Who does not like ice cream? I designed this Mango Banana Delight Breakfast Ice Cream as part our Design Your Own Breakfast Ice Cream family cook along for our Kids Health Quest Members.
I specifically design the Cook Alongs so kids get to have some control over what they include in the recipe. I create a base recipe, then the kids get too choose out of a number of ingredient options, what ingredients they wish to include.
Here’s why it’s important and why it works at getting kids to eat fruits and vegetables that perhaps they wouldn’t normally eat:
- one of the few things kids have control over is what they eat (even if we think we have control over it, unless you force the food in their mouth, you can only influence what they eat)
- you telling them or coercing them to eat something takes away their control
- most people do not like being told what to do (do you?)
- when you take away their control, it creates a tug of war between you and your child
- this often results in a child digging in their heels and refusing to eat without antics
- this behaviour around this food may continue the next time you serve it and generally gets called fussy eating.
By involving kids in what ingredients are in their food or what they are having for any meal or snack, it gives them back that little bit of control. In our Kids Health Quest Membership, our mantra is food is an experiment. Allowing them to experiment with control of ingredients is having a big difference in what the kids are eating.
In our Design Your Own Breakfast Ice Cream Cook Along, the children get to choose from a range of options:
- the frozen fruit and vegetables, and liquid in the base of their ice cream
- what ingredients they would add to boost nutrition
- what toppings they would add to their ice cream
I called this a breakfast ice cream because the cook alongs are infused with educational messages. The kids (we call them Explorers) are discovering what makes a great breakfast. We’re also talking about foods that help our body as treats as opposed to foods that are often called treats but they don’t help our body (eg. packet foods).
Even though this is called a Breakfast Ice Cream, this sort of ice cream can be eaten any time of day! It’s packed with real food goodness and is a treat for your body.
I hope you enjoy this Design Your Own Breakfast Ice Cream with ingredients chosen by our 10yo son Rilien.
Ingredients
- 220g frozen mango
- 80g frozen banana
- 1 tbsp frozen cauliflower puree
- 1 tbsp frozen sweet potato puree
- 1/4 -1/2 cup coconut water (start with 1/4 if you like your ice cream firmer)
- 1/4 cup Greek yoghurt
- 1 tbsp hemp seeds
- 1 tbsp chia seeds
- 1/4 cup raw cashews
* recipe makes 4 bowls and 4 mini ice creams
Method
- Place cashews, chia seeds, hemp seeds into the blender and blitz until it’s a fine meal (this helps give thickness as well as adding nutrition to your ice cream).
- Add in all other ingredients and blend until smooth and creamy.
Best served and eaten straight from the blender as a soft serve type ice cream. You can freeze it but it will get a bit icy. Freeze in small blocks so you can pop them back in the blender and break up to make a smoother softer ice cream again.
I used the leftovers to make mini ice creams which we will have on Fun Family Friday Night. But, don’t make the mistake I did, I forgot to include the stick in the ice cream before freezing.😂
I got these cute mini ice cream moulds from The Wholefood Collective. They are called mini but in my opinion they are the perfect sized ice creams.
If you want to grab yourself these moulds and support us, you can use this link to go to The Wholefood Collective. You get the same great price and they pay us a thank you fee for referring you. We only ever promote businesses with strong values that we relate to and that we use for our own family.
If you want to join our Kids Health Quest Membership, jump over here and join our waitlist.
