Tuesday 11 September 2007

Avocado and Cucumber Puree

Kristi is totally kicking my butt here with her very thorough and fantastic contributions. I know she's a crazy picture taking fool, me, not so much. I only wish I had the foresight to have to have done that myself. I did take a few pictures here and there when Kristi and I first thought up Mush, but since then I have been very lax. In summary, expect colourful, exciting posts from Kristi, and bland dialogue and recipe rehashing from me.

That said, here is my first recipe, borrowed from a great book called Baby Healthy Eating Planner, by Amanda Grant. The link is over yonder in the sidebar for you to check out if you're interested. It's a link to Amazon.co.uk, but I think it's available in the US as well.

Avocado and cucumber puree was attempted in this house about a month after P started on solids. Prior to that we'd only experimented with baby rice and your basic entry level fruits - banana, apple, perhaps a little peach. I decided to push the boat out and do this puree, and it was the first one she pretty much roundly rejected.

One might wonder why I'm putting it up if my own kid didn't like it. Despite her rather violent reaction (major pukefest post-feed), she liked it subsequent times I gave it to her. I think avocado and cucumber are two unique tastes that help broaden a baby's taste, so it is certainly worth trying. That is a handy little piece of advice actually - if your baby rejects a food, don't give up on it altogether. Babies are moody little things and may really like said food later, so if you've just made a huge batch of something and baby frowns, don't throw it away! Keep it in the freezer and try again in a month or so. You might be surprised.

Avocado and Cucumber Puree (makes 2 portions)

1/4 small cucumber
1/2 ripe avocado

1) Peel the cucumber and scoop out the seeds. Cut into small chunks
2) Peel, stone, and chop the avocado
3) Blend via whatever means you have at your disposal - blender, food processor, etc...

The author suggests pushing the puree through a nylon sieve for just-weaned babies, but I never bothered and the texture was fine. Use your own judgment. Extra portions can be frozen.

A little tip I learned when using avocados - if you don't want to use the entire avocado in one go, leave the stone in to maintain the avocado's freshness. People with common sense, or people who eat avocados unlike myself, may already know this.

In lieu of photos I have a video of P eating this concoction. Don't worry, it was filmed BEFORE the vomiting episode. Please disregard my annoying, high-pitched sing-songy baby voice. You know how mums can be...

7 comments:

statia said...

"God, lady. Get that damn spoon out of my face already!!"

The Mini loves avocado. And I actually bought cucs for him to try at some point this week.

electriclady said...

Every single video taken of BG features me talking in that same singsong mommy voice.

I would never have thought of combining avocado and cucumber, but BG adores avocado (it's the only solid food she'll reliably eat) so I'll have to give this a try. Re: saving avocado, I also found it actually freezes really well--I slice the flesh and freeze the slices on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper or parchment paper, then throw them in a freezer bag. Then I can thaw 3-4 slices at a time and mush them up for her.

PiquantMolly said...

Jesus, with that look on her face it's as if you're feeding her dirt!

Eva said...

Fun to hear your voice actually (if I have to hear my voice one more time on video I may lose it).

We are past the purees but haven't tried cucumber yet so maybe I'll have to try it.

Oh, and BTW, there is research that suggests it may take up to 10 exposures to the same food before a baby likes it, so you're totally right on the try again. Of course, it's so much easier to just keep giving them the things you know they like.

Nico said...

I just went out tonight and purchased an avo and a cuke. Ant *hated* the avo the first few times I tried it on him, but I hoping that third time's the charm. I'm looking forward to more recipies, I feel like my poor child's palate is only going to be used to the quite bland fare I tend to favour.

Nico said...

OK, so he hated it. But I froze the extra, just in case - now my question is, how do I thaw it? I'm afraid that if I just leave it in the fridge to thaw it will go all brown and nasty like the leftovers did. Thoughts?

Viagra Online said...

YUMMY This puree is so fabulous I made it last night to a party and it's completely delicious.