F is for Food Revolution Day 2015

I love Food Revolution Day and the aims of the movement. Unfortunately this year the three foot cooks and myself didn't get time to participate on the Friday. The girls' school had other celebrations planned for the day and by the time we got home we were all really tired.

I didn't want to miss it completely though so we went ahead and made the Oat and Raisin cookies on the weekend. Jamie Oliver's original recipe is gluten free but since we don't have any food intolerances in our house we made the cookies using regular flour.

If you like biscuits and cookies with oats in them you could also try our Anzac Biscuits recipe.

Oat and Raisin Cookies

Original recipe Gluten Free Oat & Raisin Cookies from Food Revolution Day

Makes 25

Ingredients

100 grams unsalted butter
1/2 cup caster sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1/4 cup milk
1 2/3 cup plain (all purpose) flour
1 teaspoon bicarb soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 cup raisins
2 cups rolled oats

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC and line 2 baking trays with non stick baking paper.
2. Melt the butter in the microwave or in a small saucepan over a low heat.  Leave to cool for a few minutes.

3. In a large bowl, mix together the sugars.

4. Pour in the melted butter and stir well.

Bear practising cracking eggs.

5. Add the egg and milk to the sugars and mix well.

6. Sift the flour, bicarb soda and cinnamon into the bowl and stir to combine.

7. Mix in the raisins and rolled oats.

8. Place heaped spoonfuls of the mixture onto the lined trays leaving a 4cm gap between each one.

9. Flatten each biscuit slightly with your fingers.

10. Bake for about 15 minutes or until golden brown and crisp.

11. Transfer to a wire cooling rack and leave to cool.

12. Enjoy for afternoon tea.

T is for Tiny Biscuits

Tiny things always seem to be a hit with children.  Tiny pet toys, tiny lego pieces, tiny fairies and tiny dolls are popular in our household.

Bee and Bear also love the small packets of even smaller biscuits for a snack.

And while they are cute and convenient, the biscuits do work out to be quite expensive when packaged like this. Besides, with only a few biscuits in each packet they don't last very long.

I knew I needed to find a homemade version that I could package up myself to include in the girls' kindy lunchboxes.

Amanda from One Crafty Mum has this recipe for Homemade Tiny Teddy Biscuits on her blog and that is what we used for our tiny biscuits. We don't have a thermomix which is what Amanda used to make this recipe.  She does suggest that the recipe would work with a mixer or a bowl and spoon so we used our stand mixer.

We added 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder in with the flour to make tiny chocolate biscuits.  And because I am impatient I didn't bother putting the dough in the fridge for an hour.  The weather was reasonably cool the day we made these and the biscuits turned out fine.  But if I was to make them in summer I would definitely rest the dough in the fridge for a while.

To make the dough for the Tiny Biscuits, I creamed the butter and sugar.  Then I mixed in the egg,  vanilla, flour and baking powder.

Once it was all mixed well, we turned the dough out onto the lightly floured bench, rolled it out and starting cutting out our shapes.  We don't have a tiny teddy shaped biscuit cutter so I searched through the girls playdough cutter collection and came up with small bear, small elephant, small duck and small dog shapes.  After a good wash in hot, soapy water the cutters were ready to use.  If you want to buy a tiny teddy cutter Amanda has links in her post.

L is for Love Your Lunchbox

Now that Bear and Bee attend kindy I have decided to dedicate every Friday on our blog to Loving Your Lunchbox.  Lunchboxes and their contents can be the cause of much frustration in many households.

What goes in the lunchbox, what's not allowed in and what comes home uneaten can all be problematic and as Kylie from Octavia and Vicky said in her post on School Lunchbox Ideas 

"Then just when you think you’re on to a winner, your lovely child decides that they now hate their favourite lunch box choices."

There is a lot of information about lunchboxes and what to put into them available on the internet, so I will be endeavouring to bring you the best of these each Friday.  We will also be trying out some new recipes and some old favourites too of lunchbox foods that kids can help make.  And by bringing these ideas to you on a Friday hopefully you will have a chance to add some things to your shopping list, try out some new ideas on your kids over the weekend and get those lunchboxes organised for the next week.

