"I HATE ALL FRUIT"

I cannot tell you how grateful I am for chocolate and peanut butter covered frozen bananas.

In my after school program, I was trying to cook or do something nutrition related during each meeting. I have tried many, many things: Yogurt mixed with honey, peanut butter, chocolate chips, and bananas; fresh tomatoes or carrots dipped in homemade ranch, home-made pizzas... Anything that may give these students a fresh look at fruits and vegetables.

Well, after months of this, I nearly gave up; a cook can only take so many "yucks," and refusals to swallow.

Then, the wonderful World Wide Web introduced me to chocolate and peanut butter covered frozen bananas.

Okay, so adding chocolate and peanut butter to anything feels a bit like cheating, especially when I'm trying to teach students about healthy eating habits.

This one student in particular, who "HATES ALL FRUIT!" (Here's where I set myself up for another failure.)

Then, we measured equal parts chocolate and peanut butter, melted and incorporated the mixture together. While the mixture was melting, we peeled bananas, and cut them into small, bite sized pieces. Lastly, we inserted popsicle sticks into the ends of the halved bananas. (The student wanted popsicle-like bananas!) The popsicle sticks helped to coat the banana pieces with the chocolate-peanut butter mixture. We popped them onto a plate covered in wax paper and placed them in the freezer.

Two hours later, we came back.

The bananas had frozen through (lucky for us, the freezer was set to a deep freeze)!

I held my breath as my "HATES ALL FRUIT" student took his first bite.

"I actually kind of like this," he said.

Victory!!

The student even asked to take the leftovers home for his family to try.

Now, it's been two weeks since my victory dance through the school's kitchen classroom. Yesterday, at the end of my after school program, I asked the student if he'd tried making the frozen bananas again. He said that he made them a few times. Sometimes without even covering the banana with chocolate or peanut butter.

So here's where my crazy worry is catching up with what I logically believe. Teaching students healthier eating habits. That's the goal here. That's my goal here.

Additional notes: be sure to note the state of your student's/children/audience's mouths - frozen bananas are hard to bite through and pretty hard on sensitive teeth!

Special thank you for providing me recipe ideas:
http://www.neverhomemaker.com/2010/06/frozen-banana-bites.html
http://www.notenoughcinnamon.com/2012/07/04/chocolate-covered-frozen-banana-peanut-butter-bites/