To ask what snacks you feed constantly hungry kids?

Bananas baked with a drizzle of honey, served with natural yoghurt, cucumber, celery, carrots with cottage cheese, cream cheese, peanut butter or hummus. Homemade sugar free cookies (I sweetened mine with figs and a bit of honey), mini tortillas (put egg and veg mix into muffin cases and oven cook)
King prawn lettuce wraps. (They can assemble them with other veggies), and one from my youth, cheese and pineapple squares!

I tell mine first to drink a glass of water - often thirst is mistaken for hunger. If still hungry then the go-to is peanut butter & jam sandwiches on granary/seeded bread - mine learned at age 8 to make their own with sliced bread and a butter knife without making a big mess in the first lockdown when DH and I were trapped on zoom calls. Apple, satsuma or a banana on the side.

Big plate of sliced veg and hummus, peppers, cukes, carrots, raw cauli, raw broccoli, raw mushrooms. I don't see the last three offered raw in the UK so often but they are a standard crunchy raw veg in the USA.

I also still do a once a week seeded muffins (often a "morning glory" style with grated carrots, pumpkin and sunflower seeds) or a homemade loaf bake of some kind for the mid-afternoon dip - usually banana but I have also done yoghurt blueberry, marmalade, seed cake, and homemade malt loaf with bran flakes (my MIL's recipe). To each I add extra nuts, seeds, wheat germ etc to make a bit more than just cake.

If the kids say they don't fancy a piece of cake then they must just be bored, not hungry!!

DS1 at age 12 is increasingly making instant ramen as a snack but I showed him videos of how Japanese people add ham, boiled egg and vegetables to theirs and now he adds all those to make it more than just white carbs in an MSG broth!

Cold beans- never ending amounts of cold baked beans.

crisps (but he has to eat a high salt diet, otherwise you probably wouldn’t give loads)

My son is always hungry atm. He has babybels, bananas, crackers with cream cheese, grapes, oat bars.
He's not overweight and must be having a growth spurt.

An orange. You can even have a ‘who can get the most skin off in one peel’ competition, and they take a long time to eat. A big juicy orange is my go to snack. Sadly, it is also my DS favourite snack, so by the time I get to the fruit bowl they’re often gone.

It varies. We are in the process of not giving an afternoon snack at the moment. We found that they weren't hungry enough for dinner and were refusing anything new and then moaning they were hungry at bedtime. We couldn't push dinner any further back because they both prefer early bedtimes. So for morning snack I try and make it protein heavy so I can push lunch back slightly. Usually offer cream cheese and breadsticks or unflavoured greek yoghurt with chopped up nuts and seeds.

Carbs aren’t going to fill them.

Protein should be your focus. Eggs, sausage, cheese etc.

Not popcorn! Don’t give popcorn to under 5s as there is a real serious risk of aspiration!

I bought some bento box style lunchboxes and fill them up each morning with a rotation of the following (making sure that there is good balance of proteins / carbs / fat etc)

Breadsticks / cream crackers / rice cakes / water biscuits / mini pita bread etc

Hummus / sweet potato and red lentil pate / pea and mint purée / dollop of nut butter / etc

Cucumber / avocado slices / quartered cherry tomatoes etc

Various cheeses

Chopped fruit (both fresh and dried eg dates / mango strips)

Natural yoghurt or cottage cheese etc with hemp seeds / ground up nuts sprinkled on, or a boiled egg

Leftover chicken / lamb etc, tuna mayo or deli meats

(You can find some inspiration for these if you google 'bistro box ideas')

This also means that if we decide to leave the house spontaneously I can bring the whole box with me and have constant grazing snacks on the go.

I also find a home made smoothie a day helps too (and is a good way of getting some random greens or blended nuts or other non-toddler foods in) and can also be stored / taken out.

(I have two toddler grazers so have invested quite some time into this 😆)

Cheese and crackers (wholemeal), carrot sticks and peanut butter on toast. Or toasted cheese.

Pot noodles

Mine eat more fruit and veg if they are cut up in sticks in the fridge. Same with cheese - cut it into sticks.

