Wednesday, September 5, 2018

COOKING RICE FOR BABY

Ingredients:
Rice - 1/4 cup
Water - 1 cup

Preparation:
Rice must be very soft to feed babies. Wash rice and  pressure cook seperately with more water. So add 4 times water for cooking rice.

Pressure cook for about 8 minutes after first whistle. When pressure settles down open and serve with any gravy or yoghurt.

Cooked rice is shown here.

Left side is the cooked rice for baby and right side rice is the normal rice. 

Tuesday, September 4, 2018

Sunday, August 19, 2018

BABY PONGAL


Ingredients:
Raw rice - 2 tbsp
Dry roasted moong dal - 2 tbsp
A pinch of cumin seeds
Peppercorns- 5
Salt to taste
Ghee - 1/4 tsp
Water - 4 1/2 times of water and dal

Preparation:
Pressure cook all the ingredients together in a steel box for 8 minutes after first whistle.

When done wait for pressure to release and remove the peppercorns..

Mash with a spoon and serve hot.

Friday, August 17, 2018

BABY FRIENDLY MOONG DAL GRAVY

Ingredients:
Moong dal - 2 tbsp
Shallots  - 2 small (finely chop)
Turmeric powder  a pinch
Cumin seeds  - a few
Ghee  - few drops (at first don't add ghee. Once the gravy is used to the baby after 4 days add ghee)
Salt a bit is enough or no salt too is good

Preparation:
Pressure cook all the ingredients together with water for 5 minutes after first whistle. 

Mash with a spoon.

Serve with idly, dosa or rice.


FOOD THAT CAN BE ADDED AT 8 MONTHS

After the baby completes 8 months we can add the following ingredients.
1. Moong dal
2. Schallots
3.Rice (Raw rice as Pongal;at 8 months and white rice with parboiled rice when the baby turns 8 1/2 months)
4.Coconut milk
5.Ghee / coconut oil
6. Fine samolina
7. Yoghurt
8. Spices like turmeric powder, cumin, coriander powder, whole black pepper, cinnamon, cardamom (remove pepper cardamom and cinnamon before feeding the baby).
9.Hard boiled egg yolks

Spices too must be given four days apart. Do not introduce at a time to find allergies.

Using these ingredients we can prepare varieties of baby friendly food of a particular cuisine. I will post a few south Indian recipes one by one.  

BEANS SAUCE FOR BABY


Ingredients:
Tender green beans - 4 to 5
Green gram cooked water- as needed

Preparation:
Steam or pressure cook beans. Meantime cook dehusked green gram and strain the water and set aside to cool. When cooled down grind both in a blender to get a smooth sauce. Add dal water little by little to get a smooth saucy texture and not runny.

Serve with soft and spongy dosa and boiled potatoes. Babies love the taste of this sauce. No need to add salt. Don't add salt until baby is 8 months old.

APPLE POTATO SAUCE FOR BABY

Ingredients:
Apple - 1/2
Potato - 1 small sized

Preparation:
Peel and slice the apple and potato. Boil with water until done.


Grind to a smooth paste with the boiled water.

Serve with idly or dosa.

DAL WATER WITH POTATOES

Ingredients:
Moong dal/ dehusked green gram splits  1 tbsp
Potato  1 small sized
When baby turns 7 months add a pinch of cumin seeds to the dal.

Preparation:
Pressure cook moong dal with water. Also peel and slice potatoes and pressure cook. I use a two layered lunch box to cook both together. Both will be ready in 5 minutes after first whistle. Lower flame to medium after first whistle.



Filter the water and mix add to potato pieces.



Serve with idly or dosa.



Thursday, August 16, 2018

BABY'S MENU AT 7 MONTHS

As baby has already started to have mashed fruits and vegetables, now it's time to introduce few more food items. We are a south indian family and so my babies had south indian cuisine based food items. At 7 months itself started to introduce indian based food.
1. Idly
2. Dosa/oothappam
3. Idiappam
4. Aappam / vattappam (same as aappam but a little thicker batter steamed in a plate)
5. Mung dal / masoor dal cooked water
6. Tender beans ( tender and seeds are not started to develop yet)
7. Any 6 months old food if not introduced earlier
Or introduce any soft food with these ingredients from your cuisine. If we think about giving our kids a food which is easily digestible then we could be able to create new recipes. 

I have created lots and lots of new recipes according to the taste of each kid. After my first baby I cooked what she likes. But after my second one started to have solids most of my daughter's taste didn't suit his taste. So again I started to create new for him. 

Now my third one started his solids. Now itself I could see that he is different from his brother and sister. So again my new findings started.

Sunday, July 29, 2018

7 COLORED RAINBOW CAKE ON MY DAUGHTER'S 7TH BIRTHDAY

My daughter loves surprises. She wanted surprise cakes on her birthdays which I bake and decorate for her. So I decided to make her seventh birthday special by making a seven colored rainbow cake. This was in October 2016. Just 6 days back we moved to a new apartment in a new place. So most of my kitchen gadgets didn't reach me yet. I prepared this only with hand whisk and so the cake was dense. But still she was very much happy for the special treat.

We need 7 layers but I had only two 20 cm cake pans. So I prepared batter four times and baked the cake. For two layers we need these ingredients below.

