My husband and I are both trying to lose some weight and have been cooking lower calorie and healthier dinners. Our problem is that our 11 year old son who is underweight anyway is not getting enough calories. He is not interested in eating anyway and now I am constantly pushing snacks at him. I tracked his calories that last few days and he is definately not matching his intake with his exercise. He is training for his black belt in addition to playing soccer, so he burns mad calories. I am trying to cut out some of the sugary items after dinner because of sleep issues. The last couple of nights he has snacked on sunflower seeds (doesn't like nuts) and chex mix.

Anyway here is my request - I am looking for some high calorie, somewhat healthy foods/snacks. We have all snacked on something thinking it was pretty healthy and then looked at the calories and went "Holy cow! I know I have many times!!

All suggestions appreciated. Thanks! Deb

granola/ trail mix-- very high in cals and filled with good stuff too!

Homemade smoothies
Peanut butter
You can also put butter on veggies.

Hm. I'd say be careful with the granola - especially the store-bought kinds. They're VERY high in sugars and even HFCS. If you make your own, you can control that.

Can you pad your son's meals with a little more food than you and hubby are eating? For example, if you guys eat a serving of chicken, maybe give him a serving and a half? Or allow him full fat salad dressing while you and your hubby eat low-fat?

For lunches and snacks, peanut butter on whole grain can't be beat. If he'll eat pb, then a sandwich for lunch or a 1/2 sandwich as a snack would work nicely.

Also dairy is a good, high calorie, healthy fat, protein loaded option:
Cheese of any kind: Fix him a quesadilla on a whole wheat tortilla, or cheese and whole wheat crackers for a snack. Or even a grilled cheese sandwich on whole grain bread.

Frozen yogurt for dessert would be a nice treat and pretty healthy, while adding calories and protein to his diet. Top it with some fruit and nuts for additional yumminess and healthiness.

Cottage cheese (if he'll eat it). You can mix it with fruit or jam, or toast it open faced on some wheat toast.

Even a glass of whole milk with dinner or lunch - or a glass of warm milk with vanilla and a little natural cane sugar (or stevia) before bed, which will also help him get to sleep.

I wonder if part of his issue about eating/snacking is being busy and not wanting to sit down to eat something. If you can find him things that he can grab and eat on the run (like the 1/2 sandwich and so forth) would that help do you think?

Also, is he open to drinking a protein shake or smoothie? One thing I do is mix 12 oz of orange juice (pure juice) with 1 scoop of vanilla protein powder. If I'm at home I blend it with a couple of cubes of ice, otherwise I just use a shaker cup. IMO, it tastes just like an Orange Julius from the place in the mall, and it's high carb, high protein, and chock full of vitamin C. Really good for you and really helps after a hard workout.

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Acai Berry products. It's knowed as super food!!!

Avocado...on sandwiches or guac for dipping veggies.

My husband is skinny and I definitely feed him more than I feed myself.

- Nut butter sandwiches, find whole grain breads, since he needs calories, you can go with the larger sized breads
- Dried fruit and nuts (you said he doesn't like nuts but he doesn't like any nuts? you can also use pumpkin seeds/sunflower seeds)
- Yogurt with fruit (for us, this is plain soy yogurt with frozen berries)
- Avocados, put them in sandwiches or on top of beans or other stuff
- Beans, good fiber, protein and not full of calories but are good
- Bean spreads such as hummus. They go good with veggies and also in a sandwich.
- Smoothies. Smoothies are so versatile and so quick. You can put lots of stuff in them including nut butters, oatmeal, yogurt and don't forget the fruit. You can also buy protein powders to put in them.
- Cereal. My husband snacks on things like Trader Joe's high fiber O's. Sometimes he'll even have a bowl of cereal with soy milk.

Have you tried:

1) Guacamole (relatively healthy. The green color might get it points in the looking cool in a gross sort of way department )

2) Cheese and crackers (the old standby snack. Pretty good for growing kids unless of course it's that weird processed cheese product stuff - ick! You could even mix it up by offering string cheese, cheese curds [what my dad would call squeaky cheese because it did honest to God squeak when you chewed it], etc.)

3) PBBH (Peanut Butter Banana and Honey Sandwich. This is fabulous! I used to eat these all the time pre-diet. It contains all healthy foods, but has a huge calorie content)

4) Dried fruit (Raisins are the obvious ones, but most dried fruit packs a lot of healthy calories in a small serving size. Mango is very popular with kids - it's almost like candy!)

Those are all I can think of for now...

Solid point. It's just that I love it so much, home made or otherwise, I'd love a free pass to eat it!

Oh me too! I have some fantastic recipes for granola/gorp from back when I was hiking and could "afford" the calories and carbs. Unfortunately my life is somewhat more sedentary now!

I'm thinking about a recipe I had that called for pumpkin seeds, butterscotch chips, and other yumminess. mmmmmm.

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Peanut butter and Pediasure shakes are what I pad my kids diet with. He is also underweight and very active. He's the smallest kid in his class, including the girls, poor lil' guy.

GORP. I used to make this for backpacking all the time.
Mix together peanutbutter, honey, wheat germ, oats, milled flax seed (this stuff is great for adding in healthy extras) nuts (I'm not a big fan so I used macademias) raisins (I didn't, but other people like it), a couple M&Ms, etc.
The stuff is very messy, but very, very good. I used to make a couple pounds of it (for a good size group) for backpacking. Kept the energy high but didn't feel heavy. It's a good base to add other things to. (Sadly, too high in calories for me, unless I'm backpacking, which, sadly, doesn't seem nearly as appealing now that I live there lol)

Thanks for the suggestions. I called his pediatrian and am going to start giving him an ensure everyday and try some of your suggestions. Hopefully that will atleast keep him from losing any weight. Thanks again!

Boy are we in the same boat! My DS is 13 and should be able to test for his black belt in 2 months. (I think the hardest thing is getting him mentally ready.) He's as skinny as a rail--he's grown 2 inches this year and has lost weight at the same time.

What works for me is to have ice cream around. I don't eat it (often--perhpas 3-4 times a year) and DH has the will power to stay away as well. DS has an ice cream cone every night.

Pasta is his favorite food, and with pasta I allow him as many seconds as he wants. For DH and myself, we concentrate on the salad for these dinners.

I usually fix him a much higher calorie breakfast. Such as waffles, pancakes, taquitos or breakfast burritos all with fruit while I fix myself an egg white omelet with low fat cheese. (DH takes a protein bar to work.)