Getting Creative!

For a little while now, Jocelyn has been refusing to eat regular vegetables. I completely stopped the puree baby foods a few months ago because she's too old to be eating them. And they are really expensive. She's more independent now and she's old enough to eat foods that we eat as a family - on a limited scale obviously. I've been having a hard time knowing what to do to get her to eat vegetables. She LOVED the purees. I made a call to her pediatrican today and told the nurse my concerns. She has her 18 month check up in 2 weeks but I just couldn't wait until then to do something about this. They referred me to this book called Deceptively Delicious by Jessica Seinfeld.

We are in luck!! The book was already sitting on my shelf next to the other cookbooks. I bought it a few months back "just in case." The idea this book gives to parents is to "hide" the vegetables into the foods they already eat and enjoy. I don't really like the word "deceptive" because I don't agree with using that approach on my children. But if this helps her to finally eat some vegetables when she won't eat it them alone, then I'm up for the challenge! I want to do whatever it takes to contribute healthy foods to her diet. This book offers recipes and how-to's on how to puree your own fruits and vegetables that can then be cooked into their food. A lot of the recipes sound and look good too, such as: french toast (with butternut squash), applesauce muffins (with carrots), banana bread (with cauliflower), pancakes (with sweet potato), and chicken nuggets (with broccoli) just to name a few. Tonight I'm starting on carrots and cauliflower purees. Hope this goes well. First time doing this. Wish me luck! And luck that she eats it too! :)