Pumpkin Seeds make a great tasting and healthy snack.  They provide our bodies with zinc which is perfect at this time of  year to help ward off colds!  We love roasting pumpkin seeds and trying different combinations of flavors. We always do some with sea salt, then we mix things up a little by using things like garlic salt and Worcestershire, or for a sweeter flavor we sprinkle on cinnamon and nutmeg! It’s fun to get your kids involved and let them create fun combinations! We’ll share our favorite recipe and cooking method you!

What you’ll need:

Medium Pumpkin
Olive Oil
Sea Salt

What to do:

* Preheat oven to 400 F. Cut open pumpkin and scoop out the insides into a big bowl. Add water to the bowl to help separate the seeds from the stringy flesh (a lot of the seeds will just float up to the top!) and then rinse seeds in a colander.

* To make the seeds nice and crunchy we boil our seeds before putting them in the oven. You can skip this step if you’d like as it’s not essential. In a small pot add the seeds (for a medium pumpkin is around 1/2 cup) to approximately 2 cups of water. Add 1 tablespoon of sea salt. Bring to a boil and then let it simmer for about 10 minutes.

* Remove from heat and drain.

* Spread Olive Oil on the bottom of a roasting pan or rimmed baking sheet then spread the seeds (try not to have the seeds touching). This is also the time to sprinkle on some extra flavor if you’d like!

* Bake on the top rack until the seeds are golden brown, 10 – 20 minutes, depending on how brown you like the seeds.

* Take out of the oven and allow seeds to cool. Then enjoy this tasty fall snack!!

Happy Healthy Eating
Kia

Kia Robertson is a mom and the creator of the Today I Ate A Rainbow kit; a tool that helps parents establish healthy habits by setting the goal of eating a rainbow of fruits and vegetables every day. Kia is passionate about creating tools that help parents raise healthy kids!

After a fun trip to the farmers market Hannah and I made roasted rainbow carrots for dinner!  We’re so used to seeing orange carrots that it’s such a treat for our eyes to see bright yellow and deep purple carrots!  Purple just happens to be my daughters favorite color so whenever we come across purple produce she is more than excited to try it.

We like to cook together as a family as often as possible as there are so many opportunities for little ones to learn and help out in the kitchen!

Look at that purple!!!!

Sunny yellow carrots!

I pretty much just watched Hannah prepare this…she took charge and had a blast…I was so proud to be HER assistant this time!

Ta da!!!  Our delicious roasted rainbow carrots!

I would like to encourage you to get your kids involved in the kitchen, yes it can sometimes mean that things take twice as long and can be twice as messy when they first start helping out, but if you keep at it you might be pleasantly surprised and find yourself being the helper just like I did this weekend!

Happy Healthy Eating
Kia

Kia Robertson is a mom and the creator of the Today I Ate A Rainbow kit; a tool that helps parents establish healthy habits by setting the goal of eating a rainbow of fruits and vegetables every day. Kia is passionate about creating tools that help parents raise healthy kids!