Carrot Tomato Comfort Soup

My daughter loves tomato soup and this variation is great on days she's not feeling so great. It's filling and hearty. I make it all in the Brezza but in can easily be made by steaming the veggies and puréeing using other methods.

Yields 2 Servings

Ingredients:
-1 c baby carrots
-1 large tomato (peeled and chopped)
-2 oz heavy cream
-1 tbs parmesan cheese
-1/2 tsp lemon juice
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
1) Clean veggies. Peel and chop tomatoes. I leave seeds in because they all get pureed to oblivion.
2) Steam carrots for approximately 15 minutes until tender. Drain liquid.
3) Add tomatoes to carrots and steam all for an additional 15  minutes. You want carrots very tender to make a smooth soup.
4) Puree tomatoes and carrots. Add all remaining ingredients and puree until smooth. If needed, add a splash of water to create desired soup consistency.

Pesto

It's Wednesday, which means produce delivery at our house. This is one of those weeks when I just didn't have time to check out what was coming in our box and I was so excited to see all the goodies. Really, fresh strawberries, cherries, apriums, and peaches! Oh yes, and there were plenty of veggies too. Before I get on with one of my favorite easy recipes, here's a look at what was in my Abundant Harvest Organics box.

Ok, on with the PESTO! Included in my box were basil and green garlic, great items for pesto. To make pesto, you'll want to be able to blend all these yummy ingredients somehow (food processor, hand blender, Brezza)

Ingredients:

-1 bunch basil
-2 heads of green garlic (or 2-3 cloves)
-5 tablespoons olive oil
-1 lemon

-2 tablespoons parmigian cheese

-pinch of salt

Directions:

1) Remove basil leaves from stalks and wash them

2) Cut the ends of the green garlic so that you have just the white part of the green garlic (Confused? Check out the pic)

3) Combine all ingredients in food processor, bowl (if using a handblender), or my favorite the baby Brezza

4) Blend in pulses, add extra olive oil if consistency is more dry than paste-like

5) Serve however you like it! Over whole wheat pasta is our favorite way. My 12 month-old loved this, surprise, surprise!

Variations- Add nuts for a little crunch. If I wasn't giving this to our 12 month old, I would have added in almonds or pine nuts in the blending stage, it adds a little crunch to the texture. Sometimes I also add chopped green olives as well, but if you do so balance the saltiness with a bit more lemon juice. Wanna be sneaky, add in a cube (or two) of your pureed greens to warm pasta then toss in the pesto... trust me, know one will know.

Steamed Daikon Radish & Sweet Potato

First, taste test your daikon radish to test for peppery flavor. The long-thin ones are often very mild tasting with no peppery zing familiar to radishes.

First prepare the radishes, by gently washing and peeling. Trim off both ends of the radish. Cut into small bite-size chunks. Steam until very tender (in my Baby Brezza, this takes about 15 mins). Test a piece by seeing if it will mash easily with a fork. While these are good all by themselves, I like to serve them along with sweet potato or apple.

Apples, and carrots, and cabbage, oh my! (Baby Food)

Ingredients:
- 2 apples
- 1 carrot
- 1/4 head small cabbage (our whole cabbage was about softball sized)

Yields: About 10 oz

1) Wash/clean, peel, and chop ingredients
2) Put about 1/2c water (or enough to cover about the bottom of the pan by about 1/2 an inch) in a medium sauce pan, place steamer basket in pan
3) Put chopped carrot in pan, cover, steam for 10 mins
4) Add chopped apples to pan, cover, steam additional 10 mins
5) Add chopped cabbage (or greens) in pan, cover, steam additional 10 mins
6) Check veggies, carrots and apples should easily pierce with fork. Cabbage leaves should be semi-transluscent
7) Remove from heat and remove lid from pan
8) Puree cooled veggies using hand blender or food processor

Another option, is to steam and puree these foods separately and experiment with ratios, this may be especially helpful if you have a picky eater that may be sensitive to new flavors. Also, if you have a little one prone to a lot of gassiness you may want to try lesser amounts of cabbage or subsitituting a different leafy green.

Carrots as a first finger food

Our 10 month old wants to be a big boy and eat on his own! So, just when I've got my baby food making down, now it's time to experiment with finger foods and new textures. See guidelines for finger foods here: http://kellymom.com/nutrition/starting-solids/finger-foods/.

I've started with carrots from our produce box and our little guy loves them. He is very excited to feed himself!


Finger food carrots for older infant

Ingredients:
-2 carrots

Directions:
1) Wash, peel, carrot
2) Slice into approximately 1/4 inch slices
3) Cut each slice into quarters or sixths (small chunks pea-sized or smaller)
4) Steam in steamer basket until easily pierced with a fork (approximately 15 mins) I steam on med-low heat, in a medium-sized pot with approximately 1/3-1/2 cup water, with pot covered.5) Test mushiness but taking out a few chunks and mashing them with a fork. The chunks should mash with little effort. This is important, you want your baby to be able to easily mash the carrots with their gums, otherwise, there is a choking risk.
6) Cool and serve (or store)

"Really Ugly Apples" = Really Tasty Applesauce

I love when Squeeze Play and Abundant Harvest Organics have deals on "ugly" and "really ugly" apples. These are apples that are cosmetically, not so cute. But in their imperfection are just as tasty as the so-called pretty apples. Last week I got an amazing deal on a 10 lbs bag of "really ugly" apples, so it's apple sauce time!

