In England, "kebabs" are often viewed with a lot of suspicion ? and rightly so! Large slabs of mystery meat revolve in front of a grill, and are shaven into a stale pita with something resembling a hedge trimmer.

Ordered from dubious looking take-out places at two in the morning, by people too drunk to know better, they provide a fat-laden solution to the "boozy-night-out" munchies. In Bermuda however, kebabs are largely entirely different. Fresh chunks of fish or chicken are interspersed with vegetables, and placed on individual skewers ready for the barbeque or grill ? they're healthy easy, how perfect!

Now the concept of a healthy kebab is still fairly new to me, but it has also been totally inspirational when it comes to helping out the parents of fussy-eaters. As I mentioned last week, when trying to tempt a fussy child to try out new foods, it's absolutely crucial that the foods involved are colourful and fun. So if you are trying to encourage a reluctant child to eat, or even try, more healthy foods, then I suggest you make some fun and fruity kebabs.

Fruit is an excellent source of vitamins and minerals ? especially the antioxidant nutrients such as vitamins A, C and E, and the minerals Zinc and Selenium. The nutrients in fruit are important for boosting immunity and encouraging good growth and development. To give you some examples, strawberries are rich in vitamin C and calcium, watermelon is rich in potassium, blueberries are packed with bioflavonoids, mangoes are full of magnesium and bananas are rich in B vitamins and fibre.

But you can use almost any fruit to make a fun and healthy kebab. You must be able to chop it into bite-size pieces and you need to be able to skewer the pieces easily ? so apples, pears, peaches, pineapple, berries and bananas work well, but don't try this with a pomegranate! All you do, is load the fruit onto the skewer and then dip and roll it in something fun before eating. Try drizzling them with 1 teaspoon of honey and then rolling them in "sprinkles" such as shredded coconut, grated chocolate, finely chopped almonds or granola for added interest.

This concept is pretty foolproof, but to make sure that your fruit kebabs are fun and wildly successful, here are some tips and a simple recipe to get you going!

1. Don't cook the kebabs. No grill or BBQ to wash.

2. It's great to get children involved with choosing and loading the fruit, but if they are young, pre-chop all the fruit and supervise them as you load the fruit onto the skewers. Soft fruits (berries, bananas etc) are easier to skewer than hard fruits (e.g. apple)

3. Before eating, cut off the pointy end of the skewer and encourage children to pull off the central bits of fruit, or nibble them off ? rather than sticking half the skewer down their throat!

4. Fruit may be healthy but it is still rich in natural sugars, so don't go overboard. To limit the sugar content, try mixing high sugar fruits (bananas, melon, grapes, pineapple) with low sugar fruits (berries, citrus fruits, apples, pears and peaches). For example, you could do a banana, strawberry and apple kebab, but avoid a banana, grape and melon kebab.

5. Rolling the kebab in sprinkles is fun, but may add too much sugar for your child. For example, if your child has a tendency towards hyperactivity, or is diabetic, skip the sprinkles and serve with some unroasted nuts or a natural plain yoghurt dip instead.

6. Cover fruits that discolour quickly (e.g. apple, banana) in lemon juice to keep them looking fresh and enticing.

7. Introduce new fruits one at a time. More than one new taste can be daunting for a child ? so mix the new fruit (e.g. kiwi) with a known quantity (e.g. apple).

8. Lastly, these are aimed at children but are good for adults too!

Ingredients (makes 2)

2 wooden kebab skewers - no need to pre-soak

1 banana

1-cup strawberries

1 peach

Pouring honey

50 g dark Chocolate e.g. Lindt 70 percent cocoa

Method

l Grate the chocolate finely and place to one side

Wash and dry the fruit, remove the stone of the peach

Chop all the fruit into bite-sized pieces

Carefully load the fruit onto the skewer, arranging the fruits alternately

Cut off the pointed end of the skewer

Drizzle the kebab with one tsp honey

Roll the kebab in the grated chocolate, serve and enjoy!

PS: If the whole concept of children and skewers fills you with fear ? chop up bits of fruit and allow the children to dip them in melted chocolate instead. Messy but fun.