tastes, smells, textures and how the experience makes them feels. Result - #feelingbalanced

Try it out - even as an end of week treat.

I can’t wait to hear how you get on. I guarantee smiles and happier, relaxed kids!

Here are some recipe ideas to get you going.

Any tips you'd like to share on how to relax and restore balance in your kids' lives? Comment below, I'd love to hear from you. And if you enjoyed this post, please share.