For a large batch, first I wash, peel, and chop the apples. I'll steam apples in a pot with a silicone steamer basket and shallow water. I put about 1/2 of an inch of water in the bottom a pan. I put chopped apples in the steamer basket, and steam on the stove top for about 10 mins. After that, I let the apples cool. I then put the apples in a large mixing bowl and mash them using my trusty hand blender. My variety is the Juiceman hand blender. It's got plenty of power and mushes things up pretty well.

For smaller batches, I use my trusty Baby Brezza. Again, wash, peel, and chop into bite size pieces. I set the the machine to steam/blend for 20 mins.

I don't season my apple sauce because I think it's delicious as-is, but these would be yummy with a bit of cinnamon too!

After that, I fill up ice cube trays with the apple sauce. Once frozen I pop out the cubes into freezer bags to be used as needed.

Here's a picture of my Baby Brezza in actioun making apple sauce for me.

The produce holy trinity - getting started with baby food

What I call the baby food "holy trinity" is basically my produce must-haves for baby food and really it's pretty simple...

*Something orange
*Something green
*Something sweet

I always have something from each of these categories on hand or in the freezer.

Here are my examples from each category.

*Orange*
Sweet potato, butternut squash, carrots, pumpkin, persimmon

*Green*
Spinach, kale, chard, collard greens

*Sweet*
Apples, bananas, pears

For small infants, it's often recommended to start slow and with single food items at a time. There are many guides available online as to how/when to introduce single food items. One thing that is good to note, with my daughter I started with rice cereal instead of veggies. I'd heard and even read that starting off with a mild grain cereal was best. But in a few short years, thoughts about that seem to be changing. Before introducing solids (at age 6 months) to my son, I did some research again. This time around I found more articles suggesting that there's no benefit to inroducing a cereal instead of fruits/veggies. This time around, I primarily started off with fruits/veggies and have a fantastic eater who loves his fresh purees. Could be coincidence, but I'm glad I didn't only offer cereals early on.

Now my little guy is older and can eat a more varied diet. Having one thing readily available form each of my "holy trinity" categories provides me with a nice variety to keep my little guy fed nutritiously.

Purees - Baby Food & Operation Veggie Sneak Attack

I've been blessed with one fantastic eater in our 10 month old son, and one okay eater in our 3 1/2 year old daugther. With our son, I'm able to feed him straight up fruit and veggie purees. With our daughter, we usually offer her fruits and veggies in their most purest form. These offerings are usually met with her barely touching her tongue to the fruit/veggie and quick "no thanks, momma." So, we have to be a bit more creative with her.

Ready, set, make purees - Steam, Puree, Freeze!
Here's where purees are a life saver and work great for the whole family. I love to steam and puree fruits and veggies and keep them stockpiled. If making small to medium batches I use the Baby Brezza. It is a baby food maker that steams/purees all in one step. I love it! When making large batches of purees, I'll steam on the stove top and either use the Baby Brezza for pureeing or use my hand blender. [If using the stove top method, make sure there's enough water in the pot to steam the veggies, but not so much that your veggies or steamer basket are submergered. Also, retain some or all of the water for pureeing with the fruits/veggies to make a smoother puree.] Now for storage- for me, I find that freezing in ice cube trays make it easy for me to determine portions. Each cube makes 1 ounce of puree. Next, pop the cubes of the trays and store in freezer bags, labeled with the date they were made. A couple important notes, don't store food in the trays too long, over 24 hours or so and they can get freezer burned, move them out of the trays quickly. Also, buy a good freezer bag. Not all storage bags work well as freezer bags. So, buy a thicker bag labeled as "freezer" bags.

For the babe-When we first introduced foods to our baby, it was one fruit/veggie at a time. But now a meal is usually a combo of 3-4 cubes of different fruits/veggies, with possibly a cube of protein and/or whole grain. For example for breakfast he had- 2 cubes apple sauce, 1 cube butternut squash, 1 cube chard, and 1 cube bulgar. Zapped the frozen cubes in the microwave for 75 sec, and tada, breakfast! (So usually he eats 4-5 cubes or ounces of food per meal.)

For the preschooler (and the rest of us)- I have waged a full-on fruit/veggie sneak attack. I put purees in everything- pancakes, grilled cheese sandwiches, mac n' cheese, muffins, and on and on. Really the family pretty much can never tell, but I get the satisfaction of knowing I snuck some good stuff into them :)

Ok, last thing... do NOT get discouraged! Find a way to make a healthy eating plan work for you!

Would it work better to take an afternoon and make big batches all at once to freeze? Or, would you find it easier to make small batches while you're preparing meals on a daily basis?

You don't have a weekly produce delivery? Our produce deliveries work great for us (it's cheaper and easier than going to the store on a weekly basis, bonus that it's fresh, organic, and I know where it comes from... I could go on). But, this isn't an option for everyone. So, get your veggies/fruits elsewhere! Farmer's Market, grocery store, fresh, frozen, or even canned. Anything is better than nothing!

The big switch (to Organic Produce)

We started getting organic produce delivered to us back in the fall. I love, love, love our service. It also helps that around that time our baby boy started eating solids, and man can the kid eat! Most of the items in our weekly delivery are predetermined by what's in season and available from the contributing farmers. I have been introduced to many produce items I'd rarely had and several I've never even heard of. I want to share what we do with some of these novel items.

But, let me start of by saying that there are several factors that made this switch to organic produce work for us. Boils down to it being affordable and convenient. It's delivered to our doorstep for a $5 delivery charge. Trust me, the gas to go to the store is more than that! I would say the next factor is a dedication to making the produce edible to my family.

So, coming soon are some of the ways I season, cook, sneak, and otherwise somehow get my family to eat their veggies! Even if you don't do organic produce, I hope the ideas will help!