Futari-- pumpkin and yam stew for baby led weaning

In our final installment of Pumpkin Week, we've got another East African dish: futari. It's a wonderful stew of coconut milk, pumpkin, and yams. The pumpkin begins to fall apart and thickens the liquid a bit, while the yam retains its integrity a little better and prevents it from being entirely porridge-like. Serious comfort food! Not photogenic, however. No glamour shots this time. No photos at all, in fact: Mae took a late nap and the good light vanished before I could take a photo of her eating this. (There are leftovers; perhaps tomorrow).

There seem to be only one or two recipes for this out there on the web, and I used one of them. It does taste a lot like what I had when I visited Tanzania, so it works for me. The only change I made was to add peanut butter. The recipe I found suggests that if you don't have coconut milk, you can thin down some peanut butter with water and use that as the liquid. But seeing as I do have both, and I feel strongly that they would be yummy together, I added it in addition to the coconut milk. I was right: they are good together.  (Feel free to omit it if you want, though. I won't get mad.)

Futari

1 large onion
2 Tbs oil
2 lb peeled, chopped pumpkin
2 lb peeled, chopped yams/ sweet potatoes
2 cans coconut milk
1/2 tsp cloves
1 tsp. cinnamon
uninhibited spoonful of natural peanut butter
juice of 1 lemon
salt to taste

Heat oil in a large, deep pot. Throw your onions in and let 'em go till they're brown.  Add the cloves and cinnamon, fry briefly. Add remaining ingredients; cover and let simmer until vegetables are tender.

I think this would lend itself well to crock pot preparation, but I haven't tried it yet.

Bacon and cheddar butternut gratin recipe for baby led weaning

Ok, we're venturing a bit further from pumpkin proper here, but any good winter squash or nice fresh sliced pumpkin would work in this.  I use butternut because it's so easy to peel (and yummy).  Just as any vegetable is good roasted, I'd also contend that almost any vegetable is good slathered in cream, surrounded in cheese and, if possible, bacon, then baked.  (Maybe I should try that with beets, but they might prove the exception and just be a waste of good cheese.)(Can't risk wasting cheese).

Bacon and cheddar butternut gratin

2 strips bacon, chopped
1 2lb butternut squash, peeled, seeded, sliced into 1/4 inch thick slices
1/2 c. whipping cream
4 oz. sharp white cheddar, cubed
1/2 c. grated parmesan

Grease up a large casserole dish (the shallow rectangular kind). Preheat oven to 400.  Fry up the bacon, drain on paper towels once it's nice and crispy. In the casserole, array half of the squash slices.  Scatter the cubed cheddar over it. Cover with the remaining squash slices, douse them liberally in the cream, sprinkle the bacon and parmesan over and finish it with some freshly grated black pepper. Bake for 30 minutes until it's all brown and bubbly and irresistable.

The quantities of all the ingredients are highly adjustable-- more or less of anything. To tell the truth, I never measure with this one.   

Kibbeh(-esque) Shepard's Pie recipe for baby-led weaning

Okay, I may as well tell you up front, I have never had real kibbeh. I've just read about it. It captured my imagination and I just had to give it a try. Middle-Eastern grandmothers the world over would weep if they heard me describe this dish as kibbeh, so I won't. But it is kibbeh-ish (kibboid? kibbehsque?), with its spiced beef filling and bulgur-based topping. Just simplified a bit, and made with spices that I have on hand.  Maybe someday I'll try one of the more labor-intensive variations (dumplings!), but for now, this is more my speed.

Mess-wise, it's a 3.  It definitely required more than three wipes to clean it all up. Between the bulgur and the ground beef, there are lots of little tiny bits for Mae to drop onto her lap, into the highchair, and onto the floor.  Quite a bit of it went into her mouth, too, though, so I'd call it a success.

Kibbeh(-esque) Shepard's Pie

1 1/2 lbs. ground beef (aka 'mince')
1 c. bulgur (cracked wheat)
2 Tbs flour
1/2 onion, pureed in a food processor
1 tsp zaatar seasoning
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp cloves
black pepper, salt to taste
1/2 c. pine nuts, chopped

Put your bulgur in a medium bowl and cover it with boiling water. Let it sit a while-- at least 15 minutes. Meanwhile, brown the beef in a skillet, mixing in the cinnamon, allspice, ginger, cloves, black pepper, and pine nuts.  When it's cooked, turn a portion out into a little casserole dish for the baby, and add a bit of salt to the remaining beef if you like, and put it into a larger casserole dish.

