My New Favorite Breakfast Recipe

Baby M adores pancakes, but I generally don't have enough time or energy in the morning to make a big batch.  Plus, traditional pancakes are not the healthiest way to start the morning.  I love the recipe below because it is easy, healthy and Baby M gobbles them up.

Oatmeal- Banana Pancakes
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 banana mashed up
1 egg
1/4 cup skim milk
1/4 - 1/2 tsp cinnamon

Mix everything together and cook on a lightly greased skillet.  Makes about 4 pancakes.

Today I added a handful of frozen blueberries and used soy milk instead of regular milk and they came out great.

Granola

I keep reading about these toddlers who just love helping their parents.  They happily clean up, fold laundry, and set the table.  For the most part, this is not true of Baby M.  If I say, "Hey, do you want to help me with something" he will most likely answer "No" and go about his business.  If I leave an unfolded basket of laundry out it will soon become an upside down laundry "cake" in the middle of the floor.  However, there is one place where he does love to help, the kitchen.

The minute I start prepping something in the kitchen he is there shouting "I want to help yooouuuu!"  Of course, when I suggest that the best way for him to help me would be to pick up the crayons all over the kitchen floor, he is not interested.  He wants to crack the eggs, saute the veggies and chop the carrots.  I don't want to discourage his culinary aspirations so this lead me to seek out safe activities that he could help me with.  We ended up doing quite a bit of baking, which is fine, but we really don't need another batch of cookies in the house, even if they are the healthy oatmeal ones from Alicia Silverstone's cook book (which I must note are my favorite oatmeal cookies EVER).  So I was happy when I came across this recipe for homemade granola at wholeliving.com.  I feel a lot better about letting Baby M snack on granola than cookies, especially granola made with flaxseed meal, egg whites and natural sweeteners.  I love this recipe because we can easily customize it with different fruits and nuts and most importantly, Baby M can help with almost all the steps.  There is lots of measuring and stirring and not much contact with a hot stove.  He still fights me over cracking the eggs, but I win out most of the time.  Hope you enjoy it too.

The Food Thing

I openly admit that I am not the healthiest of eaters, but I am hardly the unhealthiest. I buy mostly organic, try to avoid processed foods, rarely have cookies or candy around and am attempting to cook using more whole foods. But, yes, I am still a fan of the Trader Joe's frozen aisle, canned tomatoes and Goldfish Crackers, which brings us to today's topic: friends and food.

The other day I was in the park having lunch with some friends and their children. Baby M was happily munching on his turkey sandwich, melon balls and Goldfish Crackers when I heard my friend say sharply to her daughter, "Where did you get that?" I turned and saw a look of horror on her face and a small orange crakcer, courtesy of Baby M, in her daughter's hand. Thinking the look was of the "oh-my-god-you're-eating-something-off-the-ground" variety I said, "Oh, that's one of Baby M's, she's welcome to have some crackers." Then she looked at me and I realized the look was more of the "what-kind-of-parent-would-serve-this-junk-to-their-child" sort. She gingerly took the cracker away from her child and, using 2 fingers as if the cracker was possibly toxic, handed it back to me saying "No, that's okay."

Now I understand that parents have the right, and responsibility to teach their children about nutrition. And I absolutely sympathize with the parents of children with food allergies and how vigilant they must be about what their child eats. But isn't it just a little rude to imply that I am poisoning my child with a few refined grains? I felt so belittled that I went home and found this article by a dietitian defending Goldfish Crackers. (not that I sent it to her) When we are out and other people are graciously sharing their food I always say thank you and let Baby M have some. One oreo, one potato chip, even one of those weird fruit-like rollup thingys is not going to sicken him. In fact, hopefully, it will help him become an adventurous eater who knows the value of moderation. After all, who wants to live in a world without chocolate, ice cream and Goldfish Crackers?