Aren’t there always messes being a parent?  For me there’s now more non-food clean up such as mud (including occassional dog poop on shoes), dirt, paint, glitter, glue, etc.  Although we still make messes with colored sugars (making cookies), cherry pits (remember my pitting experiences) and spills (usually milk).  However looking back I’d take the first food messes any day. In fact some times I would strip my kids down to a diaper to eat something messy (my daughter and soup), so they could have fun and do it themselves.  Then it was bath or hose down time after, of course.

I have friends who think nothing of letting their children draw and paint at the  kitchen or even dining room table, but will not give their toddler a spoon and let them feed themself.  Why?  Isn’t this what hardwood and laminate floors are for?  Or how about a splat mat?  I’m not saying there shouldn’t be rules with food and drink.  I always like “Food stays in the kitchen or dining area and you eat it in a high or other safe chair”.  I didn’t grow up running all over the house with food and cups (sippy or otherwise).  Choose what works for you, but I’m asking you to try to indulge your child.  Why?  Because they… 

1. want control

2. are testing cause and effect

3. need to develop

4. are learning independence 

5. want you to react

6. are testing boundaries

7. think it’s fun

8. won’t get a date (or into preschool) with you hand feeding them

9. will gain positive eating eating habits

10. need help to gain confidence

Here’s a few of my messy faced babes back in the day.  When I was looking for photos I remembered it really was my daughter who liked mess with food (and anything).  My son was never big on getting messy.  Some kids don’t like the feeling of stuff (be it food, sand, whatever) on their hands.  He had his moments.  I remember with oatmeal (but can’t find the pic).  But here’s a few of my gal.

Wow! So this is puree.

My nose can eat it too!

look no sippy cup!

first b-day

I want to share a wonderful campaign to raise awareness of using green food packaging products sponsored and supported by many of my favorite local companies, such as Fabkins, KidsKonserve, Wrap-n-Mat and EarthLust.
If 15,000 people join the campaign & pledge to pack a waste-free lunch, we can eliminate 1 million lbs of waste!

Simply log on to Facebook and join the campaign! Enter to WIN A WASTE-FREE LUNCH PRODUCT: Share with others how you’re greening your life to enter to win. One winner every day!

Save 10% off all orders from Green My Lunch Box participating company websites when using the coupon code “Greenit” when checking out.  Click here to learn more and start shopping.

There was a huge recall (228 million) of eggs from Wright County Eggs in Iowa due to salmonella.  Some of the brands include Lucerne, Safeway, Ralphs, Sunshine and others.  Read article to be sure the eggs in your fridge are safe.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_tainted_eggs

I am excited to learn The Petit Appetit Cookbook has been nominated for Best Cookbook for the SheKnows 2010 Parent’s Choice Awards. The SheKnows award recognizes outstanding products and services in the parenting and pregnancy industry, based on functionality, quality, convenience and best bang for the consumer’s buck. Winners will be announced Oct. 10, 2010 on SheKnows.com.

SheKnows (www.sheknows.com), a destination for women with the latest news on parenting, health, entertainment and more, decided to create an award program with an organic approach to recognizing various brands and services within the parenting industry. The awards spread across 100 different categories covering everything from parent’s gadgets and kids’ books, all the way to baby feeding and toys.  The goal of the award is to give readers all the information they need to make the best informed decisions in their everyday lives. You’ll recognize many of your favorite products you use every day. I know many of my favorites are there, including LifeFactory bottles, KidsKonserve lunchboxes, Melissa and Doug puzzles, Flip video cameras and Kiwi Magazine.

Please cast your votes for The Petit Appetit Cookbook ,as well as your other favorite products, to help spread the word to the SheKnow community of moms like you.  To vote, go to SheKnows Parent’s Choice Awards and sign in.  Find the category, (to vote for my book, choose “Food”).  Scroll to find the subcategory, such as “favorite baby food cookbooks”.  Click on “The Petit Appetit Cookbook” to highlight and scroll to the orange “submit your vote” button at the bottom of the page.  That’s it.  You can do it once, every day (o.k. only if you’re my mom).

Kids Konserve has a great new blog from chefs that use their waste free food and drink containers.  Being one of them I was happy to share recipes that work well with their mini stainless steel containers. Perfect for packing snacks and dips, they are easy to pack into a lunch bag, backpack or even a purse.  Check out my recipes on the resident chef page for curry curry chickpeas, cherry almond granola and no-nuts trail mix, as well as other resident chef’s ideas and recipes.  Just in time for back-to-school, be sure to get 15% off your next purchase (valid thru August) with the code “minichef” at checkout.

