Vegan Nutrition with Dina Aronson, M.S. R.D.

Dina Aronson, MS, RD is a vegan dietitian whose specialties include chronic disease prevention, vegetarian/vegan nutrition, and lifestyle management. She is the founder and director of VeganRD.com, a nutrition consulting company. Active in many vegetarian nutrition organizations, Dina was the recipient of the American Dietetic Association's Recognized Young Dietitian of the Year Award in 2002.

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I will be in charge of snacks next month at my daughter's preschool, where the children are accustomed to having milk AND cheese as part of each snack. Any ideas for healthy, vegan alternatives that: (1) will be well-tolerated by meat-eating kids, and (2) will address their parents' inevitable cry of "where's the protein?" -Katharine

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Dear Katharine,

What a fun project, and what a wonderful way to get kids and parents to realize that they really do like healthy plant foods!

Will you be preparing the snacks with the children, or bringing snacks in already prepared? If you can get the kids more involved in the preparation of the snacks, they're more likely to eat it. One vegan mom I know did a little cooking demo at her daughter's preschool, where she showed them how to make whole wheat cous cous with lentils. Because the children were allowed to touch a sample of the dry cous cous and lentils, and got to help put in the veggies and seasonings, they were all very excited about trying the final product, and they loved it!

I suggest picking up a case each of the single-serving Very Vanilla Silk and Chocolate Silk containers (available at many wholesale clubs and large health food stores), and passing out one to each child. Make sure they're nice and cold! I've yet to meet a kid who didn't like them. And parents will like that the protein, calcium, and other nutrient content is similar to that of cow's milk.

Here are some other ideas that are protein-rich and kid-approved:

Whole-grain crackers, pretzels, mini rice cakes, and fruit slices with almond butter (acceptable if all kids are over 3 and there are no nut allergies). You can also use peanut butter, but almond butter is a richer calcium source. If there is an issue with nut allergies, you can use sunflower butter, soy nut butter, or tahini mixed with a little rice syrup or maple syrup.
Homemade vegan muffins, like banana, apple, or chocolate chip, where you control what goes in them! Use high-protein ingredients such as soy milk and mashed tofu. You can find recipes in many vegan cookbooks or at vegweb.com.
English muffin "faces", where the children can choose either hummus or vegan cream cheese to spread on a 1/2 English muffin, and then choose pre-sliced raw veggies to make a face or other design on top.
Fresh cut-up fruit with vanilla soy yogurt and granola. Silk sells its vanilla soy yogurt in large containers, which you can find in large health food stores and some well-stocked regular grocery stores.
Frozen "heat and eat" snacks. Large health food stores have a wonderful selection of vegan frozen goodies like "chicken" nuggets, "egg" rolls, sweet potato puffs, pocket sandwiches, burritos, toaster pastries, and more, which can be heated up in the microwave and sliced into smaller pieces if they're too large.

Disclaimer: The advice given here is for eductional purposes only. You should not use this information to diagnose or treat a health problem or disease without consulting with a qualified health care provider.

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