Little people can be very fussy about what they eat. Textures are just as important as taste. Mum or Dad can start tearing their hair out with little people refusing to eat what is put in front of them. Here are some handy Naturopathic tips!
Some toddlers will only eat mushy food- mushy vegetables are great!
Quinoa Burgers:
Ingredients
11/2 large sweet potato
1 Grated zucchini
¾ cup Grated cheese
¾ cup Finely chopped mushroom
¾ cup Qunioa
1 -2 eggs
Coconut oil for light frying
1.5 teaspoons massel vegetable stock powder
Bread crumbs (to be gluten free, try Orgran “rice crumbs”)
Mineralised Salt and Pepper to taste
Method
Quinoa is a vegetarian option which is a complete protein. Sweet potato is high in vitamin A.
Get out the rice cooker. Put in quinoa, the same amount of water as when you cook rice and stock powder. Put on cook.
Peel the sweet potato and cut into cubes. Put in a steamer. While that is steaming, grate the zucchini and add it to the steamer on top of the sweet potato.
Next chop the mushrooms into small amounts and add to the steamer as well.
When all is cooked, place vegetables in a bowl, ensuring you don’t get much water/ moisture in there.
Once quinoa is cooked, place in bowl as well. Add cheese and use a potato masher to mash together. Add 1 or 2 eggs – enough so that it binds, but not so much that it is too wet. If it does become too wet, add some breadcrumbs to make it a better consistency for rolling into balls. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Roll into balls and flatten like a rissole. Coat with breadcrumbs. Cook lightly on either side using coconut oil.
These freeze well. And are a good way for little fingers to pick up food, whilst enjoying mushy textures!
Nutty Slice:
I got this idea from the supermarket and made my own!
If your children don’t have nut allergies (and are over 2 years where they can eat nuts), this is a great “slice”. It is super easy and is super healthy.
Ingredients
Coconut
Chia seeds
Pumpkin seeds (also called pepita’s)
Cashews
Sultana’s
1 -2 dessertspoons Coconut oil
Method
This is a highly nutritious snack. The pumpkin seeds are high in zinc, chia seeds high in omega 3’s, cashews high in E, K and Magnesium. Coconut and coconut oil both have healthy oils in them.
Choose the quantity of each ingredient that you want to have more of in the mix. I would go with more cashew’s and saltana’s and less chia seeds.
Put into vitamix or blender and wizz to small bits. Alternatively you can chop up the ingredients. Put into bowl.
In a saucepan heat the coconut oil so that it is liquid. Add the coconut oil to the other ingredients.
Mix so that the ingredients are covered slightly with the coconut oil. In a baking dish, line with baking paper. Pop the mix down and flatten out. Leave in fridge so that coconut oil hardens. Once it is in a “slice”, cut into pieces.
This is a super healthy recipe but has to be eaten at home, otherwise the coconut oil will melt and it will come apart. But it is worth having for a home snack as the nutrition outweighs any inconvenience.Public Speaker and Naturopath, Andrea Strand has been successfully helping people to get well over the last 10 years. Andrea’s approach is to blend science and traditional medicine to achieve optimum results for her patients.