After becoming a parent your own birthdays are not as meaningful or exciting to you, but they are for your kids.  Even if the gifts they see you open aren’t toys like they’d hope for, they still look forward to the cake.  What’s a birthday without cake?  The cake was never as important to me, even as a kid, as the ice cream.  I do appreciate a good layer cake, and I must admit the Ghostly Good Cake was a tasty one.  However we have so many birthdays and desserts the month of July, I’m ready to make something different.  

Of course my husband always brings a cake home.  It’s usually a petit one (so we don’t have left-overs) for the candle and singing ritual from the local bakery or grocer, which is usually fine and tasty.  But I insist on making mint chip ice cream.  The kids protested when I said I was making ice cream and said “It’s your birthday, you can’t make it yourself”.  To which I replied “It’s my birthday and I want MY mint ice cream. Not one you buy in a store.” 

This is my favorite recipe for mint chip ice cream.  Note: it is more mint than chocolate and thus not chocoalte mint.  It’s not a crazy color green and doesn’t have mint extract, but the real mint from the garden.  It makes it like no one else’s.  Even the kids agree, once they’re reminded by the taste.

Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream Recipe

(from Simply Recipes.com)

Around my house there are some amazing fruit trees that yield beautiful and sweet red and yellow fruits.  Does this mentionb of “fruit” sound vague?  Is it because we argue as to what they are.  They look like cherries, but they taste like plums.  They are growing all over the hills next to my house and at our local park.  Most people call them cherries, but everyone agrees they don’t taste like cherries.  Either way my kids and I love to pick and eat them.  Although we have to fight for the low hanging fruit as we have many neighborhood deer who get to them first.

Recently we went to a friends for a playdate and the mom offered a lovely bowl of pitted cherries.  My kids were amazed.  “Wow Mom! How come these don’t have pits?”  True I like a good kichen gadget, however I feel like the pitter is one that would just spoil everyone.  How often are we presented with pitted cherries?  And where’s the fun in spitting the pit if there’s simply a hole?

About a week after our playdate my daughter spotted this cute little gadget in a pretty little box.  I said o.k. to the “Cherry Chomper” as it looked like a fun summer afternoon project and it is extremely cute.  We tried it, but it just couldn’t get by on looks alone.  It removed almost the entire inside of the cherry.  There wasn’t much left to eat but skin.  My kids were dissappointed, but I said I’d try another pitter.

Enter a gun looking (unlock, load and fire) OXO cherry and olive pitter.  This works better, but certainly not as cute.  It makes a nice hole and leaves much of the flesh, but there is some juice spattering, despite the protective shield.  Plus the aftermath is quite gruesome looking. 

We’ll keep this one in case I need to do lots of cherries – a pie, a tart, etc. Actually it will inspire me.  However I like the plum-cherries right off the tree and I’m not toting around a cherry pitter down the trail.  After pitting a few cherries with the pitter my son said “You know mom.  We already have the best pitter…our mouths”.  Truer words never spoken.

The Best Foods for Your Child during Recovery from an Illness

It’s not an easy time when your child is ill or just recovering after an illness or disease. You’re stressed out from praying that their illness does not worsen and from caring for them when they’re down and out. But once your doctor certifies that your child is well on the way to recovery, you start to focus on how you can help speed up their journey to good health. Your child would have lost both strength and nutrition because of their illness, and your prime task is to ensure that they’re given the right kind of food to get them back to normal and fortify and strengthen their frail bodies.

Ask your doctor what you can and cannot feed your child because every illness has specific recovery rules. In general however, it’s best to:

• Stick to foods that digest easily: Your child’s digestive system is delicate after an illness, especially if the illness was a prolonged one. So cook foods that are easy for them to digest and nutritious as well. Also, if your child is a fussy eater, make dishes that they enjoy instead of forcing them to eat foods that they don’t like. Come up with new recipes that look and taste good so that they’re tempted to eat and bolster their health.  
• Give them plenty of fluids: Fluids are good when your child is recovering from an illness. If your child refuses to eat, soups and consommés are a good way to keep their strength up and provide them with nutrition. Ensure that they stay hydrated with water and fresh fruit juices.
• Stay away from dairy products: Most parents think that milk is a necessity for their children to ensure nutrition and calcium. But when they’re recovering from an illness, it’s best to avoid dairy products because they’re gassy and hard to digest. 
• Avoid fatty foods: Children love fast food like French fries and burgers, but when they’re just getting over an illness, it’s best to stick to home-cooked food that is wholesome and free of fat. Don’t allow them to indulge in chocolates and candy, eat salty and fried snacks, or fill up on aerated soft drinks that are loaded with sugar. Coax them into eating healthy fruits and vegetables and other food that is nutritious and healthy.

