Healthy Finger Foods for Kids: 30 Fun Snacks They’ll Love

raspberries finger food kids

Need some new meal inspirations for some snacks for your kids? Here are some delicious and healthy finger foods for kids they’re sure to love!

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It’s very normal for children to love sweet treats, but it is also important to teach our kids healthy eating behavior. Fortunately, you don’t have to pick one or the other. Here are some ideas that combine the best of both: healthy finger foods for kids!

finger food for kids fruit

Kids Love Finger Food

Children love foods they can eat with their fingers. Chopped vegetables or fruits cut into fun shapes are a great alternative to processed snacks. For example, you can cut some bell peppers, carrots, or cucumbers. You can also chop up apples and cut strawberries in two.

Some children tend to avoid some of these at first, but you can easily figure out which kind of vegetables and fruits your kids like. Eat together with your children because by watching you, they might become more comfortable with these new foods.

Protein-Packed Finger Foods for Kids

Nuts are perfect, healthy finger foods. They are not only tasty but also full of essential fatty acids. These finger foods contain important fibers as well as proteins. Walnuts, hazelnuts, pecan nuts, brazil nuts, and more are also filled with many vitamins like Vitamin E and selenium. 

But if your child has a nut allergy or just doesn’t like them, there are plenty of other ways to get protein-packed snacks. Hard-boiled eggs pack a powerful protein punch. String cheese and yogurt tubes are a fun and easy way to get calcium, too. And adding a little peanut or sunflower butter or hummus adds some protein and good flavor to cut up veggies.

Finger Foods for Babies and Toddlers

While finger foods make a great snack for the lunchboxes of growing kids, they’re also a wonderful way to introduce your babies and toddlers to healthy food options. So when you’re thinking about appetizers or dessert for the youngest ones, why not opt for healthier snack bites instead of cookies or pizza? Or even put a more nutritious spin on those popular treats? Crispy almond flour crackers or whole foods like cauliflower bites or zucchini spears with hummus are some great delicious alternatives.

Healthy meatballs or zucchini muffins are other choices that might entice even the pickiest toddler eaters!

Finger Foods for Kids in Every Season

Each season offers wonderful fruit and vegetables. All you have to do is discover them! Seasonal fruit and vegetables will enhance your child’s sense of taste and at the same time give you a balanced diet. Try it out! Here are a few tips for seasonal finger food for children.

kids with summer finger food popsicles

Healthy Summer Finger Foods for Kids

During the summer you can easily make some fruit-flavored ice cream, popsicles, or sorbet on your own. Just be sure to have plenty of napkins!

You just need fruit juice – preferably with 100 percent fruit content – and a popsicle mold. Pour the juice in the mold, put it in the freezer, and voila!

You can make some delicious sherbet. Just mash some fruits, mix them with milk or natural yogurt, and freeze them together. If you need to, add a dash of honey for natural sweetness. In general, fruit-flavored pops have fewer fat and calories than sherbets, but the added healthy fat helps to keep kids fuller longer.

Another huge summer favorite: watermelon! It’s cheap, easy to eat, and with so many seedless options, you don’t even have to stop and spit them out!

healthy finger foods for kids- pumpkin seeds

Healthy Fall Finger Food

As hard as it is to say goodbye to delicious summer peaches and strawberries, fall is a great time to try new fruits and vegetables. A good idea for finger food – especially around Halloween – is pumpkins. While you are preparing a weird pumpkin for a Halloween Party, you can use the fruit flesh for baking pumpkin muffins. Pumpkin seeds are delicious, too! Children love them.

Another common fall snack is apples! Here is one recipe that is super simple but ensures that your kids will eat their fruit.

Lemon Cinnamon Apple Bites

Quick and refreshing spin on your typical apple snack!
5 from 1 vote
Prep Time 5 minutes
Total Time 5 minutes
Course Snack
Cuisine American
Servings 1 person
Calories 110 kcal

Ingredients
  

  • 1 apple
  • 1/2 lemon
  • cinnamon (to taste)

Instructions
 

Lemon Cinnamon Apple Bites

  • Wash and cut the apple into slices.
  • Drizzle lemon juice over apples. Then sprinkle on the cinnamon. Enjoy!

Nutrition

Calories: 110kcalCarbohydrates: 30gProtein: 1gFat: 1gSaturated Fat: 1gPolyunsaturated Fat: 1gMonounsaturated Fat: 1gSodium: 3mgPotassium: 269mgFiber: 6gSugar: 20gVitamin A: 110IUVitamin C: 37mgCalcium: 25mgIron: 1mg
Keyword apples, cinnamon, lemon
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

Healthy Winter Finger Food

During the wintertime, you can make some holiday-themed finger food for the kids. Try some Christmas finger food with fruits and vegetables, like a Grinch kabob, with marshmallows, strawberries, and green grapes. You can also slice an apple and build a candy cane. Here are some more ideas for perfect and healthy finger food for Christmas.

healthy finger foods for kids- strawberries
Photo by Paige Thiboldeaux

Healthy Spring Finger Foods for Kids

Spring is a great time to enjoy healthy snacks! There’s nothing quite like eating strawberries or blueberries straight from the pail after berry picking!

It’s also a great time to plant a vegetable garden. Radishes are also perfect to plant together with your children because the first seedlings appear after two or three days. The best planting condition is a soil temperature between 46°F and 86°F. So enjoy the fruit of your garden with your kids.

Cherry tomatoes you can pluck right from the vine, carrots, and mini cucumbers are also popular finger foods you can plant in the spring before the summer harvest.

Enjoy Some Sweet Treats

While it’s important for kids to have a healthy diet, it’s also great to allow your kids some sweets. Sometimes putting a really strict ban on junk food only makes them want it more. It’s all about moderation and helping them develop a healthy lifelong relationship with food. Kids learn by example, so when they see their parents and caregivers enjoying a balanced diet, they’re likely to follow suit.

What are your child’s favorite finger foods? Do you ever get nutrition tips from family and friends on FamilyApp? Let us know!

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