Cooking with Language - Sandwich Skewers

Summer is in full swing here in Green Country.  With the sun beating down outside, we place a high priority on refreshing snacks and meal around here in the summer months.  Lots of my patients are kiddos who are really interested in food and cooking.  And who doesn't love something on a stick?

source

My favorite summer lunch with kids is the Sandwich on a Stick.  It's a nifty deconstructed version of the standard brown bag lunch that makes it a lot more fun than just a boring old sandwich.

You can use pretty much any ingredients you want for these, which is one of the reasons I love them.  The key to making these a healthy snack or meal is to make sure you're:

• Using whole grain bread
• Using a lean protein - keep an eye on sodium content with deli meats
• Including fruits and veggies.

Some of my favorite ingredients for sandwich skewers are:

• Veggies:  snap pea pods (halved), cucumber, cherry or grape tomatoes, spinach leaves
• Fruit: red or green grapes, apple slices (I love Granny Smiths for this), kiwi, pineapple, strawberries
• Bread/Grain: whole wheat pita, lightly toasted whole grain bread
• Cheese: Marble Jack and Provolone are my go-to, but anything works. 
• Meat:  Rotisserie chicken slices, low-sodium turkey, low-sodium ham, turkey ham

Lay out all the ingredients beforehand, and make sure everything is cut to size before you let the kids go crazy with the skewers.  I cut my skewers in half and blunt the ends to minimize ouchies.  Then let them have it!

The kids will have a great time assembling their own lunches.  Talk about what's going where and why, what each ingredient feels and tastes like, and talk about sequencing as you assemble the skewers.  You can make patterns with your ingredients too!

Enjoy!