Healthy Snacks for a Valentine's Day Party

Valentine's Day provides the opportunity to get creative with snacks that show love to people's taste buds while providing healthy nourishment for their bodies. Use a combination of healthy classics and modern serving methods to prepare nutritious snacks with a few tasteful twists to make them high on the approval rating and low on the calorie count. Add this to my Recipe Box.

Flirty Fruits

Fresh fruit makes Valentine's Day appetizers colorful and healthy.

The versatility of fruits makes them ideal for cutting and shaping into desired patterns, skewering for kabobs, dipping in yogurt or grilling. Grapes, strawberries, cherries and blueberries require no preparation apart from washing before placing them on skewers for kabobs. Serving a fancy plate of melon choices becomes colorful and easy with the help of a heart shaped cookie cutter to make shapes out of juicy red watermelons, orange cantaloupes and green honeydew melons. Grilling pineapple rings brings out their taste and aroma, and almost any fruit becomes a special treat when served with fat free vanilla yogurt for dipping.

A Dipping Good Time

Brighten the look of your Valentine's Day table with freshly made dips and spreads.

Serve whole grain crackers, chunks of crusty bread, tortilla chips or a combination of all three for dipping into different creations such as fresh tomato salsa, hummus, tapenade or a ranch dip made with reduced or fat free sour cream. Use lentils, avocados, pured beets or tofu for the base of savory spreads. Brighten up the dips and spreads by serving them with garnishes such as lime wedges, fresh parsley or chives.

Valentine Vegetables

Bring an array of color to Valentine's Day snacks by serving multiple types of vegetables.

Whether cooked, pureed, mashed or served whole, vegetables can play a starring role in Valentine's Day appetizers. For a striking vegetable tray display, slice and dice brightly colored vegetables, using cherry tomatoes to form a heart shape for the center of the display tray. For a cold vegetable pizza appetizer, spread garlic seasoned Greek yogurt onto sliced squares of baked crescent roll dough, topping each square off with a variety of vegetables such as shredded carrots, diced broccoli and small bits of cauliflower.

Nutty Nuances

Toasted walnuts add a crunch to fruit whips.

People often overlook peanuts when thinking of Valentine's Day snacks, but the appeal of a miniature heart-shaped sandwich filled with peanut butter and red cherry or strawberry jelly can be irresistible. For a peanut free snack, lightly drizzle melted dark chocolate over almonds, pecans or macadamia nuts. Let the chocolate cool and harden, then mix a handful of the nuts into a bowl of fresh popcorn. A mix of toasted walnuts and sliced bananas stirred into a small amount of fat free whipped topping and garnished with a few cherries showcases a snack that manages to include sweet, salty and crunchy elements in every bite.