The proof is in the water – why using cooking water to make baby food purees is a plus

Jul 6, 2010 Fruits and Veggies, Nutrition, freezing baby food, juice, vegetables

  Behold the glass packed full of green liquid gold!   What is this you ask?  This glass is full of cooking water from the steamed broccoli we had for dinner last night.  As I was getting ready to dump the water, I realized this was a good chance to take a photo and show you how valuable the water really is.

 This water contains many of the nutrients that leached from the broccoli into the steaming water.  Recapture those nutrients by using the cooking water to thin your homemade baby food purees whenever possible!  If you’re stewing fruits like blueberries, cherries, or even apricots and peaches, you can freeze the juicy-water and then thaw to add to other baby foods.  These frozen “juices” will give an extra boost of nutrients while adding some yum to other foods.   Thaw some peach “juice” and mix it into some chicken and rice for example. 

*Using the leftover water from steaming/boiling carrots is not a good idea until after baby is around 8 months+ due to nitrates.   Use fresh water (or another liquid) when pureeing carrots for baby food*

Tags: broccoli, juice, steaming

A very special baby food recipe for you – Food for thought

Mar 21, 2010 Baby Food Recipes Updated, Dangerous Food Items, Friendly Baby Food Advice, New Baby Food Recipes, Nutrition, Solids and Weaning

This weekend has been packed full of home DIY, including painting and carpet demolition and oh my aching back! Actually, I should say that my dear hubby, DIY king of all time – oh how I worship thee, did all of the back-aching work. With so much of a mess in the house, I had little energy for cooking and ordered Chinese take-away. Tonight I made a real meal however but didn’t take any pictures because the roast made a mess of the pan and potatoes erupted all over the stove… So I thought it might be fun to post this recipe from a neato cookbook! I’ll be curious to hear what y’all think about it

Food for a young infant –

Take of fresh cow’s milk one table-spoons full, and mix with 2 table-spoonsfull of hot water
sweeten with loaf-sugar as much as may be agreeable.

This quantity if sufficient for once feeding a new-born infant; and the same quantity may be given every 2 or 3 hours — not oftener — till the mother’s breast affords the natural nourishment.”

Thickened milk for young infants when 6 months old

Take 1 pint of milk,
1 pint of water; boil it and add 1 tablespoon of flour.
Dissolve the flour first in half a teacup of water; it must be strained in gradually and boiled hard for 20 minutes.

As the child grows older, one-third water. If properly made, it is the most nutritious, at the same time the most delicate food that can be given to young infants.

Please pick yourself up off the floor now and pop your eyes back into your head.  These 2 recipes come from the book Cookery for Children by Sarah Josepha Hale.  Ms. Hale wrote her book in 1852.

I think this is a wonderful representation of how far nutrition, particularly pediatric nutrition, has come along.  I also find this to be a wonderful item to show those family/friends who insist on telling you that feeding a baby at 8 weeks old is fine because “my grandmother fed my mom” or “my mom fed me” etc and so forth…  For sure babies survived on Ms. Hale’s recipes, and sure there probably was nothing wrong with some of those babies and they “grew-up just fine”.  Knowing what we know now, I cannot imagine anyone saying that these are great recipes to feed infants even if babies back in the 1850’s might just have “grown-up fine”; can you?

3 – 5 year old kids have brand recognition “fast food is “fun”

Mar 12, 2010 Call to Action, Nutrition

How absolutely sad and depressing! Another reason to start fresh wholesome foods early on!

3 to 5-year-olds [in this study] generally thought of fast food, for example, as “fun, exciting, and tasty”, and thought of cola brands as fun for reasons such as “the bubbles are fun,” and “lots of people like them.”

The researchers wrote: “Contrary to conclusions drawn in prior research, the present findings suggest that children aged 3 to 5 years have an emerging capacity to understand the symbols of brands for which they form part of the target segment. Preschoolers can and do judge others on the basis of brand use. This finding has clear public policy implications in relation to at least two issues: materialism and the formation of eating habits.”

Read more here