Return your attention to the bulgur: pour it into a fine sieve and press down on it to squeeze out as much water as possible. Put it back in the bowl, mix in the onion, zaatar, and flour. It should clump together after the flour is added; use a bit more if necessary. Turn this out on top of the beef in the casserole pans and pat it down firmly. Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes (perhaps a bit less for the baby casserole). It should be a bit brown around the edges when it's done.

Cinnamon-flavored black-eyed peas

I love black-eyed peas. Love them, love them. For dinner last night, I made this recipe (reproduced below for your convenience). The only adaptations I made were to use a yellow onion instead of red, and to leave out the cilantro (because I didn't have any). And to not add the salt until the very end after I had set some aside for Mae, of course.

This is not a tidy recipe. I give it a 3 on the messiness scale. Mae enjoyed practicing her pincer grip on the peas, but it manages to be a substance that both smears around and drops in small bits to the floor. It's a good time to use a plastic food-catching mat, if you have one.  I forgot, and regretted it.

Cinnamon-flavored black-eyed peas

1 c. dried black-eyed peas
1/2 small yellow onion, diced
3 Tbs canola oil
4 garlic cloves
2 Tbs tomato paste
1/2 tsp cayenne
1/4 tsp turmeric
2 cinnamon sticks
2 bay leaves
2 cardamom pods

Thoroughly rinse the peas in water, and bring them to a boil in 3 cups of water. Simmer 35-45 minutes, or until tender. Heat 1 Tbs of the oil in a skillet and saute the onion until it's nice and brown. In a blender, puree the browned onion and garlic cloves with 1/4 c. water. Add tomato paste, ground spices, and another 1/2 c. water and blend. Put the rest of your oil in a skillet over medium-high heat; add the cinnamon, cardamom, and bay leaves. Cook for about 30 seconds, then add the spice slurry from the blender. Turn the heat down to low and simmer a bit. It'll thicken a little. Stir in the black-eyed peas, and simmer another 10 minutes or so. Remove the whole spices (good luck finding the cardamom), set some peas aside for the little one, and add salt to taste for the adult portion. Garnish with some minced cilantro if you have it on hand.  They suggest serving it over rice, but we thought it was fine on its own.

Spiced Roasted Eggplant recipe

I suppose we're reaching the end of the season for these lovely little eggplants. I couldn't resist buying them and roasting them up again, this time with spices.  I must admit that Mae hasn't had a taste yet; she got sleepy and went to bed before she could try them. Lunch tomorrow, then. 

Spiced Roasted Eggplant

8 Fairytale eggplant, or 1 small italian eggplant
2 Tbs butter
1 Tbs olive oil
1 tsp coriander
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/4 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cardamom
1-2 Tbs balsamic vinegar

Preheat your oven to 400. Compile the ground spices into one small bowl, and prepare your eggplant by trimming and cutting them in half lengthwise (or into batons if you're using a larger eggplant). Put them in a bowl and toss them with the olive oil. In an oven-safe skillet (perhaps your trusty cast iron skillet!), melt the butter. Add the spices and stir quickly for a few seconds until the spices become fragrant, then pour the mixture over the eggplant. Stir it up, and return the eggplant to the skillet. Put it in the oven and roast for about a half hour, stirring them up partway through.  Just before taking them out, sprinkle the balsamic vinegar over the vegetables and return them to the oven for 2-3 minutes to reduce the vinegar a bit.

Update: At lunch. These are definitely a 3 on the messiness scale. Well-cooked eggplant is very smeary!

