A busy baby week...
We've had a busy baby week - doesn't every parent? Scheduling all those extra cooking sessions really is a labour of love - but then, isn't all of parenting?This week our monkey enjoyed a variety of dishes. Some went down better than others.
Hummus
We left the chickpeas soak for aaages, as in over 24hrs, so they were nice and soft for blending. Luckily we have a kick butt juicer which doesn't just juice but can also blend. Hummus definitely didn't make it to the favourite list (yet). A bit of rice cake helped get it down easier and we ended up mixing it under some avocado the next day when it was lunchtime.Recipe was taken from Baby & Child Vegetarian Recipes by Carol Timperley
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| Moshed chick peas |
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| Hummus with rice cake |
Baby Tapas
The following day we hadn't cooked a new meal for lunchtime so decided on some quick 'tapas'. White bread with some unsalted butter, avocado blended with pear (with lots left over for the next day) and a strip of cheese to munch on. We covered plant protein with the chick peas, animal protein with the cheese and that healthy fat for growth with the avocado dip. Pear added extra vitamins. Yum. |
| The veggie baby enjoyed the various textures – as did the cat who took a good sniff at whatever landed on the floor |
Cauliflower with cheese sauce
This is a really easy recipe. Basically you make a roo (bit of melted butter, few spoons of flower mixed in until it's a nice "lump"), add around 170ml of milk and stir until it's a nice white sauce. Add some grated cheese and add to whatever steamed or cooked veg you've made. We used cauliflower but have also added this to potato, courgette, broccoli or mixed veg. Blend it for a really smooth consistency or use a potato masher for a bit more texture. |
| Cauliflower with cheese |
This is an absolute favourite with the monkey. He kept asking for more and more. In fact he didn't leave much over to put aside for another day. Success.
Quinoa pasta with Napolitana sauce
A friend of ours had just returned from Cypress where her family is from. She brought back some olive oil which her grandmother had made (in fact, our friend had helped hand-pick the olives the previous year). This felt like the perfect dish to add that extra special splash of olive oil.This is another recipe taken from Annabel Karmel's book (see resources or previous posts). Quick and easy to cook, it was a dish we all ate together by quadrupling the original recipe. A glimpse to what it will be like going back to cooking just the one family dish. We like it.
The only thing we didn't take into account was that the pasata had added sugar in it. In future we will make our own or find "plain" pasata.
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| Chopping carrot, onion, garlic... our friend's hand made olive oil and the family table. We had to cut down the quinoa spaghetti a bit for easier eating. |
