Kid Food

These thick and chewy oatmeal cookies are packed with sweet and chunky mix-ins, and are hearty enough to serve for breakfast.

You'll want to steal the wallpaper for yourself.

It's low-key, low-stress, and lots of fun! And, obviously, super-adorable.

Fall is a great time to renew your commitment to prepping meals ahead of time, and we’ve got three recipes that will keep your prep light, your stomach full, and your family happy this season.

This yummy, sweet treat is a fall staple — and the kids can't get enough.

You're left with plenty of leftovers for future dinners so you can get a reprieve from cooking.

It's the ultimate savory-sweet snack.

The very best way to make the state fair favorite at home.

It's like a souped-up loaded baked potato. (Get it?)

When Halloween candy is the only thing on the brain, make these easy, yummy dinners to get everyone out the door faster!

Who says Christmas is the only holiday that gets a cookie house?

Mulled wine, witches' brews, layered candy corn punch and so many more Halloween-ready drinks.

I couldn't stop smiling.

After spending an entire day baking, I finally found the absolute best vanilla cupcake recipe.

The winner had perfectly juicy chicken and a crispy exterior that rivaled popcorn chicken morsels.

We'll be eating this every morning from now until Halloween.

Relying only on stainless steel pains, EVOO, kosher salt ... the list of bad advice goes on! Here's what I learned about these "rules."

The tangy buttermilk batter is the perfect contrast to the rich chocolate and decadent toppings, making this the very best recipe there is.

Delicious, crowd-pleasing — and only requires 20 minutes of prep? Sign us up.

It's called rapping, and it's a serious game-changer.

My sister-in-law was right!

The sweet, bite-sized treat that will bring the coziest smells to your kitchen.

Who doesn't love a good, saucy pasta bake?

It's not glamorous, but most parents have experienced this dreaded issue — here are the foods that can make a real difference.

Of course, they're as stylish as they are effective!

It's part crepe, part pancake, and part popover — and as delicious as it sounds.

While the ol' kitchen-chair-turned-backward setup worked just fine in the '70s, today there are a slew of helpful platforms specially made to help kids reach the counter.

This recipe combines the best of two breakfast classics — cinnamon rolls and pancakes — into one picture-perfect dish.

How one humble vegetable reveals so many lessons...

With my youngest off to college, I've learned a thing — or ten — about family dinners.

Here's how to make one big-batch breakfast, two lunch options, and five slow cooker dinners for a busy week.

These family favorites are nourishing AND totally kid-approved (talk about a goldmine).

Stock up on these items to stretch out your shopping trips.

A week of delicious, no-cook meals from this family.

It's absolutely foolproof.

Meltingly soft veggies mixed with cheese and baked until golden and crunchy ... this is the definition of a crowd-pleaser

There's something about the crunch, along with the heartiness of the cauliflower. A total winner!

There's a lot working on the side of kid-friendly yumminess in this recipe.

These are cheesy, warm, and rich — perfect for a simple fall dinner. (Bonus: even the kids love them!)

I didn't set out to give my son his first bite of pizza made by a Michelin-rated chef in Italy — it just happened.

Just stick to this simple formula.

Both my 2-year-old son and my boyfriend gobbled it up and asked for more!

Put your own spin on the classic.

It's a simple — but ingenious — twist on a cheeseburger.

The votes are in, the scorecards have been checked, and the champions await their medals — but we’re not talking about the Olympics here. This is a whole different kind of competition: the Aldi Fan Favorites survey. For the third year, the grocery store asked its shoppers to vote on their most-loved products in a variety of categories — you might remember that back in May we told you about how you could participate and also win yourself a $1000 gift card.

Whenever I’m scrolling through TikTok, I can count on coming across a handful of new recipe trends. I don’t usually run to my kitchen to make many of them (instead, I simply share them with my foodie BFF), but when I came across these crispy jumbo fries I was intrigued — not only because they are made with mashed potatoes (one of my favorite side dishes), but also because I am a sucker for french fries, tater tots, and everything in between.

I will never need another mac and cheese recipe again.

Try these magically light, fluffy treats, sprinkled with pearl sugar.

My son doesn’t like the snacks I pack for him to take to school and it’s demoralizing to me. What’s your daughter’s favorite? Any good ideas? ShelleyDear Shelley, I will tell you that Ursula is actually — God bless her! — very good at choosing the healthy snack route, though she’s no stranger to ice cream and candy after school and no one’s looking. When I asked her directly what she LOVES, this is what she said.

Why choose one when you can have both?

It's done before the coffee is even ready!

Finally, an omelet that not only looks simple to make, but actually is easy to make.

Orange Julius recipes have been floating around for years, but I was always skeptical about them. I thought they could never be as good as the “real thing,” and even though I haven’t had the real thing in at least 25 years, that drink was still on a pedestal in my memory. But I recently tried making an Orange Julius at home. Turns out, it’s not only as good as the “real thing” — it’s better.

