Banana Pudding Parfaits

One of my son's nutritionists suggested I make him pudding when he was going through one of his "no liquids" phases because it is a way to "sneak" liquid in and when made with whole milk or cream it can be quite calorie dense. I don't know about you, but I don't have a ton of time to make homemade pudding and every time I would go to buy a pack of jell-o pudding I would look at the ingredients on the back and put it right back onto the shelf. Luckily the other day I finally found organic pudding at the store! I was beyond excited and bought a few different flavors. First up to try was my son's favorite flavor of everything, banana.

I also knew that adding fresh fruit to the pudding would be a must to add a more nutritional value.

1 box of organic banana pudding

 Whole milk or cream

2 yellow peaches, peeled and cut into slices

1 tbls unsalted butter

1 tbls agave nectar

1 banana, mashed with a fork

Make the pudding according to the directions on the box using whole milk or cream. Follow the directions for the peach puree in the Tiny Toddler Turnovers - or better yet, use the leftover puree!

Use a small ice cream scoop or large spoon and put one scoop of putting the the bottom of 4 small bowls or ramekins. On top of the pudding put 1/4 of the mashed banana, followed by 2 scoops of the pudding. Next up is a large scoop of peach puree followed by 2 more scoops of pudding. Refrigerate for 2-3 hours and Ta-Da! Pudding parfaits. If you want to make it a little special put a spoonful of whipped cream on top :)
 

You can really use any flavor of pudding and any of your child's favorite fruit for this. Another idea - layer the pudding and fruit into Popsicle molds instead of bowls and freeze them for a healthy pudding pop in the summertime!


For a lower calorie version omit the butter and agave and use low fat milk in the pudding.

Meals For All - Pecan Tilapia and Summer Squash

The adult version of the meal

In a perfect world I only make one meal a night. It isn't usually a perfect world though. So when I come across recipes and meals that me and the hubby like and can be mashed up to a good consistency for the little one, I am all over it! Even better, this one is fish (an inexpensive fish, I might add!), uses olive oil instead of butter and my son LOVES it! 


I use a shortcut in this meal  - boxed Parmesan risotto (I use Lundberg Farms). You just can't make everything from scratch all the time! I just make sure that when I use boxed items that they are good quality and usually organic.


The first step in this meal is to get yourself a nice glass of wine. Cooking dinner is much more enjoyable when you do :)

The Summer Squash
6 - 8 summer squash of various types, cut in half and sliced

1/2 a medium onion, thinly sliced

2 tbls. olive oil

1 clove of garlic

1 tbls. butter

fresh ground salt and pepper 

Heat olive oil in large skillet over medium low heat. Add the sliced squash, onion and garlic. stir to coat with oil, dot the top with the butter and cover. Cook covered for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove cover and continue cooking 10 more minutes, turning the heat up if necessary. Add salt and pepper to taste.

 

Now start your risotto or rice and move on to the main dish...


The tilapia
3-4 tilapia fillets, washed and dried (look for any obvious bones, but in my experience tilapia does not have many)
3 tbls. olive oil

1/2 c. all purpose flour
1/2 c. very finely chopped pecans
1/2 c. garlic and herb dried breadcrumbs
1 tsp. salt
fresh ground pepper to taste
1/2 c. buttermilk
1/2 tsp. hot sauce (opt.)


Heat olive oil over medium in a large skillet. Get out 2 shallow bowls. Place flour in one of the bowls. Mix together the pecans, breadcrumbs, salt and pepper in one of the bowls. Whisk together the buttermilk and hot sauce in the last bowl. Take one piece of fish at a time and dredge in the flour, then coat in the buttermilk and finally roll the fish in the pecan mixture. Make sure each fish is good and covered, then place in the hot oil. Cook for 4 minutes on each side or until the fish flakes with a fork. Serve with lemon wedges.

For baby food - place squash, rice and a piece of fish into a food processor and puree to desired consistency, to add calories I usually add a bit more olive oil at this point to help with the puree - you could also use broth. I make sure to puree this one pretty good, just to make sure there are no large pecans left. The amounts in the menu are enough to make several meals worth for a baby - just place in ice cube trays and freeze the leftovers.

