This isn’t a recipe that I just came up with out of the blue. I’ve actually been making this for husband for ages. For many years he was a vegetarian and so I was always trying to come up with new and exciting recipes that would offer him protein and vegetables (unlike me, a total carnivore at heart). This dish is now a regular in our house. There’s almost always a bowl of it in the fridge because it’s so quick and easy to prepare, but it’s also healthy.
Quinoa (pronounced KEEN-wah) is a fantastic grain for kids because it has more protein then other grains, contains more calcium then milk, plus it’s easy to digest. Quinoa is also full of B vitamins, vitamin E and iron which 9% of toddlers, 700,000 in the U.S. alone have shown to have to be deficiency in.
I made this for my “kids dinner party” recently and all the little ones loved it. One of my friends kept saying her daughter “hates avocado”. Being kind of sneaky (I know! I’m all against sneaking foods, but this was just an experiment, I swear!), I asked her daughter if she wanted a bite of the quinoa mexicana salad and she said yes. When I tell you she gobbled up this dish AND the avocado it proves that sometimes, even little ones can be open minded to new flavors. You just never know.

Quinoa Mexicana Salad (makes 6-8 toddler servings)

1/2 Cup Quinoa, washed and drained
1 Cup Water
1/2 cup fresh or frozen Corn, cooked
1 Avocado, chopped
1/2 Cup Cherry Tomatoes
1 Tbsp Lime Juice
1 Tbsp Olive Oil
2 Tbsp Cilantro, chopped
1/4 Tsp Cumin
Salt to taste

1. Bring the water and quinoa to a boil in a saucepan.
2. Reduce the heat to a simmer and cover for 15 minutes.
3. Place the quinoa in a bowl and cool.
4. Add the remaining ingredients and stir to combine.
5. Serve.

In my ongoing quest to find foods that are both healthy and easy for toddlers 
to hold themselves, I decided to make falafels for Kenya. The only 
trick to this dish is to make them suitable for his little taste-buds without having to fry them in gallons of oil like most falafel recipes call for.
Falafels are made with a base of garbanzo beans, a legume also known as 
chickpeas. Have you ever looked closely at a chickpea? Some say they 
look like a chick’s beak, hence the name. Beak or no beak, they’re a powerhouse of 
fiber. Fiber is an important part of a little one’s diet because it tends to fill them up longer then other foods, giving them energy to run around and 
play. Garbanzo beans are an excellent vegetarian source of protein and are 
high in calcium, magnesium and folate.
I also added a little yogurt dipping sauce alongside this recipe which boosts the nutritional content of the meal even more and adds a little fun for the kids. Now, if I can only 
get my husband out of Kenya’s food, which is slowly becoming “their” food. My husband figures that if what Kenya’s eating is super healthy, he wants to eat it too. Like father, like son. Or should I say, like son, like father?!

Falafel (Make 14 Mini Falafel)

1 1/2 Cup Chick Peas, cooked
1 Garlic Clove
1/4 Cup Onion, chopped
1/4 Cup Cilantro, chopped
3 Tbsp Flour (I used whole wheat, but you could also use white flour)
1 Tsp Baking Powder
1/2 Tsp Cumin
Olive Oil

1. Place the first 7 ingredients in a food processor and puree. Make sure the mixture is throughly combined. Scrape down the sides of the mixture as needed.
2. With moist hands (so the mixture doesn’t stick to your hands) form patties with about 1 tablespoon of the mixture and place on a plate while you form the remaining patties.
3. In a medium saute pan, heat around 2 tablespoons of oil over medium heat. You want the pan to have a thin coating of oil.
4. Add half of the patties to the pan and saute for 4 minutes on each side or until golden (you may have to add a little more oil if your pan get too dry).
5. Remove the patties from the pan and place on a paper towel lined plate (to absorb any extra oil).
6. Cook the remaining patties.
7. Cool and serve with yogurt sauce.

Yogurt Tahini Sauce (Makes a little over 1/2 Cup)

1/2 Yogurt
1 Tbsp Lemon
1 Tbsp Tahini (if your little one has a nut allergy, you could leave this out)

1. Place all the ingredients in a bowl and stir to combine.

Recently I’ve gone on a “protein kick” cooking for Kenya. Chicken, beef, fish, but what about beans. Some people dread cooking beans because they think there are too many steps in the preparation. That’s where lentils come in handy. When mixed with a grain they become a protein and lentils are packed with iron, important for the creation of white blood cells and antibodies. Iron is more readily absorbed when eaten with vitamin C, so I added tomatoes to this dish.

*Don’t be freaked out by the purple color in the dish. I used purple cauliflower.

Indian Lentil Stew (15 Baby Servings, freeze 1/2)

1 Tbsp Onion, chopped
1 Garlic Clove, chopped
1 Tbsp Olive Oil
1/4 Cup Brown Rice
1/4 Cup Lentils
1 1/2 Cup Water
1/4 Tsp Cumin
1/4 Tsp Curry Powder
1/2 Cup Tomatoes, canned or fresh
1/2 Cup Cauliflower

1. Heat oil in a 2 quart saucepan and saute onion and garlic until soft.
2. Add water and bring to a boil.
3. Add lentils, cumin and curry powder. Cover and simmer for 50-60 or until soft.
4. 10 minutes before mixture is complete, add tomatoes and cauliflower. Cover.
5. Puree mixture until smooth.
6. Cool and serve

I took a baby nutrition class yesterday that I was so excited about. Sadly, it was totally uninsperational. Someone asked the teacher about turning babies on to spices and she said “maybe you can put in a pinch if it’s part of your culture”. Really!? When I go out to dinner I can’t wait to try Mexican, French, Thai, anything and everything that’s new and exciting especially when it comes to dishes with complex flavors. Why shouldn’t babies be turned on to interesting new tastes. In this dish I put curry, cumin and coconut, 3 things that turn a blah dish into something exciting. Any time Kenya tries Indian food he gobbles it up.

Indian Fish (10 baby servings)

1 Cup Coconut Milk
1 Tsp Curry
1/2 Tsp Cumin
1/2 Potato, peeled and cubed
1/2 Cup Cauliflower
1 Tilapia Fillet (any whitefish will do)
1/2 Cup Frozen Pea

1. In a saucepan, bring coconut milk and spices to a boil. Add potato and simmer for 2 minutes.
2. Add cauliflower and cover 2 more minutes. Add fish and cover for 3 minutes.
3. Put all ingredients in a food processor and puree until smooth.
4. Cool and serve.
*If mixture is still too thick, add hot water to thin.