Five Valentine Treats!

Looking for a tasty treat to make for or with your kiddos on that special day of love?  Here are five treats that will make the day memorable!

Heart Biscuits

Take your favorite biscuit recipe (try this one), favorite quick mix, or pop-tube of dough, cut them with a heart-shaped cutter and press red sugar sprinkles in before baking!  As Fancy Nancy would say, “Magnifique”!

Dipped Pretzels

Check out this blogger’s instructions for Valentine dipped pretzels!  I never realized before that a covered pretzel looks like a heart!  So darling and tasty!  You can do this activity with your kids and make some treats to deliver to their special friends, Grammy and Papa, or a secret Valentine! 

I made some today with my boys and we had a sweet science talk about changing states of matter as the bark was solid, then liquid, then solid again.  (We also had a talk about not double-dipping because their friends don’t want spit in their food.  Sadly, one batch was relegated to home-use only.  More for Mom!  I’m immune to spit!)

Valentine Trail Mix

Here’s a fun snack mix recipe to try out for a hearty snack.  If you have kids who will eat cashews, good for you.  If they (like mine) constantly nix the nuts, or if you’re worried about allergies, just omit or substitute with granola or a boxed cereal like Cheerios, Chex, or Life. 

Trail mixes are fun to make with the little ones because it’s just pour and stir.  Up the learning opportunity by pointing out the recipe and matching the labels to the ingredients.  You might even have the kiddos make their own batches in little baggies by setting out the ingredients in bowls along with a measuring spoon or scoop with each one.  On an index card next to each ingredient, write the ingredient name and a number, indicating the number of scoops to add to their baggies.  Fantastic pre-reading, numeral recognition, counting, and procedural practice!

Heart Hotcakes

I saw this recipe for rainbow pancakes last week and thought it looked like something my boys would do backflips for.  If they knew how to do  backflips.  Don’t tell them, but I’m planning on using this obviously brilliant idea of adding color to batter to make red heart-shaped pancakes for their Valentine’s breakfast.  Shhhh.  It’s a surprise.  (If you’re morally opposed to food coloring, go natural and add some raspberry syrup!)

Sweetheart Smoothie

Add strawberries to this Orange Smoothie for a pink drink!  Slice the remaining strawberries along the length of the berry to create strawberry hearts for a garnish! 

Have a tasty Valentine’s Day!

Click here for the developmental benefits of cooking with kids!

For more Valentine’s Day activities click here!

Heart Branch image by rknds.

Rainbow Pancake image by Amanda.

Strawberry image by marta.

All other vastly inferior images by me.