Tasty alternatives to biscuits

[*Ali*]

I run a playgroup that other parents and I took over from our local govt when they cut funding to it a year ago. Parents can buy tea and coffee and it has become an awful habit to have a biscuit tin that parents just help themselves from and most give biscuits to their children too. This is left over from before we took over but I am keen to change it as biscuits just seem so unhealthy and some parents think nothing of allowing their child 4 biscuits.

So I am looking for lots of ideas on what we can offer instead on a rotational basis. Ideally it would be quick to prepare and ideally something we can buy ready made and just open and serve. And not too messy. The children are mainly 1-3yo.
Some ideas I have are:
Fruit (ideally things like grape and berries that don't need cutting up)
Tomatoes
Bread sticks
Cereals bar pieces
 
What else...?

TIA

[Mama2boys]

cheese sticks?

what about allergies and nut free zone do all those things come into the picture?

[Khalam's Mama]

Rice cakes?

[Charlygirl]

At our playgroup everyone brings a piece of fruit and it gets cut up and the parents and kiddies share it xx

[*Ali*]

Thanks girls.

There are no known allergies. We probably wouldn't serve peanuts JIC but I'd say everything else goes.

All good ideas. Keep em coming.

[ZacsMumme]

At our playgroup everyone brings a piece of fruit and it gets cut up and the parents and kiddies share it xx

Same here. The kids also get crackers - rice or normal.

Mini rice cakes are a big hit in this house as are potato sticks and cerial fruit bars (which I know are not cheap tough)
Mini muffins - savoury ie pumpkin or sweet ie blueberry?
carrot and celery sticks and dip ie hummus
ummm mini sandwiches or mousetraps/marmite and cheese toast rusks type things

[*Ali*]

What's a mousetrap. I've not heard of those before. Ta.

[ZacsMumme]

Well it's hard to explain so have a read of these
http://www.foodlovers.co.nz/forum/read.php?3,104794

The mousetrap recipe I use is
Heat oven and tray to 220 degrees celcius
Spread Marjarine then marmite (or alt spread, some people use peanut butter) on bread slice into 3 and cut off crusts
Top with a little grated cheese
Put on tray, bake till golden and crunchy  -8-10 mins
Cool and Store in airtight container.

Great for teething too

[Lemonthyme]

I'd steer clear of grapes, you still need to cut them up for little ones.  Why not raisins?  Also I know you're keen on things being all ready prepared but why not spread the load?  Ask each parent to make or bring a snack each week with no added sugar so fruit (yay), added sugar biscuits (boo).  Then you could bring along some home made snacks but as it would only be, say, one week a month max, that's not so bad?  If you want some inspiration, here's a cracking recipe with no added sugar and there are way more no added sugar recipes on my blog.  http://mamacook.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/sugar-free-date-and-ginger-muffins-for.html

[Buntybear]

Our playgroup has raisins, rice cakes, breadsticks and apple slices most weeks. Kids all seem happy with them! There is normally a tray of somehting homeade too like carrot cake, brownies, flapjacks for the adults 

[Mashi]

Just to add in other ideas of ways to do things, if you are looking to change it up a bit -- at all of the playgroups DS and I went to, everyone brought their own snacks for the children, and the first week of the month we had a group breakfast: the group leader always just took a minute at the song-time at the end of the group to rhyme off what we would need and people would put up their hands: bread rolls, cheeses, deli meats, hard boiled eggs, butter, jar of jam/other spreads.  Between 10-15 moms and everyone bringing one thing there would be LOADS of food.  It went out on the table and everyone tucked in. It was nice.

[*Ali*]

Some nice ideas thanks ladies.

Just to clarify, the group runs 3 afternoons a week (12.30-2.30) and it is different people who come each week on a drop-in basis. People might not always be there each day/week so we couldn't plan ahead with different people bringing certain stuff.

The parents pay 50p to attend so we supply the snack/treat. We don't plan on asking parents to contribute and TBH half the kids come with a whole donut in their packed lunches so I would rather we were providing healthy stuff for them to try that the parents might not buy at home. The baking ideas are great but in reality I know I wouldn't get around to making them.

BB it is interesting that you get away with munching the tasty stuff while the kids have the less-sugary snacks. Out biscuit tin actually started off as for adults but children asked when they saw their parents eating biscuits and it evolved to kids and adults.

[Buntybear]

The plate of brownies/flapjacks etc are put out at the start. By the time it is official snack time and the kids bowls of food are put out the sugary treats have gone  They are only small portions and I am sure that the kids have some too. I don't notice TBH as Olly can't have any anyway.

BTW only one thing is baked each week by a willing helper!

[Lemonthyme]

Ah ok.  Well unless there are at least a few of you to spread the load then it's probably unrealistic. 

I used to go to a Surestart session every week which featured a snack.  This was normally a combination of three of the following (the kids could then chose from them):

Cut up apple
Breadsticks
Rice cakes
Raisins
Cut up banana
Satsuma segments

But there's no reason not to do:
Cheese cubes
Cups of milk
Other dried fruits

[*Ali*]

Lemonthyme, up to what age would you cut up grapes? I stopped about 12mo with DS1 and certainly wouldn't cut them for him now at 2yo, he picks them straight off the sprig. Lol.

So today was the first day of no biscuits and some of the LOs were not best pleased. One mum even commented that her DD wouldn't want to come anymore. Hopefully she was joking. Apparently she never gets biscuits at home and she normally has about 4 (!) at our playgroup so it is a big loss for her. Oh well I didn't expect the kids to be excited. He ho. We did banana and cut it up without peeling so the kids could practise their finger skills oh well it all went and none of the other kids mentioned the biscuits so I'd say it was a success

Tomorrow is breadsticks and raisins. I need to trawl back through this thread for ideas for next week. Thanks for your help gals. Any more ideas gratefully received.