Carrot Souffle recipe for baby-led weaning

Here's a good one for the younger set-- nice and soft (perhaps a bit messy), but still pick-uppable and yummy. Don't be put off by the fact that it's called a souffle-- it isn't really, since it gets some of its puff from baking powder rather than egg whites. This recipe is a long-time favorite of my in-laws-- Mae's Grammy makes it whenever the family gets together. It's easy enough for a weeknight dinner, but fancy enough for special occasions, too.  She uses canned carrots, gives it all a whirl in the food processor, and pops it in the oven. It'd be good with other veggies, too-- parsnips, winter squash, and sweet potatoes come to mind (I have tried it with winter squash-- see the variation discussed below).  The original calls for a few tablespoons of brown sugar, but I didn't miss it in the little one she baked for Mae when we visited them last week. She baked it in a 1/2 (or possibly 3/4?) cup ramekin, and Mae polished it all off (along with some kugel, roast pork, and stewed plums and apples).

Carrot Souffle

1 lb carrots, cooked and mashed (or canned)
3-4 eggs
4 Tbs flour
4 Tbs melted butter
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla

If you're using canned carrots, drain them. Then pour everything into a food processor and give it a whirl until it's nice and smooth. Pour it into a greased baking dish-- give it some room to grow, it'll puff up marvelously-- and bake at 350 for 40-50 minutes.

Variation: Use pureed winter squash or pumpkin (I don't think canned pumpkin would be very good, but then, I'm obsessed with winter squash and a bit biased. More on that come October), and add 1/4 tsp nutmeg and 1/2 tsp cinnamon.  The souffle in the picture is winter squash (Hubbard, to be precise).

Messiness rating: 3 (3+ wipe clean-up)

Roast beef

Roast beef (perhaps technically pot roast, but we always called it roast beef and so that's what I'm going to continue to call it, so there!)  is one of those dishes from my childhood that I remember us having on a regular basis. I just loved it. It's what started my enduring love affair with gravy, really. It took me a while after technically entering adulthood before I tried it myself, and then only in a crockpot. I had never understood the reasoning behind the various instructions my mother would leave me with if I were left at home to babysit the roast while she went out-- start it hot, turn down the temperature, make sure it's covered make sure there's water on it...cover it with foil, take the foil off...what?  And we never really could predict accurately when it would be done-- sometimes it went too long and was dry, sometimes it wasn't quite ready by the time we were ready to eat dinner, and was still tough. Most of the time it was juicy and tender, but there always seemed to be an element of luck to the process. As the years have passed, I've finally acquired a theory of meat, and finally felt ready to try it on my own-- just me and the oven, no Crockpot needed. (I do love my Crockpot, don't get me wrong-- it's just the principle of the thing.)

Simple roast beef

3 lb rump roast
an onion
1/2 c. water

Preheat your oven to 400.  Put the roast in a roasting pan (find one with a cover so you don't have to mess with foil like my mom always did), and salt and pepper it.  I know I'm trying to be all no-salt for Mae, but I really think a roast needs it, so to minimize her salt intake, I give her meat from the inside of the roast. (It also happens that I really like the browned bits from the outside. Isn't it nice when things work out like this?).

Ok, so you've salted and peppered it. Put it in the oven for 30 minutes to get it started browning. Meanwhile, thinly slice your onion. After the half hour, turn the heat down to 200, add the onions and the water to the roasting pan.  Then let 'er go a while. Honestly I'm still not clear on how long it should take-- I think I leave it in for 3-4 hours. I start checking it after 2 hours, and pull it out when it starts to pull away easily when you stick it with a fork.  I like it falling-apart tender.

Save those juices and make yourself some gravy.

Roasted Brussels Sprouts recipe for baby led weaning

At the farmer's market on Saturday I stumbled across the cutest little brussels sprouts and decided that if I was ever to make good on my promise to give them another try, now would be the time. So I bought a box of them and headed home, wondering where such a reckless path might lead me.  It led me, it turns out, to deliciousness.

Going on my observation that all vegetables are delicious roasted, I decided to give it a go with these, too. The generalization still stands: brussels sprouts, too, are good roasted. Of course, I didn't want to salt them, so I made a balsamic vinegar reduction and crossed my fingers hoping that it would provide the flavor needed to make them irresistable even to a skeptic such as myself. It did. Browned and a little bit crunchy on the outside, tender enough at the stem end that Mae could gum them without a problem, and drizzled in sweet and tangy balsamic vinegar...yeah, I'll be making these again.  Next week, in fact, if I can find the brussels sprouts at the market again.

Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Balsamic Vinegar

1/2 lb of the smallest brussels sprouts you can find (1/2 inch)
1/4 c. olive oil
black pepper
1/4 c. balsamic vinegar
1 small bay leaf
pinch of cinnamon

Preheat your oven to 400. In a bowl, toss the brussels sprouts with the oil and grind black pepper to taste over it. Roast for 20 minutes, giving it a good stir halfway through. They should be brown and tender when they're ready.  Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, simmer the balsamic vinegar together with the bay leaf and cinnamon. Let it go until it's reduced by half.  When the sprouts are ready, return them to their bowl and toss them with the now-thickened vinegar.

Grilled chicken with tomatillo sauce-- recipe for baby led weaning

I bought some tomatillos at the farmer's market last weekend. I've never actually managed* to make anything with fresh tomatillos before-- I'd only had green salsa sorts of things at Tex-Mex places.  Let me tell you, the fresh ones are so different! They have a natural sweetness to them that I hadn't expected based on my prior limitd experience.  I will be buying more next week, and we will be broiling us up a mess of this sauce to freeze for later.

Anyway, this recipe is adapted from one I found on epicurious. We blackened the tomatillos and peppers on the grill, used non-spicy peppers, and grilled the chicken breasts too while we were at it. I also left the salt out until the sauce was done and I could set some aside for Mae.  I put aside a couple of tablespoons for her, to go with her own little piece of non-salted chicken we had grilled and cut up for her. It wasn't enough. I mean, there was enough chicken, but she wanted to eat the sauce by the spoonful.  Mae knows good stuff when she tastes it.

Grilled Chicken with Tomatillo Sauce

1 lb husked tomatillos
2 small sweet peppers (we used half a pimento and a little red one of unidentified variety that I thought was going to be hot but really wasn't. Probably a quarter cup of peppers altogether, and we agreed that a bit more would be even better)
2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
1 Tbs olive oil
1 onion, chopped fine
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 c. fresh cilantro, chopped
salt to taste

Grill the tomatillos and peppers on a hot grill until soft and skins are beginning to blacken a bit. Under the broiler works, too. When they're done, let them cool, remove the stems, and toss them in a blender to puree them.  Get the chicken breasts on the grill-- cook till brown and mostly done.

Saute the onions and garlic. I caramelized mine-- not strictly necessary, but I do recommend it. Add the blended tomatillo mixture to the pan and simmer briefly. Stir in the cilantro. At this point, set aside some sauce for the baby and then add salt to the rest if you want. Then add the chicken breasts to the pan and simmer until they're cooked through.

* I say 'managed', because I have bought them before, but then waffled about what to make out of them until they went bad. I am ashamed.  Stop yelling at me!

Garam masala roasted sweet potato fries recipe

I have come to believe that for any given vegetable, there's no better preparation than just tossing it with olive oil and roasting it. I'm beginning to wonder why I would ever want to do anything else, unless said vegetable is meant to be a vehicle for cheese, in which case you toss it with cream and cheese and then roast it. But I digress. 

I love love love roasted sweet potatoes. I like them roasted with just salt and pepper, I like them roasted with curry powder, I like them roasted with chile powder...and on and on. But I believe I have found my all-time favorite flavor to complement the sweet potato: garam masala, a warm Indian spice blend that involves cinnamon, cardamom, clove, nutmeg, mace, chile, cumin, coriander, bay... So much flavor when combined with the browned sweet potato that I honestly did not miss the salt. I know people say that all the time, but usually, I am the sort of person who misses the salt. So it really means something, coming from me.

And, oh yeah, you can give them to your little one, too. This is a relatively tidy one for Mae-- easy to grab and eat, yet nice and soft. They keep rather well in the fridge for a couple of days, and as such lend themselves handily to grabbing if you're eating out. Case in point: some friends invited us over for dinner, and we snagged a leftover container of these (and some roasted eggplant) on our way out the door. Although we brought the plastic mat for under the highchair, we may as well not have, because nothing got dropped. I mean, her face and hands were orange (and eggplanty), but the mess was largely contained. And most of it made it into her mouth.  So go ahead and make a large batch, is what I'm saying.

2 large sweet potatoes
1/4 c. olive oil
1 Tbs. garam masala

Preheat your oven to 400.  Peel the potatoes and cut them into 1/2 inch by about 2 inch long sticks. In a large bowl, toss them with the olive oil, and then the garam masala. Spread them on a large sheet pan and bake for 35-40 minutes, until tender and beginning to brown. Give them a stir halfway through and they'll be the better for it.

