Snack ideas for a fussy nearly two-year-old without spending a fortune

[Workinggreen]

Im spending a fortune on snacks for my almost 2 year old.

When she was 18m and under I used to make my own biscuits and oat bars sweetened with fruit and prep lots of things in advance. She’d also eat things like pita dipped in hummus, eggs, little pieces of meat or overnight oats with chia seeds or whatever else I put in front of her. I promise I wasn’t smug! and I knew this day would come and sure enough since she turned 18m she won’t touch any of that and just wants fruit, yogurt (but only from a pouch) and things like breadsticks.
I’m spending a fortune and half of it has little to no nutrition. She’s also low weight and I don’t want to stuff her up with things that aren’t nutritious, but if I offer for example homemade cakes or flapjacks (with no refined sugars) she won’t touch it so it’s better she eats something.

I see loads of recipes on social media but are there any your kid will actually eat? or what other snacks are you giving?

She doesnt need loads of snacks. That is probably why she is not eating her meals.

Why can’t she just eat main meals?

DS likes apple slices with a spoon of peanut butter. Crackers and cheese. Veg sticks with hummus or tzatziki. Sandwiches. Marmite, cream cheese, honey or mashed banana on toast, Greek yogurt.

What’s she like eating meals? Why do you think she’s gone off things she used to like? It’s not inevitable. I’ve never bought yogurt in pouches, it costs a fortune, so I’d stop buying it and offer her yogurt in a bowl and she can take or leave it.

I’m not absolutely convinced that non-refined sugar is any better than refined sugar to be honest.

Snacks my kids will reliably eat:

Fruit
Crackers and cheese
pitta bread and hummus or cream cheese
Scotch pancakes (sometimes homemade)
Hot cross bun / fruit toast
fruit yoghurt
greek yogurt with a tiny bit of jam
cheese omelette / scrambled eggs
banana bread (homemade)

Fruit is a perfectly good snack, if she'll eat that then just give her fruit. I don't think you need to get involved with oat bars and bread sticks etc. As you say they're of no real value nutritionally and she obviously isn't that hungry if she won't touch stuff she used to like.

You can buy reusable yoghurt pouches that you can fill yourself so you could try those. Also try putting the homemade stuff into a bag, put a sticker of her favourite character on it and ask if she wants 'Peppa Pig cake' or 'Bluey biscuits' or whatever.

But mostly, just don't worry about it. Offer her a snack and if she doesn't eat it she probably wasn't that hungry.

If she’s not eating snacks, don’t give her snacks.

Nhs guidance is to still give snacks
i never said she doesn’t eat her meals
and she does want snacks, she’s just being a bit fussy about them because she’s 2.
I don’t just offer lots of junk food, but I’m mostly just offering fruit and yogurt and I personally would be bored of that too, and I’d rather try some other ideas so she is being exposed to different food, even if she chooses not to eat it. I would like to try and find other things she’d actually like though, particularly anything protein filled as she could probably do with more of that in her diet.

thanks for the idea about the stickers and the yogurt pouches.

@NorthFacingGardener thanks fair point, I don’t really give any sugar. But I thought if I said she has no sugar but I use fruit in biscuits or she eats some prepackaged things like raisins or date bars, someone would be along to tell me fruit has sugar in. Thank you for the suggestions a few I’ve not tried

For snacks mine used to have....

cheese & crackers
cucumber/carrots/celery sticks with hummus
breadsticks/pitta with hummus
boiled eggs
crumpets
toast
scotch pancakes (there's some quite good homemade recipes online using banana as a base and you can add fruits in too)
fruit
yoghurt (does she like greek yoghurt?)
rice cakes
raisins
the odd breakfast bar or oat bar
quavers (bad I know shock horror I gave my kids crisps) 😱

They were also known to be passed a couple of digestive biscuits or a biscuit bar occasionaly too....

