What I'm Cooking
Carrot, Apple, and Oat Chicken Nuggets. I've been skeptical of making my own chicken nuggets before, but using ground chicken made all the difference. The texture isn't right when you just cut up chicken; that's a chicken bite, not a chicken nugget. These took forever to make -- mostly because I make my own bread crumbs, and I didn't make enough the first time around, but I did dump the food processor in the sink, so then I had to wash it before I could make more crumbs, and in the meantime the older boys were goofing around at dinner and Silas was just-before-bedtime cranky and Isaac was out of town and couldn't help. But they were a huge hit, and I'm super happy about having a big Ziploc bag full in the freezer for future lunches.
Tamale soup. A recipe from a mom of some of my former piano students. Super easy: 1/2 pound browned ground turkey, 1 can diced tomatoes, 1 jar salsa, 1 can tomato soup (OR tomato paste), 1/2 tsp garlic salt, some chili powder (I love it, so I use almost a full tablespoon), 4 cups water. Simmer away. Add a small bag of frozen corn 20 minutes before serving. Top with whatever makes you happy. We do cheese and tortilla chips, but if you're into sour cream or avocado, go for it.
Breakfast cake. Isaac's back from a week-long conference in Nashville, which totally calls for cake for breakfast, don't you think?
What I'm Doing
Experimenting with Silas and solid food.
Talking about the four seasons with Levi and Owen. (Funny how the weather did a 40-degree swing this week, which had us outside in sweatshirts and stomping in the snow within 3 days of each other. I couldn't have planned that.)
Taking Levi to the Cincinnati Pops for the second time. This concert wasn't a huge success -- too loud? too stimulating? not sure -- but maybe I'll write more on that later. He was very happy to be out with "just Mommy," though, and we had a nice time together.
Favorite Pin: Downton Abbey Flow Chart (or see it here, if you're not on pinterest)
Favorite Blog Post: Homemade Lip Gloss from Our Best Bites. Nothing extraordinary here, but it came on a day when I was desperately hunting for my missing chapstick*. Hooray for having coconut oil, beeswax, and vitamin E oil on hand. I didn't even bother flavoring, and I only used a tiny bit of each amount to fill one old chapstick* container.
*I'm using the word "chapstick," but the truth is, my former favorite is Blistex Complete Moisture. And then suddenly about six months ago -- pregnancy, perhaps? -- I couldn't stand it anymore. Fortunately, a dear friend had sent me a care package including some Burt's Bees, which I really really loved, but then I lost it. But now I can make my own whenever it suits me! . . . or whenever I lose the current tube, which is fairly frequently.
Carrot, Apple, and Oat Chicken Nuggets. I've been skeptical of making my own chicken nuggets before, but using ground chicken made all the difference. The texture isn't right when you just cut up chicken; that's a chicken bite, not a chicken nugget. These took forever to make -- mostly because I make my own bread crumbs, and I didn't make enough the first time around, but I did dump the food processor in the sink, so then I had to wash it before I could make more crumbs, and in the meantime the older boys were goofing around at dinner and Silas was just-before-bedtime cranky and Isaac was out of town and couldn't help. But they were a huge hit, and I'm super happy about having a big Ziploc bag full in the freezer for future lunches.
Tamale soup. A recipe from a mom of some of my former piano students. Super easy: 1/2 pound browned ground turkey, 1 can diced tomatoes, 1 jar salsa, 1 can tomato soup (OR tomato paste), 1/2 tsp garlic salt, some chili powder (I love it, so I use almost a full tablespoon), 4 cups water. Simmer away. Add a small bag of frozen corn 20 minutes before serving. Top with whatever makes you happy. We do cheese and tortilla chips, but if you're into sour cream or avocado, go for it.
Breakfast cake. Isaac's back from a week-long conference in Nashville, which totally calls for cake for breakfast, don't you think?
What I'm Doing
Experimenting with Silas and solid food.
Talking about the four seasons with Levi and Owen. (Funny how the weather did a 40-degree swing this week, which had us outside in sweatshirts and stomping in the snow within 3 days of each other. I couldn't have planned that.)
Taking Levi to the Cincinnati Pops for the second time. This concert wasn't a huge success -- too loud? too stimulating? not sure -- but maybe I'll write more on that later. He was very happy to be out with "just Mommy," though, and we had a nice time together.
Favorite Pin: Downton Abbey Flow Chart (or see it here, if you're not on pinterest)
Favorite Blog Post: Homemade Lip Gloss from Our Best Bites. Nothing extraordinary here, but it came on a day when I was desperately hunting for my missing chapstick*. Hooray for having coconut oil, beeswax, and vitamin E oil on hand. I didn't even bother flavoring, and I only used a tiny bit of each amount to fill one old chapstick* container.
*I'm using the word "chapstick," but the truth is, my former favorite is Blistex Complete Moisture. And then suddenly about six months ago -- pregnancy, perhaps? -- I couldn't stand it anymore. Fortunately, a dear friend had sent me a care package including some Burt's Bees, which I really really loved, but then I lost it. But now I can make my own whenever it suits me! . . . or whenever I lose the current tube, which is fairly frequently.
Hi Christy, our daughter did baby-led weaning for much the same reason as Silas. She refused all purees etc until, at 7 months, she grabbed a piece of garlic bread and ate the lot. We found wedges of cucumber, cheese, broccoli (boiled until it's quite soft), potato, beans, strawberries and pasta were favourites. She had a corn on the cob at about 9 months and adored that - and still does! She also loved to have meat - chicken was a particular favourite.
ReplyDeleteShe really liked to be able to hold fruit and chew into it - plums, apples, that sort of thing - she preferred to gnaw at a whole fruit rather than eat it chopped up. Her favourite foods were cool and juicy (e.g cucumber, tomatoes, apples); she had her full set of teeth by 13 months, so I think she liked things that felt quite soothing on her gums.
When she first started eating, she would sometimes make choking sounds when she put food into her mouth - but we could always see the food on the tip of her tongue. However, after a week or so, she didn't do that any more and . She seemed happier to have big wedges/sticks that she could hold rather than smaller pieces.
When she was about 9/10 months, she started eating yoghurt but didn't want to eat it from a spoon. She preferred those little sachets that she could suck from. In fact, the only time she ever ate pureed fruit or veg was if we gave her the odd sachet - never from a spoon!
Now, as a two and a half year old, she eats almost anything. The foods she doesn't like tend to be more based on texture (e.g. she doesn't like cake / cakey texture). She is also very good at regulating how much she eats because, from the start, she controlled her appetite.
Good luck, hope that it goes smoothly!
Maria
PS she wouldn't eat bananas until she was nearly 18 months old!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the good ideas! I never would have thought of cucumber. Silas has been loving apple slices, though last night he managed to gum off a sizable chunk that he nearly choked on. We do have a few fruit and veggie pouches that I'll have to try -- might save them for when he can hold on himself a little better, though.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if there is any correlation between getting teeth early (earlier) and not wanting purees. Both of my other boys were almost a full year old before they got their first tooth. Silas is already working on his second tooth. Just a theory.
Anyway, I'm glad to know we're not alone, and it's so helpful to hear your ideas! Thanks!!
Christy