Kate and Kelly
Serves: 4
Prep time: 5 mins
Cook time: 40 mins
Ingredients:
1 medium sweet potato (peeled and chopped)
400g of macaroni pasta
320g cooked Tenderstem broccoli (or purple sprouting broccoli)
150g plant-based "cheeze" (grated) - or use regular cheese if not vegan
2 tbsp of plant-based (or regular) butter
2 tbsp of plain flour
300ml plant based milk (we used oat milk - you can use regular milk if not vegan)
Veg Portions / Serving: 1
Our Superpower Monster Mac ‘n’ Cheeze is a total winner for the whole family to tuck into! Get the kids involved in making this one – they’ll love helping make the sauce and squidge in the broccoli trees!
Method:
First of all preheat your oven to 180C / 350F / gas mark 4.
Put your chopped sweet potato in a pan of water to boil over medium heat. When they’re cooked, drain and pop them back into the saucepan. Add 1 tbsp of your butter – time to give this a good mash and put it to one side.
Cook your macaroni following the instructions on the packet. Drain and set aside.
Pop a separate pan on medium heat, add the rest of the butter and let it slowly melt. Tip in your flour and stir together, this will go into a lumpy paste – don’t worry this is good! Give this a mix and slowly add the milk until you have a sauce (again don’t worry too much about getting rid of all the lumps).
Add the sweet potato mash, and most of your cheeze to the sauce and again, mix together really well. Turn the heat off, add your cooked macaroni to the lovely cheezy sauce and stir everything together.
Fill the ovenproof dish with your mixture. Take the cooked broccoli stems and squidge them into your macaroni so they are just sticking out the top. Sprinkle over the rest of your cheeze. Pop the dish in the hot oven on for 20 mins until gooey and golden.
Carefully take out your Monster Mac ’n’ Cheese from the oven – time to get stuck in and enjoy!!
Engaging Kids
Kids who engage regularly with veg through veg-themed activities, such as arts and crafts, sensory experiences, growing and cooking are shown to be more likely to eat the veg they engage with. Encouraging kids to engage and play with veg is the handy first step to them developing a good relationship with veg and life-long healthy eating.
Kids in the kitchen
Get the kids mashing the sweet potato, stirring the sauce, and popping in the broccoli before it goes in the oven.
Activities
While getting kids to interact with veggies for real and using their senses to explore them is best, encouraging hands off activities like arts & crafts, puzzles & games or at-home science experiments can be a great start, particularly for those who are fussier eaters or struggle with anything too sensory. Use these veg-themed activities as a stepping stone to interacting with the veg themselves. We have loads of crafty downloads here, puzzles here, and quirky science with veg here.
Sensory
Once you feel your child is ready to engage a little more, you can show them how to explore the veg you have on hand with their senses, coming up with playful silly descriptions of how a veg smells, feels, looks, sounds and perhaps even tastes. Find ideas, videos and some simple sensory education session ideas to get you started here.
Serving
The moments before food is offered can be a perfect opportunity for engagement that can help make it more likely a child will eat it! Giving children a sense of ownership in the meal can make a big difference to their feelings going into it and the pride they take in it. You know your child best, but if you aren’t sure where to start, we have some fun and simple ideas for easy roles you can give them in the serving process over here.
Kate and Kelly
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