Healthy Valentine-themed potlucks are easy with 2 kitchen accessories: bamboo kabob sticks and uniquely shaped stainless steel cookie cutters. If you have these tools leading up to school celebrations during the holidays, you have empowered yourself to easily create uniquely themed snacks for parties that kids will love. More importantly, you’ve ensured that the more convenient last minute scramble to whip up something kids will love can be healthy! As parents we know food presentation is important and with these easy tips, children won’t miss or notice the traditional chocolate, cupcake, and candy options are missing.

Bamboo kabob sticks:

Kids will eat almost anything on a stick and kabob sticks are great in the classroom to avoid kids dipping their hands into snack bowls. With flu and colds going through schools, having kids just pick up a stick to eat already portioned fruit or veggies is an added bonus! You can either stick with Valentine complimentary coloured fruit on the Kabob – purple grapes, watermelon, cantaloupe, strawberries, etc. or veggie kabobs of tomatoes, peppers, and radish. Kids love to eat from a stick so why not load it up with healthy options? You also eliminate allergy concerns by bringing fresh produce and the teacher will thank you for not supplying energetic children with the not-so-lovely after affects of artificial colorants and sugar. These fruit kabobs shown by Parents.com show how cute fruit on a Popsicle stick can be! Photo credit: Parents.com

Shaped cookie cutters:

Looking at the above heart shaped melon leads us to the next fun and budget friendly Valentines kitchen accessory – heart shaped cookie cutters. If you’re desperate, just dig through your play dough shape cutters…. you’ll probably find a heart! If you have time, source a stainless steel cutter in a few different sizes, but go pretty small for fruit and veggies; a larger heart shaped cutter could be used for packing sandwiches on the 14th.  Other awesome heart-shaped healthy snacks are cucumbers (pictured below), melon, and apples. Stamp out your heart using the cookie cutter and the presentation will have kids flocking to your plate of heart shaped snacks. Photo Credit: Workman Family Blog

Free hand more your style? Use your creative skills to cut up cherry tomatoes with toothpicks to create cupid’s bow. Photo credit: Eye Candy

With many of the fruit options not being currently in season, bringing fresh produce might not be the most budget-friendly option but you are buying yourself quick convenience (think of the time and mess to create cupcakes) and you can’t put a price on healthy snacks and food. So on Feb 13th, when your child casually mentions they need to bring a dish for the classroom party the next day, don’t even bat an eye – sticks, stainless steel cutters and fruit to the rescue!