To start this new weekly series off, here's a few of the recipes on our blog that would be great for lunchbox fillers.

Weetbix Slice

Chocolate Raspberry Muffins

Savoury Muffins

Vegie and Cheese Puffs

Anzac Biscuits

Popcorn

Plus, here is two more good ideas for lunchboxes.

I like this printable of 20 Lunch Box Snack Ideas from Christie at Childhood 101.  It's a great idea to print the list and hang it inside your pantry door.

If you want a lunchbox menu plan for the week go and have a look at Momables.  MOMables is a kid friendly family meal plan that tackles school lunch and family dinner. It helps parents feed their kids a variety of meals they will love. Members receive 2 family sized meals (perfect for dinner) and 3 single lunch ideas. 

Click on the link above or the Momables image in our sidebar to check out the website.

What does your child like in their lunchboxes?

L is for Lemonade

Bear eager to make lemonade.

Hubby brought home some extra large lemons recently which meant I could fulfil Bear's desire to make lemonade.  I am not sure where she saw homemade lemonade but Bear was adamant that we make some.

The recipe for making lemonade is super simple.  I would recommend you have a look at this Simple Homemade Lemonade Recipe from Learning4Kids if you want to try making some yourself.

 And to compliment the lemon theme I have gathered together these great lemon related activities.

If your kids are keen to organise a lemonade stand, have a look at this list of 10 Lemonade Stand Ideas from Crystal & Co.

I can't wait to try this Lemonade Pretend Play with Scented Sensory Rice from Twodaloo.  Just have to buy some lemon jelly crystals.  While you are there check out their lemon slide painting post.  I think the magical lemon paint would be cool to try with Bear and Bee.

These Strawberry Lemonade Popsicles from Makeovers & Motherhood sound delish.

How about making some Lemonade Scones for afternoon tea with this recipe from Learn with Play at Home.

A Moment in Our World made Lemonade in a Bag which can be done all by the kids (maybe not cutting the lemons though).

B-inspired Mama created Lemonade in Winter Preschool Activities to go with the book Lemonade in Winter by Emily Jenkins.  If you are interested in this book you might like to purchase a copy through my Fishpond Affiliate store.

***This post contains Affiliate links.***

T is for Travel Tucker and Our First Giveaway!

tucker
1 [mass noun] Australian/NZ • informal Food: what’s the best tucker for setting you up for a job?

[ early 19th century: derivative of British English slang tuck 'consume food or drink'] {Source: "tucker." oxforddictionaries.com. 2014. http://www.oxforddictionaries.com (11 June 2014).}

With kids on school holidays, or soon to be, many of us will be embarking on long trips either by car, train or plane.  The right tucker, or food, is an essential requirement to help these trips go as smooth as possible. So to help with my planning (we are going camping up the coast), and yours, I have collected some great ideas on food for children while travelling.

To help celebrate the school holidays, I have joined with some other great bloggers from the Kids Blogger Network to have three $500 cash cards to giveaway.  Yes you read that right.  Three $500 cash cards. How cool is that?  You could use the money to prepare for your next road or plane trip or even do some early present shopping.

Travel tucker

Our whole family like to snack while travelling in the car.  Not only does it help to pass the time but it can also ward off any travel sickness. We can also avoid the temptation of the fried and sugar loaded offerings at the travel stops along the way.  The right snacks are essential though.  I always include some treats like jubes and gummi bears but these are usually spaced out between trail mix, crackers and water.

Since this is our fourth longish trip already this year, I have been looking for some new travel food inspiration.  I love these ideas from some of the other Kids Blogger Network mums and dads and I hope they help you too if you are planning a trip away with the kids.

 A great way to get kids excited for the trip is this Road Trip Muffin Tin Meal from JDaniel4's Mom.

The Kids Activity Blog has this list of Road Trip Snacks and tips for Eating on the Road with Kids.

While hubby and I like a trail mix full of nuts, seeds and carob, Bear and Bee would love this Kid-Friendly Chex Mix Recipe from Nothing If Not Intentional.  And I can get them to make it and bag it too ready for the trip.

