Nice & easy vegetarian Cornish Pasties that my little boy loves!

Another of Charlie's favourites, and this is a recipe that I got right. They turned out beautifully and they are so, so easy to make - no scales required!

2 cups plain flour

1 cup butter

1 cup vegetable fat (I used Stork - it worked)

1 (or 2) onions

1 cup of grated carrot

3 cups of potato chunks

1 cup cold water

1 cup milk

300g Quorn/soya mince

3 veg stock cubes

1 tin of sweet corn (wasn't in the mood to pay 3 quid for a fresh cob!)

• Fill a cup of grated carrot
• Peal & chop potatoes into 3 cups. Optional potato shapes! :)
• Boil potatoes until they slide off the fork & mash with milk & butter.
• Fry sweet corn, onion, carrot & mince - add one jug of veg stock gravy to the pan.
• Mix flour & fats together until breadcrumb consistency - add milk and water until it forms a sticky dough.
• Do lots and lots and lots and lots of kneading - adding flour generously!

• Roll out the dough - really important that it's a small, thick circle so it won't tear.
• Dollop in your mixture (Or 'elegantly place' if you want)
• Close up the sides & squish together
• Glaze with a mixture of melted butter &  milk
• Bake in the oven 10 mins gas mark 7 & then 20 mins gas mark 4

Nice one mammy! :)

Quinoa veggie burgers!

Charlie LOVES these. And They're just brilliant because you can pack soooo much into them and add so many flavours - and different ingredients every time.

They're probably pretty time consuming so if you have a little monkey make sure they're out having some daddy bonding time or something!

They're easy to make. If I can do it then you can!  They're so, so nutritious.
I'm not even going to list all the nutritional info - lets just say they have everything including being packed with protein from the quinoa!

You can pick the veggies you love but here's what I used:

(Excuse the alcohol - it's left over from Christmas - people always buy us it and we never drink it!)

Sweet potatos x 2
Quinoa grain (Which you soak overnight first)
Sherlots x 3
Red pepper x 2
Cherry tomatos (a fair few!)
3 x carrots 1x suede cubed.
Flaxseed
Smoked paprika
Garlic powder
Mixed herbs
Cashew nuts
Lemon juice

I was also going to use butterbeans but didn't feel like I needed to in the end.

• Boil/steam the sweet potatos, carrot & suede
  until they're mashable.
• Boil the quinoa (keen-wah!) for 30 mins in boiling water with herbs & smoked paprika.
• Fry the red pepper, sherlots, tomatos, sprinkling in smoked paprika, onion powder, mixed herbs & lemon juice.
• Crush the cashew nuts & sprinkle them into the frying pan.
• Mix together the mashed sweet potato, carrot & suede and the boiled quinoa.
• Mix the fried veg with the mash & quinoa.
• Squish it all together (nice and messy!)
• Add flax seed liberally - it's a super food and it'll help it form a less gooey mixture.
• Form into burger shapes (Yorkshire pudding trays really help!)
• Cook - gas mark 6 for 30 mins, keep checking, attempt to turn over!
  
  
  
  
  
  
  I made a cheese & chive sauce using alrpo soya milk, sunflower spread, whole meal flower, cheese & fresh chives & lemon juice.
  
  Worked SO well with the burgers!
  
  

  

  Charlie "Two spoons" :)

  
  

Pancake day! Misson: Blueberry pancake shapes!

I had the idea of making Charlie little blueberry pancake shapes & I think they turned out pretty well!

Wholewheat flour: (Has more fibre, vitamins and regulates blood sugar)

Free range eggs
Soya milk: (just because I prefer it because it tastes so good!)
Blueberries: Rich in antioxidants
Sunflower spread: (Healthier)
Lemon juice: (For flavoring)
Shape cutter: (For fun!)

Melt the butter. I use this microwave pan (argos £3.99 absolute bargain!) - Seriously, these little plastic pans are SO versatile I cannot recommend them enough - they steam veg, cook soup, porridge, beans, spaghetti, melt anything; butter, chocolate - I also make a ton of cheese sauce in them! And nothing splatters and they're so easy to clean.
I LOVE THEM.

Fill a bowl with 2 cups of flour, then pour the butter into the bowl.

Stick some butter into a very low heated frying pan.