The baby food version of the meal

Farmers Market Friday

I consider myself quite lucky - I live 30 minutes from the mountains/foothills where there are apple trees, pear trees, pumpkins, mountain blackberries and 30 minutes from the hot hot valley where heirloom tomatoes, squash, peaches, plums, pluots and strawberries thrive. So the farmers markets here, although not huge, are really great. On Friday mornings there is one just down the street, so I get up, get little A fed and dressed, throw on a baseball hat and sunglasses, grab my $20 and go!

 

We wander around, try the fruits, talk to the vendors and I sip on my coffee. Today I realized that we are becoming regulars. The vendors recognize little A and give me some of my fruit free since I "buy so much from them". I buy the usual peaches, plums, apricots, tomatoes, berries and summer squash. Some days I get lucky and the vendors have fresh eggs or bread. I try to take advantage of what is in season, so during the summer I make a lot of things with stone fruit and berries - since these fruits in any other season are just not even close to being as sweet. To be honest, I would rather buy the local fruit from the farmers market than the organic fruit from a chain grocery store.

I decided that I need to buy one "new" fruit or veggie each week to try out in a recipe. I tried pluots this year for the first time and both me and little A loved them. So, today I grabbed a bunch fresh beets - complete with dirt - for the bargain price of $1. I plan on making the sweet beet cookies from weelicious.com - they look way to intriguing not to try!

What are your favorite farmers market finds?

Tiny Toddler Turnovers

Leftover pie crust + overripe peaches = one good idea

I was cleaning out my freezer the other day and came across some frozen leftover pie crust from a pie that I made a few weeks ago. In an attempt to remove as much as possible from a very overcrowded freezer I took it out and decided to find something to do with it. Enter overripe peaches sitting in the fruit bowl on my kitchen table. 

The great thing about this is that you can use ANY fruit you happen to have laying around, even frozen fruit taking up valuable space in your freezer.

3 ripe yellow peaches
2 tbls unsalted butter
1 tbls agave nectar (I used vanilla flavored because that is what I had - you could use honey or even maple syrup, too) 

1 homemade or packaged frozen or refrigerated pie crust 

1 egg lightly beaten with 1 tsp. water

2 tbls sugar mixed with 1/2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat broiler. Peel and cut peaches into slices and place in broiler-proof glass dish. Dot top with butter and pour over agave nectar. Place dish about 6 inches from the broiler and cook until butter is melted and peaches just begin to brown. Let cool slightly and run through a food processor until desired consistency is reached.

Preheat oven to 350. Flour and roll out pie crust (if using homemade roll to 1/4 thick). Use a floured cookie or biscuit cutter to cut 2-3" circles - you can use the top of a drinking glass also. 

Spoon a 1-2 teaspoons of peach puree into the center of each circle and press dough ends together, rim the edges with a little bit of water to help seal. Place on silpat or parchment paper on baking sheet.

Brush top with egg wash and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake on the center rack for 10-12 minutes - until bottom in lightly brown. Cool on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes.

These were really good for being just kind of thrown together. Stay tuned to find out what to do with the leftover peach puree (and it will explain why there is a box of pudding in the first picture)!

To make this lower calorie, omit the butter and agave.

Basic Butternut Squash

The finished product

I prefer to bake winter squashes and sweet potatoes because I think it gives them a much better flavor than steaming does. Plus peeling them once they are cooked is soooo much easier! This is a good basic recipe that I like to freeze in ice cube trays and use as a building block for little baby meals. Little A's favorite squash meal is 2 cubes butternut squash, 1 cube chicken, 1 cube corn and a little bit of shredded cheese mixed in.

1 large butternut squash

2 tbls. olive oil

Fresh ground pepper

Garlic powder

Preheat oven to 425. Cut the squash in half lengthwise and scoop the seeds out with a spoon. place then into a square or rectangle baking dish. Drizzle each half with the olive oil and sprinkle with garlic power and pepper to taste. Bake for 45-60 minutes until fork tender - depending on how big your squash is.