Family Travel: Road Trip Snack Suggestions by Childhood 101 not only has a good list of snacks to take but also some suggestions on what containers to use and some things to avoid on a road trip.

Eating on the Road: Meals and Snacks is a fantastic post by Kid World Citizen on what to pack to eat on the road whether its for 1 day, many days or even internationally.

How about stopping for a picnic lunch?  In their 5 Must Have Tips for taking a road trip with kids, Your Modern Family suggests packing some sandwiches and then letting the kids run around to burn off some extra energy

If you are travelling by plane you can avoid the hit and miss nature of the onboard menu options and take some Wholesome, Homemade Food for Air Travel from Simple Bites.  This list is so good I am going to use many of the suggestions for our upcoming road trips.


What do you do if your child has food allergies and you want to travel.  Travel Mamas have some good advice on Travelling with Children who have Food Allergies.

And while this Restaurant I-Spy printable from 3 boys and a dog is not directly food related it is a good way of passing the time in the car for older children.  The printable could easily be adapted for the areas you will be driving through.

If you are planning a trip away I hope these tips help and Good Luck with the giveaway!

An InLinkz Link-up

Giveaway Information 
Win one of three $500 cash prizes directly in your paypal account! This giveaway is open internationally. You must be 18+ years old to enter.
a Rafflecopter giveaway

B is for Biscuit Mix for Busy Parents

Do your children like biscuits (or cookies)?  I know mine do.  Biscuits are a great snack to include in lunchboxes or to have after school and always taste best fresh from the oven.  But what to do if you don't have time to whip up a fresh batch of biscuits?

In the past I have made a bulk batch of this recipe 120 biscuits for less than $5 with Bear and Bee and stored them in the freezer.  Sometimes we cooked the biscuits and then froze them and other times we froze logs of biscuit dough, then defrosted it and baked the biscuits.  Both ways work well.

If you don't want to commit to biscuit flavours in advance, this Best Biscuit Mix for Busy Mums is great to have in the fridge.  I altered the original recipe slightly and also tried out our own variations.

Biscuit Mix for Busy Parents
Download a free recipe card for this recipe here.
Makes 8 cups of biscuit mix

Ingredients
4 1/2 cups self raising flour
2 cups brown sugar, lightly packed
250 grams butter

Directions
For the biscuit mix
1. Sift flour into bowl.
2. Stir through brown sugar making sure there aren't any lumps.

Bee adding butter to dry ingredients in hand blender.

Bee using hand blender to rub in butter.

3. Rub in butter until it resembles breadcrumbs.  If you hate rubbing butter in like me use your food processor to do it.  We don't have a large processor so we just did it in two batches in the hand held blender.
4. Store in a sealed container in the fridge.

To make biscuits
1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius and line 2 baking trays with non-stick baking paper.
2. Measure 2 cups of the biscuit mix into a large mixing bowl.
3. Mix in 1/4 cup of milk and any extra ingredients to make a soft dough. (You may need to add slightly more or slightly less milk depending on soft or firm you want the dough)
4. Use a teaspoon to spoon small amounts of the dough onto prepared trays.
5. Bake in the oven for 10 to 15 minutes.
6. Cool on a wire rack.

Variations
Jam Drops
Add an extra tablespoon or two of self raising flour in Step 3.  Roll small pieces of the dough into balls and place on the prepared trays.  Make a small indent in the middle of the dough balls using your finger.  Spoon 1/2 teaspoon of your favourite jam in the indent.  Bake as above.

Shaped Biscuits
Add an extra 2 or 3 tablespoons of self raising flour in Step 3 and roll out dough on a flour surface.  Cut out biscuits using floured cookie cutters and place on prepared trays.  Bake as above. Cool and decorate with icing and sprinkles.

Double Chocolate Chip Biscuits
Add 1/2 cup chocolate chips and 2 tablespoons cocoa powder in Step 3.  You may need to add an extra 1 or 2 tablespoons of milk if the dough is too dry. Spoon small amounts of the dough onto the prepared trays and bake as above.

Other variations
You could also try rolling small pieces of the biscuit dough in a cinnamon sugar mix, desiccated coconut or 100s and 1000s before baking.