Mine eat tonnes of crackers. One dc has peanut butter, the other plain.

Cereal

Pancakes- type buy in packets

Tubs jelly

If they aren't eating meals. I'd make up a plate of snacks for each kid and stick them in the fridge. Then roughly know what they have ate

-Beetroot melty buttons

• balsamic and beetroot rice cakes

It varies- my 2 year old has started grabbing my hand to take me to the kitchen to show me what he wants

Just a caveat he eats 3 decent meals a day, if he didn't the snacks would be reduced

DS (5) is a bottomless pit nursery suggested bigger snacks that include a whole grain carb, protein and a fruit/veg eg wholemeal toast with nut butter and banana sliced on top, humous, carrot sticks and mini pitta, he also likes babybel, a few crackers and apple slices, we also still give him full fat milk to drink several times a day, he eats like a horse but he's on the lower end of healthy BMI and very active/lots of sports clubs so I'm conscious to make sure he's getting enough fuel type food. We also make banana bread with just mashed bananas, eggs, butter, flour, baking powder and a splash of milk/water, sometimes I put nut butter in, other times cinnamon and a few sultanas a slice of that and some full fat yogurt goes down a treat after school and before gymnastics. He also has free access to the fruit bowl anytime

If they will only eat little and often (so from the sound of it, they aren't having a full meal at meal times) then it's even more important to make sure the snacks are healthy and along the lines of what they're missing from a full meal. IE, veg like carrot sticks, protein such as hummus or eggs, hearty filling carbs such as oatcakes etc.

You say the biscuits are disappearing at an alarming rate- I'd definitely not be offering biscuits until they'd eaten enough proper food. Often snackers opt for snacking because the snacks being offered are the more desirable fun foods.

I agree re: snacking in general but there are times when children are having growth spurts where their appetite goes crazy.

For example when my son was a mid-late teen he was perpetually hungry (never overweight). Had a good breakfast at home, plus homemade substantial pack up and evening meal. He still needed food more regularly. He just needed a lot of fuel for being very active and a big growth spurt.

So I just tried to make sure we had things that were healthy. Those nigellla bars were a godsend in terms of cost and keeping him satiated.

Place marking for my very fussy 3 and 4 year old

Breadsticks, popcorn, cheese and crackers, carrots and hummus, olives, apple and peanut butter, smoothies,flapjack

Don't fill them up with refined carbs, like biscuits and bread, as they will be hungry again shortly afterwards. Instead give higher fat and higher protein foods such as cheese, nuts, avocado, beans etc.

Bananas, ALL the berries, bread sticks, rice cakes, crackers with cheese, cucumber sticks, slices of ham with grated cheese inside rolled up, crusty bread and butter, small bowl of cereal, yogurt with honey, leftover cooked chicken/fridge raider type things.

I find my kids are most "satisfied" aka willing to be done eating and not just eat for the sake of it if they have something decent and then a small biscuit after like a custard cream or something. Then they've had something sweet they feel "done" so they usually get a biscuit or two after lunch and then a couple of these other snacks in between.

They are quite fussy though but I've come to know what they like.

Egg in a cup (soft boiled egg mashed in a cup with a knob of butter and salt and pepper) Scottish childhood staple 😋

Cold tuna pasta

Yoghurt and berries

Apple slices with peanut butter

We use homemade flapjacks/cereal bars.

Pancakes are quick and easy to make (flour,egg,milk really) with some bannana and fruit on. You can freeze an additional ones if you make too much mix then a quick warm up of one through the week.

I do the same with porridge once it's done on the hob, serve one serving then put the rest in a few little tubs with an extra splash of milk in then you can reheat for brekkie or supper with some blueberries or strawberry or honey

Breadsticks with humous, cucumber, hard boiled egg or apple.

Our DS used to like ham rolled up with cheese In the middle as a snack or part of little nibbles at snack time

Hot cross buns, ham sandwiches, sausage rolls, Grapes, raisins, anything my son will eat tbh