Energy bites to fuel kids between meals 

Deirdre Doyle of the Cool Food School has ideas for after-school snacks to keep children's hunger at bay, at least until dinner time.

The return to school brings back the after-school snack demands. With children often arriving home starving and grumpy — or maybe that’s just my pair — it can be a tricky time of the day. 

Despite all your hard work at the crack of dawn assembling a carefully balanced lunchbox, they may not have had time to eat all its contents (or — being fussy — they just might have ignored it). 

It’s too early for dinner and, especially if they’re heading to an after-school activity, they need something substantial. Head them off at the pass before they start reaching for that packet of biscuits by having a few nutritious, healthy snack ideas at the ready.

Food educator Deirdre Doyle set up the Cool Food School in 2018 with the aim of showing children that healthy eating can be fun. 

With a degree in hotel and catering management and a nutrition and health coaching qualification, she has deep foundations in the food world. She also has three children, so has plenty of hands-on experience feeding little ones.

Keeping in mind that dinner time isn’t too far away when children get home from school, Doyle’s definition of a healthy snack is “one that is balanced and filling — but not too filling.” She makes sure that protein in some form is included, like “cheese, egg, chicken, nuts, seeds etc. We often use peanut butter as part of our snacks as it’s quick, easy and full of protein. A slow-release carb like oatcakes is great and then some fruit to finish.”

While banned in many schools due to allergies, nuts and nut butters are good sources of healthy fats, protein and minerals so they are ideal for after-school eating. For the best quality, read the label to make sure the variety of nut butter you choose only has nuts as an ingredient.

Rather than stocking up on convenience foods, Doyle is a fan of making things from scratch: “I try to focus on whole foods and steer away from packaged snack-type foods, although we do serve them too from time to time.”

Through five years of the Cool Food School — including a recent appearance at St Peter’s for Cork on a Fork — Doyle has taught many children to have fun in the kitchen. 

Her workshops involve lots of hands-on activity, with kids having the opportunity to chop, taste, smell, and dance (Doyle never misses an opportunity for a boogie on her Instagram and TikTok accounts) while making healthy, delicious dishes. 

One of the most popular snack ideas from her classes is the Powered Up Energy Balls. “I make power balls using Weetabix as the base and kids love these. We also make carrot cake-style power balls, which are delicious dipped in chocolate. Power balls are an easy, fun, nutritionally dense snack to make with kids.”

Her cookbook Chop, Cook, Yum! Recipes from the Cool Food School has many quick ideas for snacks that children can make for themselves. “I focused a lot on more snacky kinds of foods as these are the foods children are most likely to make independently. In our house, we are big fans of pizza bagels — so easy in the air fryer — and two-ingredient pancakes.”

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that a parent needs to become a slave in the kitchen to make these snacks either. Doyle is firmly in favour of getting kids to take responsibility for their food, running a popular back-to-school lunchbox, making classes for children and showing them how to make snacks they can prepare in batches at weekends.

“Anything that keeps well like the power balls or flapjacks, is great,” she says. “Muffins made with oats and banana, a batch of nutty, seedy granola to eat by the handful or pop on top of yoghurt, chocolate peanut butter cups, egg muffins, a batch of hummus to have with bread sticks or veggies, carrot and courgette mini loaves or other savoury muffins, baked porridge, cheese and ham pinwheels — there are so many options.”

Lots of these recipes can be prepared ahead of time, frozen and reheated for that witching hour at 3pm. Planning ahead, as with so many elements of parenthood, is key. Or get the children invested by sitting them down to write lists of their favourite snacks. Stick these up on the fridge or kitchen notice board so that you always have a reminder to hand.

It’s well worth brainstorming together for inspiration. You may be pleasantly surprised by the ideas that they come up with. Just beware: five minutes after they’ve finished their snack, and before you’ve had a chance to congratulate yourself on a task well done, the dreaded “What’s for dinner?” query will be trotted out.

Deirdre Doyle's Powered-Up Energy Balls

Taken from from 'Chop, Cook, Yum! Recipes from the Cool Food School' by Deirdre Doyle (O'Brien Press, €14.99).

Servings

12

Preparation Time

 30 mins

Total Time

 30 mins

Course

 Main

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp. chia seeds

• 4 Weetabix

• 8 pitted dates

• 1/4 cup cacao powder

• 1 tbsp. melted coconut oil

• 1 tsp cinnamon

• Extra cacao powder, for rolling

Method

1. Put the chia seeds into a small bowl or cup. Add 4 tablespoons of water to the seeds and leave toone side. Watch the magic happen!

2. Meanwhile, break your Weetabix in two and throw them into your food processor.

3. Add your dates, the cacao powder and the melted coconut oil to the food processor. Add the chia seed and water mixture, which should be like a gel now.

4. Blitz everything together for about 30 seconds or until it’s all well mixed together.

5. Take small amounts, about the size of a table tennis ball, in your hands. Squeeze together and then roll between your two hands to form a ball.

6. Put in the fridge for 20 minutes or so and then roll in the extra cacao powder mixed with the cinnamon.

Five after-school healthy snack ideas

Make it fresh: Put a plate of chopped-up fruit and veg down before anything else, things like sliced pears, peeled clementines, blueberries, strawberries, celery sticks and cucumber slices. Hunger is the best sauce, so make it easy for hangry children to fill up on all the good stuff. Choose in-season, Irish-grown options where at all possible for the best flavour.

Winning eggs: Eggs are endlessly versatile. Teach kids how to make omelettes, boil and scramble eggs at a young age and they’ll never go hungry. Eggs are also the basis of homemade pancakes, waffles and French toast — all good things to have as a nutritious after-school snack.

Milk puddings: These take a bit of prep but are comfort food classics for a good reason. Baked semolina, with an egg whisked through it, is irresistible, as are rice puddings of all kinds. My girls are fans of slow cooker rice pudding which, although the rice breaks down a little over the long cooking time, is worth it for the easy hands-off cooking method.

Smoothie bowls: Blitz natural yoghurt, nut butter, frozen bananas and berries. Decant into shallow bowls. Top with decoratively sliced fruit, toasted nuts and seeds and eat before everything melts. Can also be made in advance and frozen until needed. 

Snack boards: Make like an Instagram influencer and repurpose a chopping board to host a selection of picky snacks. This can be a cheeseboard by any other name so orientate it around cheese in different formats - mozzarella balls, grated cheddar, wedges of brie — along with halved grapes, sliced apple, mini pretzels and crackers. Add a dish of hummus and a jar of carrot sticks for extra nutrition. This is a great option for Friday afternoons with friends.

Chop, Cook, Yum! Recipes from the Cool Food School by Deirdre Doyle is published by O’Brien Press (€14.99).