How to Get 5+ A Day Every Day
Our practical tips will provide some great ideas on how to incorporate 5+ A Day into every snack and meal.
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Breakfast Ideas
- Grate an apple or pear into porridge, mix mashed banana or other fruit puree through cooked porridge.
- Slice bananas into cereal. Try adding peaches, berries and kiwifruit when in season
- Freeze bananas and blend with low fat milk, yoghurt or fruit juice to make a smoothie. Peaches, berries, apples, pears and kiwifruit also work well
- Slice tomatoes, cooked mushrooms or bananas onto wholemeal toast
- Add chopped vegetables like peppers, onion, broccoli, spinach, mushrooms or tomatoes to omelettes or scrambled eggs
- Spread peanut butter on wholemeal bread and roll it around a banana
- Add peaches, apples, berries or bananas to your pancakes or pikelet batter
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Lunch Ideas
- Load sandwiches up with vegetables: grated carrot, capsicum, sliced mushrooms and spinach
- Spread avocado on your sandwiches instead of butter
- Prepare sliced cucumber, lettuce, sprouts, tomato wedges and grated carrots for your family to make their own wraps, sandwiches and subs
- Mix chopped fruit such as kiwifruit, apples, pears and oranges with low fat yoghurt. Young children tend to eat more fruit when it is chopped up
- Add diced carrots, corn, silverbeet, onions and tomatoes to chop suey for a colourful lunch
- Make home made salsa with tomatoes, mangos, avocados, red onion, coriander and lime juice. Use as a dip or sandwich filling
- Fill vegetarian sushi with avocado, finely sliced carrots, red peppers, cucumber and silverbeet
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Dinner Ideas
- Stir chopped or grated vegetables such as carrots, courgettes, beans, spinach, silverbeet, puha, potatoes and kūmara through mince dishes, soups, casseroles, rice and pasta dishes
- When making mashed potatoes boil some cauliflower, parsnip or brussels sprouts with your potatoes and mash together for a tasty change.
- Pile diced tomatoes, onion, mushroom, broccoli, green and red peppers onto homemade or frozen pizza before cooking
- Add lettuce, spinach, pineapple, tomato, beetroot slices and grated carrot to home-made burgers
- Boil up a hearty soup with left over hangi or roast dinner vegetables
- Stew apples and serve with pork or chicken
- Try mashing kūmara, pumpkin, carrot, broccoli or yams with potato
- Add layers of spinach or silverbeet into a lasagne
- Mix grated pumpkin or cooked pureed cauliflower into soups or casseroles. It thickens them and adds a touch of sweetness
- Heat leftover vegetables and serve as a topping for toast or pizza
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Dessert Ideas
- Prepare a colourful fruit platter for dessert for your family to share – include chopped pineapple, orange wedges, apple quarters, mangos, papaya, grapes, bananas and more
- Bake apples, pears or bananas for a healthy dessert
- Thread chopped fruit onto skewers for a colourful kebab
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Snack Ideas
- Keep a bowl of fruit on the counter for snacking on the run
- Prepare “grab and go” snacks in small plastic bags in the refrigerator. Use cut up carrots, celery, cucumber, peppers, orange segments and grapes. Store at eye level
- Offer carrot, courgette, red and green pepper and celery sticks to children for snacks with dips such a hummus, salsa or low fat cottage cheese
- Blend or mash bananas, berries, plums or peaches and freeze in ice trays with one tooth pick in each to make a summer snack
- Dice or grate onion, carrot, courgette, potato and corn into savoury muffin or pikelet mixture
- Serve vegetable sticks or whole grain pita bites with a salsa made with fresh tomatoes, red onion, garlic and herbs
- Make oven-baked wedges using sliced potatoes, carrots, kūmara, parsnips, beetroot and serve with your favourite chutney
- Use raw or cooked vegetables as a base for hors d’oeurves. Try salmon on cucumber slices, ricotta and herbs in button mushrooms or mini baked potato halves
- Bite-sized pieces of cooked vegetables like potatoes, kūmara, yams and pumpkin make great snacks for kids
- Freeze unused fruit or vegetables in individual bags and use when you are making smoothies
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Lunchbox Ideas
Snacks
- Cherry tomatoes
- Baby carrots and chopped cucumber with hummus
- Sliced capsicum
- Celery with cream cheese or peanut butter
- Banana and apple cut up in yoghurt
- Mandarins
- Strawberries and blueberries
- Pineapple chunks
- Whole fruit – pears, apples, stonefruit
Fillings for sandwiches, wraps, pita pockets
- Avocado, grated carrot and marmite
- Banana and peanut butter
- Cucumber, mint and low-fat cream cheese
- Lettuce and mashed hard-boiled egg
- Coleslaw and cheese
Try these for something different
- Home made pizza slice with mushroom, capsicum, onion and spinach
- Potato frittata with cheese, tomato, corn, grated courgette and onion
- Sushi with avocado and cream cheese
Tips for parents
Finding creative ways to encourage your children to eat and enjoy fruit and vegetables can be fun for the entire family:
- Let children choose which fruit and vegetables to serve and how to incorporate them into their favourite meals
- Eat lots of fruit and vegetables yourself. Children will model their eating habits on what they see you eat
- Breakfast is an important meal of the day. Try adding sliced banana, grated apple or pear to porridge or cereal. Peaches, berries and kiwifruit add great variety when in season
- Serve fruit and vegetables at every meal. You can add grated or cut vegetables into entrees, side dishes, pizzas and soups
- Keep trying: For some foods, it may take multiple times before a child acquires a taste for it
- Don’t force children to eat things – this will create negative associations and discourage them from trying again in the future
- Don’t reward your children with food
- Keep a bowl of fresh fruit on the counter. Refrigerate cut up fruit and vegetables in small containers for easy snacks on the run
- Try feeding different textures of fruit and vegetables to your child. Some children prefer smooth food, whereas others like lumpy, and some children like crisp foods, but others like soft
- Offer new fruit and vegetables in combination with old favourites to show your child a variety of smells, textures and colours
- Kids are turned off to trying new foods if the smell, flavour, or colour is not appealing to them. It may be more appealing to a child if fruit or vegetables are served raw
- Involve your child in shopping for fruit and vegetables and encourage them to select something new or unusual for the family to try
- Raise children’s interest in fruit and vegetables by growing some in your garden (or in pots). Strawberries and carrots are favourites and are easy to grow
- Try freezing pieces of bananas and grapes for a summer treat