Quick snacks are a must all the time with growing children, but add the warmer weather and those kids get even hungrier.  And a house full of teens doing bigger and more things… even more so!

Warmer Weather

Spring has sprung, and the temperature is rising to lovely 60+ sunny degrees most days.  A little higher, a little lower, it doesn’t matter.  The kids are out the door running, bike riding, heading to the park.  And all that fresh air and activity?  Makes them hungry.  I’ve been pulling out my hair just a little with all the “what’s for…” “when’s dinner” questions.  Noon to 6 is a long stretch once the kids head outside so I began thinking about heartier snacks and healthy lunch fillers.

Mini Pizza

We often have home made pizza for lunch or dinner.  Recently I doubled the dough recipe and ended up with enough pizza for dinner, with dough left over.  Dividing the dough into 3 portions I rolled them out and made 3 personal size pizzas.  These pizzas were then loaded with pepperoni and cheese.

 

After cooling, each pizza was wrapped in parchment paper and slid into a quart sized ziplock bag.  The next day when people wandered into the kitchen looking for something to snack on, I pointed them to the fridge in search of those bags.  The pizzas were gone in a snap, but they were a hit!  One or two heated the pizzas, the other ate it cold.  So I do plan to take a few hours in the next week to make up a double batch of dough and turn all of it into mini pizzas.  Usually I put things like this into the freezer, but I really doubt that is needed or helpful in this season.   The turn over rate in our fridge is pretty high!

This is the recipe I currently use for pizza dough.  Normally we have bowls of chopped bell peppers, black olives and green onions, as well as pepperoni, turkey or ham to use for toppings.  For sauce I often use Classico marinara sauce, a jar goes a long way in pizza making!  This sauce is often on sale and when it is I stock up.

I’m looking for more fresh ideas for hearty quick snacks and simple, healthy, filling lunches.  The house is now full of strong, active teens and while they don’t eat a lot at one time, they do wander into the kitchen OFTEN looking for something to eat.  Surely I’ll get back into the groove, but for now, I need some ideas!

What ideas do you have for simple, healthy and filling snacks for these warm weather days?