Messiness rating: 1 (1-2 wipes)

Rotini with Tuna and Garlic baby led weaning recipe

I decided that Mae should eat more pasta. I haven't hardly given her any, despite the fact that pasta shapes are very grabbable, and it's a pretty easy thing to whip up.  So here's the first pasta we tried, sort of a cross between the classic olive-oil-and-garlic-tossed-with-spaghetti and, I don't know, tuna noodle casserole.  (Ok, the only resemblance to tuna noodle casserole is that it's got tuna in it. And noodles.) Simple yet tasty in the way that things with only three or four high-quality ingredients can be. No picture for this one. I'll admit I'm an amateur photographer, and I'd need more food styling experience than I've got to make this one look good. But it does taste good! And Mae loved it. I think Mae loves anything with garlic in it.

1 1/2 c. tricolor rotini
1 can tuna in olive oil
1 tsp additional olive oil (optional)
3 cloves garlic, minced
black pepper

Cook your rotini in unsalted water until tender and drain (unsalted for the sake of the infant in question; you can add salt to yours later if you want, it'll be fine. Really.)

Drain the oil off the tuna into a small skillet, add the additional olive oil to it if you've decided to go with that, and heat the skillet up over medium-high heat. Watch out for spattering if any juicy tuna bits get into it. Toss in the minced garlic and saute until fragrant and just starting to brown; pull it off immediately before the garlic burns. Toss in the tuna and rotini in with the garlic and oil.  Black pepper to taste.

Messiness rating: 2 (2-3 wipes)

Burgers for babies-- baby-led weaning hamburger recipe

Burgers! Mae's dad makes up a big batch of these and separates out a portion for Mae-- no salt, tiny little patties. Regular sized, salted ones for us. We freeze the extras (individually wrapped in Press n Seal)for quick dinners on days when we lack initiative.  They're almost like little, grilled meatloaves-- moist and tender inside, and a finer texture that plain meat patties, so it's less likely that a big chunk will break off and give Mae trouble.  Even though the ones we make for her are small and baby-hand-sized, I end up breaking them into smaller, bite-sized chunks for Mae.  She handled 'em like a champ when we had them last weekend.

2 lbs lean ground sirloin
12 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp pepper
2 Tbs dried oregano
¼ c. matzo meal
¼ c. skim milk

Just mush it all up together, form into patties, and grill till done. Or fry. Or whatever. It's a hamburger; I trust you have your preferred methods.

Yeah, Mae's dad puts cheddar and pepperoni on his. I'm a pickle, ketchup, and mustard kind of gal, myself.

Cheesy squash casserole recipe for babies

Squash casserole, that Southern classic, is one of my favorite things about summer. The original recipe involves a cup of crushed Ritz crackers, which isn't the most baby-friendly ingredient in the world (salty!), so here I've subbed in bread crumbs. Traditionally the veggies are boiled, mashed, and turned out into a casserole dish, but I save a bit on cleanup and make it tastier by sauteeing the veggies in an oven-safe pan (my trusty cast iron skillet) and then popping the whole thing into the oven. Even without added salt, this is one that tastes good to both adult and baby palates. Golden brown and delicious!

The squash mushes up readily, and Mae can grab big handfuls with no problem. Sometimes the skin of the squash doesn't mush up quite enough for her preferences, but she just spits that out and carries on.

Cheesy squash casserole

5 small-med yellow squash

1 med. onion, diced

2 Tbs olive oil

3 Tbs minced fresh parsley (or dried if you haven't got fresh)

1/2 c. bread crumbs

1 c. grated cheddar cheese

3/4 c. parmesan cheese

1/4 c. milk or cream

black pepper to taste

Add oil to an oven-safe skillet over medium high heat. Add onions. Cook until beginning to brown. Meanwhile, slice squash into thin disks-- about 1/8 inch wide. Add squash to skillet. Cook until brown -- the squash will cook down a LOT. It should all be very soft (this could take a while, but it's worth the wait). Stir in the remaining ingredients, saving a little cheese to sprinkle on top. Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes, until golden brown.