Now that school is reopening in my neighborhood again, I need a new lunch box for my kid. What’s the best one you’ve found? HollyMorning! I’m running this again as I’ve had a bunch of new inquiries on this question! On to the email:Dear Holly (as well as a few others that have just asked me this question again),Over at The Kitchn, they’ve spent a good deal of time testing and writing about lunch boxes, and I’ve tried them all.

If you can resist filling up your Trader Joe’s shopping cart with just snacks and cheese, the cult-favorite grocery store is actually a brilliant place to help you meal prep for a super busy week. It’s a one-stop-shop for breakfast essentials like coffee and oats, and their already-prepped ingredients like hard-boiled eggs and frozen stir-fry blends make quick work of lunch boxes and weeknight dinners.

The restaurant kitchen has nothing on being in the kitchen with little ones.

Getting kids to eat veggies is often a challenge. Pasta, rice, and bread are easy, but lots of kids shy away from the more complex — and healthy — stuff. I’ve been lucky with my girls: They mostly eat their vegetables (sometimes even with gusto!). Still, if they had a choice between cheese and crackers or spinach? Yeah, they’re going for the crackers.

Bacon-and-egg hand pies, oatmeal breakfast bars, and so many more delicious and quick breakfast options for those busy mornings.

These picks are all cute, functional, and back-to-school ready!

For many families, back to school means a return to packing lunches. Making sure that your children are well-fed 365 days of every year is hard enough, but adding 180 school lunches can feel downright relentless. I understand and am here to offer relief. Get ready for the most liberating school lunch advice you’ll ever receive: Let your kid pack their own lunch box.

Some kids are notorious for craving predictability at dinnertime. They like the same pasta served in a particular bowl. Or they only eat tofu pho, which sounds adventurous, without green things, from one Vietnamese restaurant, and only on Thursday nights. (We’d like the table by the window, please.) Or they eat gyoza, but only at a certain friend’s house, because her dad really does make it best, and in that case he’ll have 20. I have one of these children.

It won’t officially be summer until you’ve had your first watermelon of the season. Chances are, though, that it’s been about a year since you’ve bought your last watermelon. Do you remember how to pick out a good one? Did you ever really know? There’s a definite art to picking the very best watermelons. But don’t worry, once you know what to look for, it’s easy.

There is no stronger bond than a shared, nostalgic food memory. That’s why when I saw all the buzz over the cinnamon toast recipe recently shared by the New York Times, I felt incredibly excluded. Cinnamon toast … crunch? Like the cereal? What is cinnamon toast and why is everyone suddenly coming forward that this was their go-to after-school snack? I have not one single memory of ever making this. Is everyone around me secretly making this at home and not telling me?

Kids think it’s funny to mess with adults. It’s just the way of the world. They think it’s hysterical to prank call their parents, hide their grandparents’ remote controls, and hide from the teacher during roll call. They also think it’s adorable to not try new foods at the dinner table that they will willingly eat at the cafeteria at lunch. So, how are you supposed to get your kids to eat new things? I have a slightly sneaky way that actually works.

Last year I publicly declared my love for nectarines over peaches, causing a little stone fruit drama. Nectarine season hasn’t started here in Washington yet, but we’ve got the first few weeks of peaches under our belts. Plus, I have a giant box of Georgia peaches I ordered online to see if there really was something I was missing. I am pleased to report that while my mind remains unchanged on the superiority of nectarines, peaches are still close behind.

From personal convenience to communal equity: here's why we'll take advantage of the free lunch program.

For most of my life, I took breakfast for granted. Heck, I took eating for granted—until I had a baby. He taught me that even a food writer could lose her kitchen footing in the relentless deluge of spit-up (his) and tears (mine). But eventually I figured out enough clever work-arounds to fill a cookbook. For the book, I assembled a group of more than 100 new moms, who tested my recipes to make sure they worked amid real-life challenges.

There is a time and a place for jarred pasta sauce: The time is all the time and the place is my kitchen. (Can someone print that on a wooden sign and sell it in Home Goods? Thanks.) That’s not to say that I don’t have a deep love and appreciation for the homemade stuff, which pretty much courses through my Italian American, New Jersey-born veins. It’s just that in a pinch, jarred pasta sauce feels like a gift from up above.

This expert advice turned hectic dinners into a time to connect (without any bickering!).

As disappointing as it is when Trader Joe’s discontinues a favorite product, the one thing that makes up for it is finding out what took its place on the shelves. Every Trader Joe’s shopping trip is an opportunity to discover an exciting ingredient, packaged good, or some other surprise that will pique your curiosity.

Packing for a trip with my daughter means a suitcase that’s equal parts clothes, entertainment, and food. The food part is oh-so-necessary to keep little (and big) tummies full and blood sugar levels steady. We bring stuff from home so that we don’t succumb to the expensive snack kiosks at the airport.

This mall-inspired treat is low-effort and infinitely customizable. Just add ice cream!