Chicken Puree

Back in the pregnancy days, I decided there was no way my baby was going to be fed jarred baby food. Idealistic, maybe, but that's the way it was going to be.

Brian and I go to many book fairs, and I picked up a couple of baby food books, but it wasn't until a woman from church recommended this book, Mommy Made and Daddy Too, that I knew I had the book that would make this a reality.

This book tells you month by month what to feed your baby (when to introduce what food), how to select produce, and how to prepare the food. It's not difficult and mainly features a cooking pan, a microwave, an oven, water, and some food that goes with the water and the cooking pan into either the microwave or the oven.

Oh, and then there's the blender.

So we made it through carrot puree, which turns the blender orange. And sweet potato puree - which also turns the blender orange. There's acorn squash puree. Apple puree (maybe you've seen it before; we adults call it applesauce). Pear puree. Plum puree.

But you haven't seen anything until you've seen CHICKEN PUREE.

In the 8th month of life, our helpful book recommends chicken puree. It's simple enough to fix - see the cooking aids I mention above. Microwave some chicken in water. Throw it in the blender with more water. Blend...chicken puree.

But, oh, chicken puree. It's non-spiced, and after it's been blended, the ONLY way you know it's chicken is by smell. It looks a lot like a plaster mixture. It doesn't look like food.

Open mouth, insert spoon. Crinkle nose. Try to do the baby equivalent of chewing (no teeth). The consistency of pure chicken puree really isn't for babies - funny, isn't it? YOU try to eat a plaster mixture. We have since learned that mixed with a vegetable puree - usually squash - it smells a lot like chicken noodle soup, and it's easier to gum. So on to the next adventure.

But, oh, and there's another aspect. Poof - my child's no longer a vegetarian. And that's when you realize - wow, he's really grown up. Some mothers will tell you it's that first haircut (no, he's had 3). For me, it was the chicken puree. See, gone with the chicken puree were the pear-scented diapers. All that pureed produce really doesn't smell that bad after the nutrients are long gone. But chicken - that's a whole other story.

hln

Posted by hln at March 15, 2007 08:56 AM | Baby | TrackBack