Kids

Baby food. Gaia's just loved pumpkin

After 15 days of successful fruit introduction, I started with vegetable stocks. Again, I would like to repeat that I haven’t followed to the letter any manual, letter, brochure, medical card, nutritionists’ sheets etc.. but I tried to get information from many different sources, adapting them in order to get a personal plan, prepared with love. In fact there is nothing worse than forcing a baby to eat vegetables because they are good for you and you have to (??) eat them because they are healthy.

As I prepared the first baby food for Gaia (my daughter) it was late Autumn and the most seasonal vegetable was pumpkin. As it tastes sweet and delicate, I thought that would be the best vegetable to start with. And so it was.

Personally I decided to introduce just one new vegetable every meal, but I repeat that this is just a personal choice.

I started with about 100gr of pumpkin cut into small pieces which I boiled for 30/40 minutes in 500ml of water in order to get a portion of about 180/200 gr, which corresponds to a cup. Please note that some ingredients,for example potato, absorbs more water so if you use 800ml of water.

I served the warm stock to my very hungry and very curious daughter with 20gr. of baby cereals, 1 teaspoon of olive oil and 1 teaspoon of grated parmesan cheese. 

I used the rest of the pumkin to make a soup for my husband and myself using extra vegetable stock, olive oil, parmesan cheese, a pinch of salt and some croutons.

Some alternatives:

Instead of baby cereals you could use ready prepared baby rice, multicereals and tapioca (preferable for the first meals) or millet, quinoa and amaranth but you will have to cook these first.

Instead of parmesan you can use (brewer’s) yeast flakes,a natural ingredient that helps avoid red skin spots if the baby is particulary sensitive.

You can prepare the stock in a pressure cooker with about 1litre of water for 20 minutes.

You can also prepare a double portion in order to have one ready for the next day. The stock can be stored in a glass in the fridge, as soon as it got cold.

I prepared 2 portions because I have been adding a new vegetable every 2 days.

Letizia

Helping children to enjoy vegetables ( 2)