Fast & easy Fruit Dessert (or snack) for Toddlers

Banana and Peach

I usually always have fruits at home for us and the little one to nibble on. Some will be eaten just in its initial form or sliced, some I might make a lovely cake of and some I just blend together to make a nice little healthy fruit purée for my little one.

Although he can chew already a purée is always nice to have for adding a bit more taste to your semolina or rice pudding or just on its own as a snack.

For making this nice dessert you just need a blender and a high jug (to avoid spilling when blending).

1 banana -> peel it and break it in chunks
3 peaches -> wash them thoroughly and also cut into chunks. You don’t need to peel the peach, first of all the skin is quite healthy for the digestive systems and you don’t loose any vitamins and secondly: you are blending it, so the skin does no bother when chewing the fruity-yummy desert.

Mix everything together until smooth – here you go. Ready steady eat :)

It’s an easy “fast food” and again, if you have any Tupperware or other storage you have enough for the next 3 days and / or can freeze it into the sized pots you like. Make sure the storage is airtight (round Tupperware) so the purée does not loose vitamins by being exposed to air.

Enjoy and Guten Appetit.

Who needs Jamie Oliver? Here is my easy meal for kids: The Higgledy-Piggledy Pot

Its sooo easy!

Here is an easy and simple way of using just what you have and still have a healthy meal for your kids. The basics like Rice, Noodles or Potatoes are usually in every household, combined with milk, tomato-sauce and some veggie and whatever you find in your fridge… *tataaa* here we have a proper dish.

I am only going shopping again tomorrow so I tell you what I did today for us. I even have enough for my boy alone for the next 3 days and some little pots leftover for the freezer to be eaten another day.

½ onion cut very fine and fry in
1 Spoon Rapeseed oil add then
2 slices bacon which you slice up very finely - bear in mind that depending on age your Toddler has not yet all his teeth and still swallows some bits wholly.

I checked our garden and found already:

3 medium sized carrots adding to the pot that fries on a low temperature
1 big potatoes chop in little cubes and add also
1 little zucchini/courgette which I will add a bit later because it will soften too much.

1 cup Rice Add to the mix in the pot with
2 cups Water (rule of thumb = 1 cup rice / 2 cups liquids)
Also I added 1 tomato (incl. skin + seeds) which is more for the consistency of the dish because it will fall apart anyway.
I cut a green pepper in fine slices and added them too.
I had also a bit of creamy soft cheese left with herbs + garlic. Again, this will dissolve in the sauce and will be absorbed by the rice and most of all adds more flavour to our little Higgledy-Piggledy Pot.

Now if you like you can add any herbs you might have. Either from your cupboard or maybe you grow them fresh in your garden or on your balcony. I added a bit of fresh Thyme and only a minute bit of Salt. Just ½ a teaspoon. Bear in mind that your Toddler does not need much salt. And having bacon in the dish is already a quite salty ingredient.

Until the Rice is soft it usually takes 20 Minutes on a lower setting. Don’t use too much temperature or the bottom will burn to the base of the pot. If the consistency is too sticky, add more water or milk to make it creamier for your child. They tend not too like it too much if it is too dry.

Note: you can use Noodles instead of Rice, organic noodles or just potatoes. Have a look around what you have and use it.

So you see: cooking is not witchcraft or science.
Be experimental, have fun with it without using complicated cooking books from fancy chefs around the world. Its soo easy, the time you wait for your fast food to arrive – the meal is ready. And you have an economic way of using simply what you have for a healthy nutritious meal.

Birthday cake for kids – our 2nd Birthday

For the birthday of our little man recently we had a big celebration with family & friends. I tried to do a “healthy” cake so I made a Choco-Biscuit with fruity Raspberry-Banana-Filling.


 

Here are the ingredients for the cake:

Mix 6 egg yolks with
4 Spoons of Cocoa powder
100g sugar and
1 spoon Lemon juice
until the sugar has dissolved and the cream has a quite foamy consistency.

 

Whisk 6 egg white until they are very stiff and add them to the egg yolk-mix.

Stir veeeery careful

Sieve 150g flour on top of it and stir very, very carefully.

The egg white should still stay stiff although it is stirred with the other ingredients. So you can guarantee a nice and fluffy Biscuit dough.

Add the dough onto a backing tray and flatten it with a spoon.

Closeup Choco Biscuit...yummy

My Tip:   

ALWAYS use baking paper when you bake biscuit. Never grease the form you put the dough into. So the dough stays nice light and airy and is “rising” to its best performance :)

Bake the cake in a fan assisted oven for about 20-30 Minutes at 160°C. Then let it cool out.

Went quite well....

... and I didn't even use a draft for it

Once the dough is cooled, cut the cake in to any shape you wish: 

that ranges from digits to animals, hobby related objects (football, tennis rack etc) or you can try to make your own Hello Kitty head. 

Let your creativity free range.

 

Then I prepared the filling. For that I used:

2 Bananas

250g Raspberries
500g greek Yogurt
1 packet ground Gelatine
3 spoons Vanillasugar

Mix all ingredients (except Gelatine) with a blender. Prepare the Gelatine according to the info on the package, let it cool down a little bit and blend it into the fruity mix. Then put it in the fridge, so the fruit mix is getting hard – best overnight.