Crack 4 eggs into the bowl of butter and flour then use a whisk or a fork or a blender... I used an electric hand blender

Pour some blueberries into the mixture. Hand-blend/whisk them in.

 

Pour into the pan and fry. Yummy!

Press shape cutters into the pancake!
Squirt on lemon juice & brown sugar.

Feed to toddler!
(Charlie rockin' his pink PJ's too)

He liked them, and he liked the shapes, but he only ate a couple due to becoming a very fussy little monkey over his textures lately. Anything slimy or squishy he'll make a face at and give back to mammy... so I'm hoping he'll like them more next year!

Quick healthy spaghetti lunch & Quorn chicken korma tea!

Dry Soya mince - Cheap & healthy: Protein 14.9g--Fibre 4.3g
Red split lentils: Protein 6.4g--Vitamin C 5%--Iron37%--Calcium 4%
Milled flax seed: Rich in omega 3
Spagetti: Fibre & Iron

Due to not eating meat, Charlie has lentils a lot, one serving of red lentils is comparable to one serving of meat, but is healthier. They're also full of vitamins and minerals.
Similarly with the super flax seed which he has every single day due to the incredibly rich content of Omega 3 - which non-veggie babies get from fish.

Charlie usually has other things added to this such as avocado, scrambled egg, cheese and tofu (but we'd run out of it all!) - but this is probably healthy enough on it's own! He has this as a lunch all the time and loves it!

Quorn Chicken Korma

Kids Korma sauce (asda) (Yes I cheat and use sauces sometimes!)
Quorn chicken pieces - lots of protein.
Plain Tofu - lots of calcium, protein and magnesium.
Cashew nuts - Protein, Vitamin K,
good source of Magnesium, Phosphorus, Copper and Manganese.
Lemon juice
Mixed herbs
Smoked paprika
Pilau Rice
(I also had suede, carrot & an avocado)
Vitamins A, K, Calcium & iron.

Use olive oil and add small chunks of:

Quorn chicken
Avocado
Carrot
Suede
Tofu
Squirt in some lemon juice
Add smoked paprika

Crush some cashewnuts with a spoon - sprinkle them in.

Add the rice and mixture to a toddler plate!

It had the Charlie stamp of approval!

 

Pizza Smiley faces!

This is something I've wanted to do for ages. I know Charlie is still a bit young but he loves to explore things & I thought he might enjoy feeling the textures of the toppings and watching us create a face for him.

Found this in asda. "Chosen by kids" cooking sauce - been looking for something
like this for ages!

Spaghetti cheese strings - these definitely didn't exist when I was a kid!

I would have rather made my own but went for the simple option to save a bit of time.. (always trying to save time!)

I set little bowls out of
Childrens cooking sauce
Red pepper
Mushrooms
Cherry tomatoes
Cheese
Cheese string spaghetti

Charlie came running in and started looking at and feeling everything!

Putting on his sauce
(Excuse the gaping hole in our kitchen -
our dryer used to be there before it broke down!)

Sprinkling cheese

He liked the cheese strings!

Cheese string hair

He liked it when his pizza suddenly had a face!

Charlie's creation!

Ready!

Taste test: Mmmmmmmm! A hit!

Mammy and daddy's crazy pizzas!

Tuesday's meal: Butternut Squash & Avacado covered sausages

I'm no kitchen genius, but I have a bit of pride in myself for the work I put into Charlie's nutrition. I'm quite OCD about making sure he gets all his vitamins and minerals.

I've been asked a couple of times for tips on baby/toddler meals.

I buy lots of things I know are super nutritious and try sticking them together in various ways for lots of variety, flavour and colour.

                                        This one was a hit!

Butternut Squash
Vitamin A
Vitamin C
Protein
Iron
Calcium

Baked in the oven to keep all the goodness in.
(40 mins)

Green beans & Sugar snap peas from the green grocers
Vitamin A
Vitamin C
Calcium
Iron
Protein
Vitamin K
Folate
Magnease
Dietary fiber.

We're vegetarians so I use Quorn Sausages.
I cooked them in olive oil & mashed avocado.
Protein
Fibre
Vitamin B-6
Vitamin A
Vitamin C
Iron
Zinc

I normally steam my veg but I boiled these for some reason!
(20 mins)

Mash up the squash

Serve on an elmer plate!...
These turned out to be two portions as usual.

This was a BIG hit!