I’ll start with the “recipe” because I hate scrolling paragraphs after paragraphs that I don’t want to read. BUT keep in mind that my recipes will not likely have a specific measurements. On this site, I really want to emphasize of making cooking less stressful. No strict measurement. Replace with whatever veggies (though some will work better than another). The worst thing about recipes is having to run out to get the one missing ingredient that you need 1/2tsp of, especially when you don’t have time for that. If you’d like to go on to read further details or back stories, please read on!
You will need :
Squash or sweet potato or some sort of veggies cooked to mush to somewhat mush, but you could change it up depending on your baby/kid’s age and what you’re comfortable with.
maybe onion if you have it
whatever the heck you want your baby to eat
cooked quinoa
a bit of baking powder (possibly optional)
flour, whole wheat (or not)
egg or egg replacer
salt and pepper to taste
For this particular batch, I used kabocha squash and finely chopped onion, cooked/steamed in the microwave until soft. I kept the kabocha skin on because it’s awesome. Quinoa-maybe like 1/2 cup. 1/2tsp or so of Baking powder. 2tbsp or so of whole wheat flour. Originating from my Japanese background and Japanese style babyfood making, I still keep the seasoning for my younger (currently 15m old) quite minimal. Maybe a smidge over a sprinkle, because she started getting tired of completely bland and I would like her to explore more flavor now. Just enough for her to taste it and like the food, but not love the seasoning.
Our older has no food allergies but this one has a bunch, so I’m using the egg replacer, which I’ll put the details later. I used the equivalent of 1 egg, mixed with 2tbsp of water. I mixed the mush together. I Just so you get to a pasty consistency. If it’s too dry maybe you can add some milk or milk alternative. You don’t want it to go watery or too dry, hmm…not school glue, not diaper paste. Somewhere in the middle. Soft cookie dough? Raw meatball? Something like that. I’m great at explaining, aren’t I *shakes head*
Heat up a skillet, spray oil, fry the batter! You can drop a spoonful directly, you can roll it in a ball and smoosh it so it’s more rounder. Whatever works, whatever size you want. In the end you just want to cook it until they’re nice and brown and firm enough for the kid to hold. If you used an egg replacer, everything should be cooked so rawness shouldn’t be a problem…if using egg-eggs, its like pancakes.
BTW I just made some and forgot to add baking powder. It was maybe a tad flatter/less fluffier, but I don’t know, it may not be necessary. You probably need flour to bind the ingredients up a bit more than just quinoa and veggies, but baking powder maybe optional.
Back story is… Our younger has a bunch of food allergies we’re working on. Egg, milk, peanuts, some tree nuts and sesame…I hope that’s the entire list and she can outgrow some, but we can only cross our fingers. Of course, because life is just like that, she LOVES eating, way more than her big sister who has absolutely no food allergies. She’d eat anything. But, like many toddlers, she loves those dang wheat ‘o’ cereals and bread. I’m sure she loves the autonomy of feeding herself. I make our bread now so I’m a lot less reluctant to feed it to her, but I mean…bread is just bread. I’d rather her have other nutrients. That’s why I’m consistently in search of “bread like food that has good stuff in it”. With our first, I’d do this because she won’t eat much veggies and fruits. For this one its more “she’s gonna eat, might as well put some more healthy in it because there a bunch of things you’re missing out on”.
I’m sure if you’re dealing with egg allergies you’d at least heard of this by now, but Bobs Red Mill Egg Replacer has been great. I wish it was good for omelette and stuff but alas we’re not there yet. Maybe one day people will come up with something. This is only good for baking and binding, but still! 1tbsp this + 2tbsp water is 1 egg equivalent. You could use flax egg, I do sometimes, but this makes it a bit easy.
Here we go. Does she like it…? So after I served both kids and sat down I realized that I served rice (Japanese blood automation) and served quinoa so it was a bit of a grain heavy dinner. Whoops. But hey if it wasn’t the quinoa she’d ask for bread so…eh.
Anyways, she liked it so much that she went for it, finished them and asked for more, was reluctant to try the other stuff, she put them in her mouth and realized they were also food, and ate most of the rest and some pineapples. Kid, where does all the food you eat go!?
Anyways, win!
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