 

Cut the 2 into half and add the fruity-yogurt-mix onto the cake. 

Then decorate the cake as you wish. I added icing-sugar and a few blue sprinkles.

 

Happy Birthday little Man :)

Veggie-Turkey-Dish for Toddlers (& Mummy's)

Here another very fast recipe for Mummy’s and Toddlers. If you use a pressure cooker / steamer it is done fast & easy, with almost no loss of vitamins and… yummy!!

 The ingredients I used were:

Only the best from our Cottagegarden

1 Onion

1 Spoon Rapeseed Oil (very rich in Omega 3+6)

300g Carrots

300g Parsnips

100g Beans

100g Peas

(All ingredients are indefinite amounts really – I had the vegetables frozen from our summer Cottage garden and used a good handful of each)

A bit of rice

A little bit of cooked Turkey breast

Grated cheese (Gouda or Parmesan or… whatever you have handy)

First I chopped the onion into little bits and fried them in a bit of Oil.

Then I added the frozen vegetables, put the lid on my pressure cooker and cooked it for roughly 8 Minutes. Once the lid can be opened again, add the turkey breast and the cheese.

Blend it with the Mixer so that the consistency is a bit softer but just so that you still have some chunky bits left. Depending on the age of your Toddler and depending how many teeth are already there :)

I added Rice to it which I had left over from the day before (you can also add noodles if you have them handy)

Rice = cold / vegetable-turkey-mix = hot -> stirred together it is a perfectly warm meal – not too hot or too cold, ready to eat for little hungry bears :)

Mum's Guide - Cooking for Toddlers - Must have's to make your life easy!

Getting started

Today I would like to share some little tips when cooking for baby's & kids.


I usually cook for a few days in advance because sometimes I am not as hungry, some days I eat in the evening with my husband or some days we just eat something which is simply not yet for our little one due to spices or the lack of a full set of teeth. The little one however needs lunch and proper nutrition and with some easy tricks it is quickly prepared.

Always handy to have are

· Some little Tupperware storage boxes for freezing or storing for the next 3 days.
It can also be a no-name brand from your local supermarket. If I have cooked more or for anything we don’t eat in the next 3 days, freezing it in the relevant portion your child is able to eat comes handy. The portion then just needs to be defrosted by putting it into the fridge a day before consumption.

· A Blender = a Mums lifesaver!
My old one gave up on me a few weeks ago so I got one from Kenwood with 3 blades. It’s a fantastic product; I love it and couldn’t live without it. Even though my boy can chew already most of the things its handy to have for making fruit-puree which he can eat either pure or you add it to semolina or rice-pudding to give it a little vitamin-lift. And if you don’t need it for baby food, well its always good to have for making a creamy soup, marmalade / jams or even part-blend salsa-dips or relishes to have a 50:50 chunky yet creamy consistency.

PS: If your child is a bit bigger and does not "love" i.e. vegetables in particular, a blender is quite handy to cover-up the healthy veggies by mixing them with the tomatoesauce in order to get the vitamins into your child.

· A Pressure-Cooker or Steamer.
As I am German I am using usually either WMF or Silit however any other brand will do. They come in different sizes depending on size of family or what you plan to cook. Don’t be afraid of any stories you might have heard regarding the pot exploding etc. These days that is very unlikely to happen. If the food is not ready or hasn’t cooled down yet enough it is not possible to open the lid except you use extremely strong force or leave the pot boiling unattended for a long while - which are both things you should never do anyways; with or without kids.

Be careful though when making fruits for compote… I once had apple mash all over my hub because I filled too much into the pot - so always follow the instructions (RTFM as they say ;)) ...

A Pressure-Cooker is SO handy for making stews, soups or even a roast and it’s quick and easy. Not to mention that you safe a lot of time and electricity (as it is faster cooked due to the pressure) which makes the investment also environmentally friendly ;)

At the end of the day no matter if a working or full-time stay-at-home Mum, we all still have our own lives and need some rest and every little help to make things easier is greatly appreciated, don't you think so too?

Creamy Dessert for Toddlers & Kids

Puree with Banana & Strawberries

Sometimes it is not easy to get fruits and vitamins into out little ones. Escpecially in the winter season this is important in order to strengthen the immunesystem - no only for your child. Here is a quick and easy trick for a nice dessert that is tasteful for all.

1 banana -> peel it and break it into bits
A handful of strawberries -> wash thoroughly and cut into halves.

Blend it all together until you have a smooth consistency - Ready :)

Using the banana gives the purée a nice consistency so the dessert is not as runny as if you would mix several “watery” fruits together. Also Banana adds natural sweetness to a maybe more “sour” fruit like a strawberry which is a complete new taste exprience for little tastebuds.

Also I use Banana as a sweetener because recent studies have shown that it is not recommended to sweeten your toddlers dish with honey unless it is 2 years of age. So in this case the banana is the healthy alternative.

Not to mention that sugar is not recommended for Toddlers anyways and believe me, they will get to the sweets counter early enough ;)

If you wish you can add some natural yogurt to the puree as well, so you have the perfect blend of vitamins and calcium your child needs for growing.

Store any leftovers or whatever you don't consume immediately by using Tupperware or any other containers you have. If the container is airtight (round) you wont loose any vitamins.