I totally understand you not wanting her to have too much sugar etc but I wouldn't stress yourself over it too much. All in moderation is fine mine at that age in a typical day would usually have in a day

Breakfast; porridge with some berries or banana
Snack: one of the above (depending how much they ate for breakfast)
Lunch: pasta usually with veggies
Snack: again something from the list usually a yoghurt and a couple of rice cakes
Dinner: what we were eating and yes it was sometimes the odd happy meal or abit of pizza with some cucumber sticks
Drinks: mainly milk and water but again yes I did let them have juice or the occasional fruit shoot too

You will work yourself into a stress over it and be hyper focused on food and this is not healthy for you nor your DD. Aim to go for 3 big balanced nutritional meals a day to ensure all food groups are inc and the snacks will be few and far between anyway I used to find much of the time mine would eat them just because they were there and not because they were hungry they are 10 and 7 now very active, very healthy and still have a varied diet (with occasional fussy periods thrown in for good measure and yes they still have the odd pizza or Mcdonalds because sometimes it just suits because life gets busy. :)

You can buy refillable yogurt pouches on Amazon. I fill them with Greek yoghurt and some blitzed fruit. It’s cheaper and a bit healthier

Mine’s really into raisins at 2 - she likes the tiny box and fishing them out.

Stop buying them. Give her yoghurt in a tub (or whatever ) and if she asks for a pouch say “there was none left in the shop 🤷🏻‍♀️”. If she is hungry she’ll eat it, if not let her go and play and offer same again if hungry .

She isn’t fussy - sugars and carbs are addictive - she wants what gives her a dopamine hit, she needs the habit broken and the only way is to stop offering those foods(easier said than done)

Don’t bother with snacks at all

Nuts? Raw veggies sticks? Dry cereal?

my usual go to and costs next to nothing.

Joe Wicks has some good recipes for sweetcorn, spinach and banana (!) muffins. Cheese scones with red pepper chopped in are another good one.

I'd cut the morning snack so she eats her lunch. Mid afternoon do greek yoghurt with peanut butter for lots of calories. Or do an early dinner instead of snacking and yoghurt as a snack before bed.

I had one who was super fussy so you do have my sympathy. My best advice is to stop the snacks or at least offer her fruit and if she refuses that, just assume she’s not hungry.

She might not like the fact that the UPFs have gone but if she’s NT she will get the hang of eating at mealtimes in a couple of days.

Oh ok, apologies. I thought it was just that under ones should not have snacks and over ones they could have snacks. Not that they should. Mine only had snacks when they had done something like swimming or we were out of a routine that day for some reason.

Sorry I think my title is misleading, I took the MN auto generate one. She isn’t fussy imo, but she’s more fussy than she used to be. I think it’s normal for toddlers to start to assert themselves a bit and start saying no but she did lose 2lbs when I was strict and said no to the things she wanted, and she couldn’t really afford to lose that weight so at this point Im not looking to take a hard line on this, just to find some other options to try.

So for snacks she used to eat things like chai pudding, egg muffins, pitta and hummus, homemade oat bars or homemade biscuits usually made with oat flour, mashed banana and yogurt or something. But now she won’t have any of that she just has fruit in between meals but she is hungry still.

I don’t think she’s just looking for junk food or sweet food because she really doesn’t get that, and even if I did add things like jam to toast instead of just butter, she doesn’t want that. I’ve also offered crisps and cake and she wasn’t really fussed for them.
she eats loads of fruit, she’ll try most things once but then not go back to it, at meal times she tries but doesn’t seem to like any meat or sauces, she doesn’t get much protein, she will try vegetables raw but she just chews them and spits them out.

Im not particularly worried about it but I don’t want to fall into a rut of offering either nothing (except fruit) because I think it’ll be rejected, or just giving things like breadsticks every day. If anyone had any recipes they used to make things at home I’m really interested to hear or just other snack ideas are great

I tried pancakes today though and they were a hit so thank you to the pp who suggested that.

You could add nut butters or cream cheese to the fruit slices or breadsticks?

I think you’re really overthinking it. At most she needs 2 snacks- morning and afternoon. She eats fruit. Give her a banana in the morning and an apple in the afternoon or whatever you happen to have in. Maybe a few breadsticks too of she’s particularly hungry. Those are cheap and readily available. It’s not like you need to bake oat cakes from scratch or cook pancakes twice a day to avoid UFPs and added sugar.

I know but she’s already eating fruit and is still hungry. I don’t want to just give breadsticks every day, if I can offer something more nutritionally dense.

I’m literally just asking for snack ideas rather than people’s opinions about if she needs snacks or not. Sorry if I didn’t make that clear.

Thanks I tried this a while ago and she didn’t like it but she was being more fussy then than she is now, so I’ll try this again

Soreen has always been a good snack for my toddler. Sugar content isn’t too high and its easy to pop in a box to take on the go

Does she like cheese? Cubes of cheddar or Gouda are a good snack. If she liked the pancakes and you want to get more protein into her, try ricotta drop scones. They are currently a big hit with my baby.