Ingredients for two layers:
Egg - 1
Butter at room temperature - 1/4 cup
Sugar - 1/2 cup
Flour - 1 cup
Milk - 2 tbsp
Vanilla essence - 1 tsp
Baking powder - 1 tsp

Food colors:
Red, Orange, Yellow, purple, green, blue. For indigo I mixed blue and purple.

Other than these we need buttercream to decorate the cake.

Preparation:
Beat together sugar and butter. Add egg and beat until fluffy. Mix baking powder and flour and sieve together once. Now add this dry mixture to the egg mixture. Now add vanilla essence and milk. This batter will be thick. But it bakes to a softy spongy layer, Mine is not fluffy this time as i just whisked using wire whisk. The egg mixture must be fluffy, so that cake turns good.

Now divide the batter into two and add food colors. Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes.

Repeat for other colours too. I baked cupcakes using the extra portion of batter after the seven layers.

Prepare buttercream and divide into eight. Mix in the food colors to get rainbow colors.
Leave one bigger portion without adding colors.

Arrange the layers one by one by placing same coloured buttercream in between. Finally coat with white buttercream and decorate.

I created rain bow design and a garden with rainbow colored flowers. Add sprinkles and wait to surprise the birthday girl.




Monday, July 23, 2018

MASHED TAPIOCA WITH COCONUT MASALA

There are many types of mashed tapioca mash. This is the method which my mother used to prepare. I love this the most. I tried to prepare the same many times and never got the real taste. This time my mother came to visit us and she prepared  this. 

Ingredients:
Tapioca - 1 big sized 
Oil - 1 tsp
Mustard seeds to season
Curry leaves  - 1 sprig
Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
Salt to tatse
Ginger - about 2 mm slice
Green chili - 1
Tamarind - 1 small piece
Water  - 3/4 cup


Preparation:
Cut Tapioca into pieces and boil in water with a pinch of salt. Grind all the other ingredients with salt to taste to a coarse paste.

Heat oil in a pan and splutter mustard seeds. Add curry leaves and add the masala. Add water and mix with masala. When the masala mix comes to boil add boiled tapioca and mash with a spoon.

When the mixture slighty thickens but still little semi gravy consistency turn the heat off and set aside. This thickens after some time.

Serve hot with fish curry or meat curry. Or simply with thick coconut thuvayal.

Thursday, July 19, 2018

SWEET POTATO CARROT SOUP FOR 6 MONTHS OLD

Ingredients:
Sweet potatoes - 1 small piece
Carrot - 1 medium sized


Preparation:
Peel and slice sweet potato and carrot. Boil in a pot in water until done.



When cooked well, cool and grind in a mixer grinder jar to a smooth paste. 



Add cooked water to thin the soup to a soupy consistency. If more water needed add some boiled and cooled plain water.

Serve warm.

Note: Sweet potatoes give a creamy texture and taste. So no need to add potatoes.

Wednesday, July 18, 2018

BABY MASH AT SIX MONTHS - DIFFERENT MASH IDEAS

At 6 months we could introduce only a few food items. But the baby asks for new taste everytime. So we need to blend few food together to get a new taste.

1. Potatoes and carrots
Potatoes and carrots go well together. Puree together or just keep both purees aside and feed alternatively.

2. Potatoes and apples
Potatoes and apples together tastes very yummy. Follow the same method as given above.

3. Carrots and apples
Carrots and apples too go well together. Puree together and it tastes very nice.

4. Banana with apples or sweet potatoes
Banana tastes alone better than together. But if you would like to mix then it goes nice with apples and sweet potatoes.

5.Avocados with any fruit or vegetable
Avocados tastes better alone very nicely but goes better with any fruit or vegetable.

6.Rice cereal with carrots or sweet potatoes
Prepare rice porridge and then mix with carrot or sweet potato mash. This tastes very nice.

7.Sweet potatoes with every food
Sweet potatoes tastes yummy alone. But it goes better with any of the other mash.

Try these and your baby will love every meal time.

BABY'S FIRST MASH HOW TO COOK AND MASH

We must cook baby food very carefully. Vegetable or fruit to be cooked must be cooked well. Also in the beginning food must be thin enough for the baby to swallow easily. There are three methods to cook baby food.

COOKING

Method 1: Pressure cook


I prefer this method as nutrients are retained more than any other method. First peel the vegetable or fruit. Just place the vegetable or fruit inside a steel tiffin box. Close and pressure cook as usual. Time depends on the vegetable and the size of chunks.



















Here I gave pictures of apple and potatoes.


Method 2: Steam cook


We can chop or slice the vegetable and steam until it's just done. Don't forget to peel the skin.

Here I steamed sweet potatoes.

Method 3: Boil in water


We can cook the vegetable or fruit in enough water until just done. First peel the skin and then cook. Here I gave pictures of cooking carrots in water.


MASHING


To mash the food we can follow two methods.

Method 1: Grind in a blender

Grind to a smooth paste in a mixer jar. If necessary to thin then add boiled and cooled water or the water used to cook (if cooked by third method. Otherwise pressure cooked or steamed means don't use the same water).

Method 2: Press through a sieve

Pass the food through a fine sieve by pressing using a spoon. I prefer to mash potatoes using this method only after baby is already used to the method 1. Because in this method the mash will not be soft. If necessary to thin then add boiled and cooled water or the water used to cook (if cooked by third method. Otherwise pressure cooked or steamed means don't use the same water).