Let the squash cool slightly. Peel with a knife, cut into 1 inch chunks and place in the food processor. Drizzle a little more olive oil in to make pureeing easier. Thin with your child's usual milk until you reach your desired consistency.

Tropical Smoothie

I recently read a lot about coconut milk and how it is high in calories and fat but still has very healthy qualities. Perfect for my recipes - but how do you incorporate it? Even though it is unsweetened, it still has a fairly coconutty flavor. So I have been able to figure out how to fit it into a few recipes so far, this one seemed like a fairly obvious choice to start with :) My son has issues with liquids and a thick smoothie like this is good to use to teach your child how to use a straw.

This is a really easy, quick puree - no cooking is required unless you are making it for a very little one, in which case I would recommend you steam the fruit (except the banana) for about 10 minutes prior to pureeing. I use organic mango and papayas, but use regular bananas and pineapple to save a little cash. Since the skin on them is so thick and you peel them, very little (if any) pesticides get into the fruit. 

1 Mango, peeled

1 Papaya, peeled and seeds removed

1 Large Banana, peeled

1/4 of a pineapple, skin and core cut off

1/2 a 14 oz. can of full fat coconut milk

Cut all the fruit into 1 inch chunks.

Dump it all into a food processor (I use my beaba babycook, but all you need is a regular or mini food processor) and add in the coconut milk. 

Puree until smooth. You can thicken this up with baby oatmeal cereal or you can thin it down with milk and serve it in a straw cup as a smoothie. Freeze the remainder in ice cube trays.

To make a low cal version just substitute reduced fat coconut milk.

Little A's Favorite Oatmeal

A couple years ago we planted a peach tree, not really expecting that it was going to produce anything - I don't exactly have a green thumb. A few years went by with nothing and then - bam! This year...peaches, peaches, peaches! The only problem is that 40 peaches all got ripe at the same time. So I made some peach pies, and then decided to stock the freezer with little A's favorite breakfast - peach oatmeal. 

This is recipe with tons of variation possibilities - the batch featured here is made with 3 large peaches and 3 apricots. I have used blueberries, plums, pears, raspberries and a combination of fruits. This recipe will grow with your child - puree it totally smooth when they are little and gradually make it chunkier until you don't need to puree it any longer.

I add ground flax seeds to his oatmeal because they are full of omega 3s and fiber (they are also supposed to help with constipation). and add a little nutty texture.

2 cups of peeled cut up fruit or berries

3 tbls. unsalted butter, cut into pieces

2 tbls. brown sugar - you can use maple syrup or honey instead if you don't want to use sugar

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1 c. old fashioned rolled oats (not instant)

1 c. water

1 c. whole milk

2 tbls. ground flax seeds
1 large cup of hot coffee, with cream and sugar or plain - it's up to you!

Coffee? In a baby food recipe? Yep, that is for you...it is morning, and since you have a little one I am guessing you need it as much as I do! OK, now for the recipe, preheat your broiler. Put fruit in a shallow glass baking dish and dot the top with butter. Sprinkle the top with the brown sugar and cinnamon. Place about 6 inches from the broiler and bake for 5 minutes or until the top just starts to brown.

Meanwhile, bring the water and milk to a boil in a large saucepan over medium high heat. Add the oatmeal and cook over low heat for 10 minutes. 

Add the fruit mixture to the oatmeal and stir to combine, let them cook together for 2-3 minutes.

Add the flax and transfer to a food processor and puree to desired consistency - smooth for smaller babies and a little chunky for toddlers.

Spoon the left overs into ice cube trays and freeze. Another good thing about this recipe is that you can add cream to make it higher calorie and make it a little runnier or you can add in baby oatmeal cereal to make it a little thicker - or do both just to add the extra calories.

To make this lower calorie reduce butter to 1 tbls and omit the sugar or use one of the alternatives above. Use 2 cups of water and omit the milk or use low-fat milk.