AnchorMommy

Toddler Trail Mix

September 23, 2009 by Shannon

Have a lot of snacks on hand. 

That’s pretty much the universal advice for taking small kids on a road trip. And obviously, the more interesting the snack, the better. Enter Toddler Trail Mix.

The beauty of this simple snack is that you can load up each mix with plenty of healthy ingredients such as whole wheat crackers and cereal, dried fruits and nuts and include just enough sweet and/or sugary bits to keep things interesting. For example, I bought an organic, whole wheat version of Cinnamon Toast Crunch (which only has 8 grams of sugar) and tossed it with freeze dried apples, and Kashi Heart to Heart cereal. Kellan picked out the cinnamon cereal first. But he eventually finished the entire bag, healthy cereal and all.

Overall, I try to choose cereals that are low in sugar and high in vitamins. Here is my list of ingredients, but you can always mix and match them according to a kid’s favorites:

 
• Chopped walnuts
• Freeze dried apple pieces
• Freeze dried banana and strawberry pieces (Gerber makes these freeze-dried fruits especially for babies and toddlers. Target’s Up brand also has a comparable version.)
• Dried bananas
• Dried currants
• Cheerios
• Kix
• Cascadian Farm Organic Kids Cinnamon Crunch
• EnviroKidz Panda Peanut Butter Puffs

Just load about a quarter of a cup of each mix into small snack bags. For our Oregon Coast vacation, I mixed up several versions of Toddler Trail mix, and I made a TON of it because I knew I’d need some for the road trip as well as various hikes and picnics. Kellan had fun looking through the mixes, identifying shapes and colors. Plus, each bag bought us about 15 minutes of peace and quiet in the car. And during a 12 hour road trip, that comes as welcome relief.