If your child has special needs and has to avoid certain food groups, consult your doctor for the best post recovery foods.

My children’s b-days are both in July.  (Actually mine is too, but who’s counting?)  There’s always a lot of gatherings and feasts as the various grandparents each come to celebrate.  Of course this also means birthday cakes.  I’ve talked about my cupcakes and cookies for birthday and my cakes at the half (birthday), but it was time to try someone’s else’s recipe.  Luckily we had been to the library and found a really great children’s book called “The Bake Shop Ghost” by Jacqueline K. Oghurn.

It’s the story of a baker named Cora Lee Merriwheather who ran a wonderful bakery and was relied upon by the town for all it’s cakes, pies and pastries.  Cora Lee dies and she haunts the bakery; scaring away all the new owners and sending them out the door in hysterics.  After the shop sits for years a pastry chef from a cruise ship, Miss. Annie Washington, settles in and has it out with ghost Merriwheather.  Annie asks the ghost what she wants and Cora Lee replies “Bake me a cake to fill me up and bring tears to my eyes, a cake like one that I might have baked but that no one ever made for me”.  Annie is stumped and makes hundreds of recipes from around the world but can’t  please the ghost for over a month.  Finally she figures out the thing that Cora Lee never got… a birthday cake with her name on it.  The ghost and Annie continue to get along and bake together (unbeknownst to the towns people, of course) , now for the Washington and Merriwheather Bake Shop. 

At the end of the book is a recipe for that birthday cake that my kids and I made to celebrate the birthdays.  It really is one of the best (for this world and beyond).

Ghost-Pleasing Chocolate Cake

This rich chocolate layer cake would satisfy the hunmgrioest ghost.  Is is adapted from my friend Luli Gray, a wionderful writer and baker, from a recipe published in Cook’s Illustrated magazine.  Preheat your oven to 325 degrees.  Prepare two 8 or 9 inch round pans or one 13 x 9 inch pan, by lining the bottoms with parchment paper. 

In a Large Bowl Mix Together…

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 1/4 cups ll purpose flour, siften before measuring

3/4 cup cocoa

4 tablespoons buttermilk powder (available in supermarket baking sections)

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

In a Medium Saucepan, melt over low heat (or you can use the microwave)…

1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter

8 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate

Remove from Heat and Add…

1 cup water

4 beaten eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

Whisk the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients just until blended.  Pour evenly into prepared pans and bake on the middle rack of the oven about 30 -40 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the middle of the cake comes out with moist crumbs gathering to it.  Do not overbake.  Cool thoroughly on a rack before icing.

Easy Frosting

This frosting can also be tinted with food coloring for decoration or writing.

3 cups confectioner’s sugar

1/3 cup softened unsalted butter

1/4 cup water 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

pinch salt

Combine all ingreidnets in a large bowl and beat until smooth.  If using an electric mixer, beat at low speed.  Add more sugar for stiffer frosting.

I’m so proud of my parents.  My mom asked her gardener to pull up some lawn in their backyard and plant a vegetable garden.  Mind you it’s not that big – about 5 x 8, but there’s lot’s growing.  They’re growing tomatoes, carrots, squash, cucumber, peas and radishes.  Yes, lots and lots of radishes.

My mom was so excited to show my kids the garden on our visit last week.  And the kids had a great time watering the plants, and pulling up those radishes.  We also had them on salads and sliced them with butter and salt. 

My son shared a song with his grandparents he learned at school about growing a garden.  It’s so sweet and goes like this…

In by inch, row by row,

gtta make this garden grow.

All you need is a rake and a hoe,

and a piece of furtile ground.

Inch by inch, row by row,

someone bless these seeds I sow,

some one warm and from below,

til’ the rain comes tumbling down.