- Sultanas {although only Chloe likes these}
- Popping corn to make our own popcorn. I usually leave it plain, sometimes will add a little pink sea salt or jazz it up like I did here.
- Nuts and seeds. My kids love nuts {almonds and cashews} and seeds {pumpkin and sunflower}. Obviously though this is not a snack for school lunch boxes
- Home made ‘milo’ with milk is a common yummy afterschool treat here.
- Cream cheese – I spread this on the rice cakes or on crackers or sometimes the kids will have them as a sandwich. I also use it as a base for some home made dips. Check your cream cheese – I believe the mini containers you can buy contain preservative. The blocks do not. I do not buy cheese spreads.
- Yoghurt squeezies – we usually have tub yoghurt in the fridge but I buy a few of these each shop for convenience. Noah might take one in his lunch box once a week. The Vaalia Vanilla and the 5am Organic Vanilla are our favourites and are additive free. I steer clear of flavoured yoghurts in most cases.
- Sesame snaps are a nice little occasional treat that my kiddos love
- We love the Macro Organic Corn Chips at our house. But we only buy the plain
- Macro Organic Rice cakes are great for topping with cream cheese, avocado, organic peanut butter etc
- Marcro Organic Crackers, great with cheese, cream cheese, home made dip
- Coles brand Chocolate Koala and friends – my kiddos love these as a little treat with a home made babycino or hot chocolate.
Not pictured but some other things enjoyed at our house are:
- Aribar organic rice bars
- a little bit of good quality chocolate
- natural confectionary lolly or organic lollipop (very rare though!)
- arnotts scotch finger biscuits
- Coles organic sweet / salty popcorn
- Cruskits
- Fairy bread made with natural coloured sprinkles
And in addition we have a lot of fruit and raw veggies {although only carrot and cucumber for Noah} and home made yumminess like pizza scrolls, scones, cookies, muffins, banana bread, pikelets, cinnamon rolls. I make a batch and freeze half for Noah’s school lunch boxes. I just try to change it up so that our food is always interesting and varied and also try to make sure there is a good balance of healthy food and less healthy food or ‘treats’ in our day to day.
A normal lunch box for recess and lunch at school for Noah consists of:
- A sandwich – just cheese or tuna and mayo or egg and mayo – made on wholemeal bread {Brumby’s Pure Bake contains no additives and this is what I buy} sometimes with a spread of butter {home made or Mainland Butter Soft salt reduced}.
- An apple, peeled and cut up {otherwise he doesn’t eat it}
- A banana but most days this comes home
- Carrot sticks
- Crackers with dip or rice cakes with cream cheese or corn chips or popcorn or some chocolate koalas etc
- Something I’ve baked
- Sometimes a yoghurt or a box of plain milk
A normal snack + lunch for Chloe consists of:
- Cut up fruit for morning snack – apple, strawberries, grapes, orange, melon, banana, almost anything goes for her
- Something I’ve baked
- Lunch is usually a plate full of cut up veggies {carrot, capsicum, cucumber, avocado, tomato, celery} some cheese, maybe a little sandwich {though Chloe doesn’t often eat her bread so I rarely make her a sandwich, of course when Noah is here she wants the same as him but picks out all the filling haha} and some form of protein like some tuna, boiled egg etc. And some yoghurt.
Both my kids are starving at 3pm so I do offer them a snack at this time. In the afternoons the kids usually have something I’ve baked that day or the day before. Or will have a home made ‘milo’ and milk or some pop corn or fruit or a banana smoothie etc. I want them to eat but not too much as dinner at our house is normally between 5/5:30pm.
Although I try to stay clear of additives and highly processed foods, we still eat some store bought processed stuff. I just try and make the best choices additive wise and balance out the rest of their food for the day accordingly. I do try to make most of our foods from scratch or at least offer healthy / semi-healthy snack foods but I’m a busy mum too so I like the convenience of being able to pop some corn chips or a yoghurt squeezie into Noah’s lunchbox. You can read a little more about what I feed the kids in this post here.
I hope this helps? Please feel free to ask away if you have any questions! xx

Awesome Bianca – thank you soooo much. So many fantastic ideas!
What s fantastic post, will definitely be referring to it when I go shopping!! Thank you!
I think Chloe eats exactly the same as my two year old …and its nice to know theres another little girl out there that will only eat the filling in a sandwich!
Thanks so much for all these ideas, I have been trying to make more homemade snacks for my daughter and freeze them (made the banana bread yesterday, I love your recipe!) but its great to know a few packaged snacks I could buy her that arent too bad 🙂
Great post Bianca – while I’mnot one who had contacted you about this, I’m currently trying to think up new, exciting lunch alternatives for my girls, especially with the kindy lunchbox thing happening next year for us. I’m a bit like you and try to balance fruit/veg/protein/baked goods etc. but what I really liked in this post, was seeing ideas for simple, ready made things to have on hand for those times when a snack is needed and there’s nothing home made around 🙂 Thanks for sharing with us xx
Love this post Bianca. I am a bit addicted to the 5AM yoghurt too!!
Thanks for this post. I am a newish reader and love your blog. I have to admit that, although we have nearly every one of those foods on your snack list, I sneak a few more extra snacks of the not so good variety (packaged biscuits etc). Which I really don’t want to do but they kids want some of the things that they see in other kids lunches. Usually when I haven’t made time to bake, or when I am short of time/energy, I allow this to happen. Thanks for the reminder to choose healthier options.
Do you have any particular cook book, that contains great snack recipes that are healthy, that you recommend using? Cassy