Are you looking for different ways to help incorporate fresh fruit into you or your child’s lunch?

These strawberry shortcake kabobs, like many recipes from MOMables school lunch menus, includes fresh fruit and tastes delicious!

One of my favorite things about summer is the gorgeous looking produce that accompanies it. During the winter months, fresh produce doesn’t always look so “fresh”.

Fortunately, by summertime the produce aisles at grocery stores are popping with bright colors of luscious looking produce. One of my personal favorite summertime fruits- strawberries!

What I like even better than getting them at the grocery store is finding a strawberry farm and picking my own with my family. Each year we make a family affair out of it and the outing always promises a good time for all.

I love picking our own strawberries for several reasons:

1) The freshness, juiciness and flavor of the strawberries cannot be beat!

2) It shows my kids the origin of one of their favorite foods. So often these days, I feel it’s easy for kids to think that food just magically appears on grocery shelves. Strawberry picking gets them out in a field and teaches them about food and gives them more of an appreciation for the people that work hard to bring such food items to our tabletop.

So whether you pick your own strawberries or get them from the grocery store, embrace the season and make as many recipes using strawberries as possible…like these strawberry cake kabobs for example. Don’t forget to check out the healthier pound cake recipe below!

They are super easy to whip up and are the perfect thing to bring to a summer BBQ or Fourth of July celebration. Bonus: your kids can skewer them!

If you’re making them for adults, make larger portions and thread the ingredients onto a skewer. If you’re making them for kids, put them on a popsicle stick to ensure they won’t poke themselves. These kabobs will go great as a treat with one of our lunches.

Healthier Pound Cake

Recipe adapted from Cooking Light

• Author: MOMables
• Cuisine: Baking

Scale 1x2x3x

Ingredients

• 6 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 vanilla bean or,
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 3/4 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 2 large eggs
• 12 ounces cake flour (about 3 cups)
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup nonfat buttermilk
• Cooking spray with flour

For Strawberry Shortcake Kabobs

• Pound cake (homemade or store-bought), sliced into cubes
• Fresh strawberries, whole or halved
• Melted milk chocolate
• Melted white chocolate

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350°.
2. To prepare cake, combine oil and vanilla in a small skillet over medium-high heat, and bring to a simmer. Remove from heat. Let stand 10 minutes or until mixture cools to room temperature. Scrape seeds from bean, and stir into oil; discard bean. If you use vanilla extract, skip this step and add it to the next step.
3. Combine the oil mixture, 1 3/4 cups sugar, and 1/2 cup butter in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at medium speed until well blended (about 5 minutes). Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Weigh or lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt, stirring well with a whisk. Add the flour mixture and buttermilk alternately to sugar mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture.
4. Spoon batter into a 10-inch tube pan coated with cooking spray, and spread evenly. Bake at 350° for 1 hour or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan for 10 minutes on a wire rack, and remove from pan.

For Strawberry Shortcake Kabobs

1. Alternate putting pound cake cubes and strawberries onto skewer or popsicle stick.
2. Drizzle with melted white chocolate and/or milk chocolate.