Children's Birthday Parties - Healthy Style

Even if you stick to healthy eating principles most of the time for yourself and your children, it's harder to keep this up when it comes to giving a birthday party for your child. Most party food is a dietary nightmare, but you still want your child to have "treat food" that makes the party special. What are you going to do?

Some experts say that you should take some time off the diet - after all, a birthday doesn't happen every day and if you're eating healthily the rest of the time, one day of not-so-good food won't be the end of the world. There's something to be said for this point of view, as it does make for less stress for a parent, especially as kids' parties take enough organising as it is. Another school of thought suggests that you should try to stick to your healthy eating plan, presenting healthy treat foods (they exist). If this sounds like something you'd like to try, or if you'd like to take the halfway option of having mostly healthy foods but with a few "baddies" thrown in, the following suggestions may come in handy:

Instead of:

Saveloys/cocktail sausages

Potato crisps/chips

Sweets

Regular ice cream

Bright coloured fizzy drink

Try this:

Grilled chicken wings or nibbles

Oven baked spicy potato wedges (easy enough for a 10-year-old to make)

Mixed nuts, salted or unsalted

Dried fruit (apricots, raisins, cranberries) and chocolate, preferably dark

Frozen yoghurt (ordinary yoghurt thrown into the freezer overnight will do)

Plain lemonade or mineral water mixed with fruit juice or chilled herbal tea (peppermint's popular)

You can also try these healthy party foods:

raw vegetables and bread sticks dipped into hummus or guacamole

fruit kebabs in a chocolate fountain (dark chocolate, of course)

old-fashioned cubes of cheese stuck on a toothpick with a square of pineapple

mousetraps (slices of bread spread with Vegemite and a slice of cheese and popped under the grill; chutney or slices of tomato can substitute for the Vegemite)

garlic bread, preferably home made and/or wholemeal

cherry tomatoes

a salad of edible flowers - popular with little girls

It's probably a good idea to make the cake yourself. You'll probably want to ice it, which means food colouring and icing sugar (but you can get away with decorating a cake with plastic animals, if you have a good imagination, or with edible flowers). You can control the flour and the other ingredients that go into the cake and icing (e.g. instead of butter or margarine in the batter, you can use rice bran oil).

If you are throwing a party with a theme, you can try to include healthy foods that fit the theme. For a Western/cowboy party, baked beans fit the theme (chilli optional, except among older boys who want to take a dare). Edible flowers suit a princess or fairy theme, while an animal themed party can include foods that the animal would eat (e.g. carrots and apples for horses, meatballs made of mince for cats, dogs and tigers).


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Find more tips about child rearing and healthy eating at Friday's Child Montessori (Created using Semantic Writer - SEO for real readers, not robots).