Five Tips for Sneaking Leafy Greens into Your MTHFR Kids
We all know it’s not the easiest thing to get most kids to eat their veggies. And leafy greens? That can take boss battle skills. The truth is though, MTHFR Kids especially should be eating more leafy greens than their non-mutant counterparts. Heck, all of us MTHFR mutants should!
Over the years, raising two MTHFR Kids, I’ve developed some pretty nifty ninja skills for stealthily sneaking greens in. Here are my five tips for sneaking leafy greens into your MTHFR Kids.
Five Tips for Sneaking Leafy Greens into Your MTHFR Kids
Smoothies
Smoothies are the most obvious and easiest place to sneak greens in for us and many other families. Chunky Monkey Smoothie? Add a cup of spinach. Strawberry banana smoothie? Add a cup of spinach. Mango, blueberry, pineapple? Add a cup of spinach. Vanilla mint smoothie? Spinach, spinach, spinach. Why? Boasting a nutrition content rich with MTHFR supporting B vitamins and choline to boot, spinach has a mild taste easily masked by other flavors.
Muffins and Breads
I feel like the next most obvious place for most is in foods like muffins and quick breads. There are some great recipes that place spinach front and center with great results. For example, this Blender Spinach and Banana Muffin recipe and Spinach Banana Bread (Vegan). Once again, spinach takes the lead here over other greens, and I think it’s because of its adaptability and subtle flavor.
Now we’re going to get into some less common ways to get these leafy greens in because the way I do this sometimes doesn’t really hide them so much. Think there’s no way your kiddo would eat it? Just try it — you may be pleasantly surprised.
Minced and Sprinkled
This is my personal favorite because it keeps the greens from deteriorating too much from cooking. B vitamins are delicate, and cooking reduces their content in foods.
The mince and sprinkle method is self-explanatory. You mince the greens up finely and sprinkle into whatever you’re serving — similar to a garnish of parsley. The pieces are so small, the kids can’t pick them out the way they do when I serve dishes with bigger cuts of greens in it. More importantly, they don’t taste them since they’re in such small bits.
I’ve used this method for salads (lettuce-based salads, egg salad), stir fry (fold it in at the end), pasta dishes (again add at the end — the heat will wilt it), and tacos, soups, stews and casseroles. The craziest dish I’ve ever sprinkled spinach onto? French toast. Yep. French toast. Chocolate-ish French toast to be exact. Picky eater: “Mom, is that spinach on top?” Me: “Yes.”
And then it was gone without another comment.
Blend, Baby, Blend
Blending greens into food is another easy win. Really, for all of these strategies, it’s about ratios. I find that as long as I keep the greens ratio high enough that I feel they’re getting some nutritional value, but low enough that I can mask the flavor, we’re (usually) golden.
I’ve blended greens into nut cheeses, dips, tomato sauces, and nut based cream sauces (like a vegan alfredo). I even made a pesto sauce using carrot top greens once — that particular one wasn’t so much a win with my kids, but my husband and I thought it was really good.
Sweet Treats
Spinach ice cream? Really? Really. This one is perfect because spinach is green and so is mint so this combination is an easy sell. This recipe for Minty Green Protein Ice Cream has the added bonus of being protein packed with the addition of hemp powder.
Where else can we eat greens for dessert? Head on over to Pinterest for some inspiration. Here are a few to get you started:
Gluten Free Healthy Spinach Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
Spinach Smash Cake
Apple Kale Cake with Apple Icing
And there you have it… my five tips for sneaking leafy greens into your MTHFR Kids. I hope they help you get more of the green into your group. Have any of your own skills to share? Drop me a line to let me know or join the conversation over on Facebook!
