Coming up with toddler meal ideas day in and day out is harder than expected. It’s even harder when you go to the trouble of coming up with nutritious and delicious meals and then they throw it all on the ground. I’ve been there! Now while throwing food is just part of the joys of toddlerhood, and I can’t promise it won’t still happen every now and then, I can at least promise that these meals are easy, quick, delicious and nutritious. Let’s jump into breakfast ideas first!
Toddler meal ideas for breakfast
Ahhh the beloved breakfast. One may say breakfast competes with dinner for being the hardest meal to prepare. While dinner time is often the most hectic and we’re all so tired after a long day, breakfast time with toddlers is often at the crack of dawn. So, these meals are mean’t to be fast and easily prepared, even with one eye open.
Lets break it down. I usually like to stick with 3 breakfast meals for the week and then rotate them. As long as each meal consists of the main nutritional components that our little ones need as fuel for the day, then I’m totally okay with repeating the same foods. Trust me, if you find something they actually like to eat, this will end up happening anyways.
The three meals I did on rotation are, pancakes with fruit, cottage cheese with fruit + mini muffin and then yogurt with berries. All of these meals contain Fiber, Protein, Calcium and Carbs.
Pro tip* To make these meals super quick I pre-make my pancakes + muffins and freeze them. The pancakes take a maximum of 10 minutes in the toaster and I take out a muffin or two the night before I know I will be serving them. So there ya go, quick, easy, delicious and nutritious.
Toddler meal ideas for lunch
Lunch is one of my favorite meals to serve. Usually, my toddler is nice and hungry at lunch time because we serve it after her nap. She’s gone all the way from breakfast + nap without a meal so she is ready to devour what I put in front of her. So, you will notice that most of my lunch meal ideas consist of different parts of our dinner left over from the night before, which is the second reason why lunch is my favorite. It’s super easy to serve something for lunch when it’s already cooked from the previous meal. I usually just throw in an extra component so that meal time doesn’t seem to redundant.
Let’s break it down. Something I live by is that just because it is “lunch” time doesn’t meal you have to serve the typical lunch foods. It’s not a rule that you have to serve a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and some goldfish crackers just because it’s lunch. In order to ensure that my toddler gets all the nutrition she needs, I often use the typical breakfast + dinner foods, in the lunches I serve.
Almost all of the foods on all of these plates are leftovers. Which is why these meals took me about 5 minutes to prepare. With the exception of the eggs and watermelon everything was prepared in advance.
**If you want to see how I prep my fruit to make sure its all safe to eat – check this post out.
Toddler meal ideas for dinner
Let’s break it down. Dinner is not fancy in this house. For our toddler anyways. I don’t do crazy hard recipes, I save that for my husband and I. My only concern for my daughter is that she gets the nutrients she needs and she eats enough to get her to sleep (at least partially) through the night. If you know, you know.
So that being said, chicken, peas and carrots are always a hit. Luckily, our little one adores fish. So we serve either salmon or trout at least once a week. Fish is what we call brain food. There are so many benefits and I am truly surprised but also happy that our daughter loves it. Last but not least, hamburger meat, garlic + butter noodles and vegetables. I boil all my vegetables in the same pot so its a one stop shop. It also allows me to control how soft the veggies get so my 16 month old can eat them well.
So there you have it! 9 different toddler meal ideas that all take under 10 minutes to prepare. And remember mama – no matter what, you’re a great mom!
If you’re interested in other family meal ideas check out my recipes page!
