nice rice

Rice is a staple in our home.  I have no less than four varieties of rice (basmati-white, basmati-brown, sushi-white and wild) sitting in beautiful, air-tight glass jars on my counter top at any given moment.  Like most parents we introduced our daughter to solid food by adding rice cereal to her bottle.  Once she mastered purees, she graduated to "regular" plain rice.  Now she's two and we always have a tub of some sort of rice concoction sitting in the fridge ready to be reheated and tossed with something to make a quick meal.  For example, if you have frozen peas and steamed chopped carrots, just toss them into 1-2 cups of cooked rice and snap, you have festive "carnival" rice as a base that can be eaten as-is or mixed into a scrambled egg.  I make "instant soup" with 1/4-1/2 cup of vegetable or chicken broth, a 1/4 cup of carnival rice and a few spoonfuls of shredded silken tofu.  You wouldn't believe something so easy could be so satisfying.

A sassy lass I know in New Hampshire recently shared with me that her 15 month-old was literally licking her plate clean after a coconut rice lunch. Since I'm always on the look-out for a delicious rice, I asked her to share her secret.  Ms. Sassy adapted the original recipe from Coastal Living magazine, then I tweaked it and vetted it through Bettina RD for nutritional input.  Of course, you may adapt this yourself and eliminate mango or pistachios, but keep in mind that these ingredients add nutritional benefits like mango's vitamin C, beta carotene, and potassium and pistachios' lutein, zeaxanthin, B vitamins, fiber, copper and magnesium.

Coconut milk puts the coconut in coconut rice.  You may be surprised to learn that a 14 oz can of coconut milk contains about 84g of fat. Recommended total fat intake for a 1-3 year olds is 30-40g/day (25-35g/day for a 4-8 yo).  However, research is inconclusive right now on what the appropriate saturated fat intake levels are for babies, so use your own judgement here and if in doubt (or if you plan to snarf some of this up yourself and find the fat content over the top), substitute with low-fat coconut milk.  If you decide to go full-on full-fat, don't panic, this recipe yields seven cups of rice, which translates into 14 servings for baby, assuming that you dole our a 1/2 cup per serving, which means each serving contains about 6g of fat.  

If baby (or anyone in your family for that matter) has a tummy troubles, coconut rice may help as it fits into the BRAT diet (bananas, rice, apple sauce, toast).  On top of that, coconut fat is often used to help resolve digestive issues since it has some easy-to-digest medium chain fatty acids. Let's go back to that can of coconut milk again.  Of the 84g of fat in the entire can of full-fat coconut milk, 75g of that is saturated fat, and of that saturated fat, 50% of it is lauric acid (12:0), a medium chain fatty acid (MCFA) which is easily digested.  Lauric acid may also have a positive impact on immune function.  

Equipment

• Sauce pan with tight-fitting lid
• Wooden spoon
• Coffee grinder or blender (to crush the pistachios)
• OXO mango slicer -- you don't have to have one, but it sure makes cutting mango away from the seed a lot easier and I'm convinced that you end up with more mango too.

Ingredients

• 1 1/3 cups low sodium chicken or vegetable broth
• 1 14 oz. can of coconut milk
• 2 cups of brown basmati rice (of course you can use white rice instead.  Jasmine rice works great too.)
• 1 cup diced mango
• 1/2 cup chopped and toasted pistachios
• 1/4 shredded coconut (just a bonus if you have it)

Instructions

1. Stir all broth and coconut milk together in the saucepan while the burner is on med/high.
2. Stir 2 cups of rice into the liquid. 
3. Cover wait until you see steam escaping from the pot, then turn the heat down to simmer or melt.
4. Leave pot covered and allow to cook on the lowest temperature for 45-50 minutes.  All of the liquid should be absorbed and the rice should be tender.
5. Remove from heat and allow to stand for 10-15 minutes.
6. Remove the lid, fluff with fork and mix in mangoes, pistachios and shredded coconut.
7. Spoon out 1/2 cup servings and get ready for clean plates!

It is so easy to make rice but it takes time which is why I keep a covered tub of prepared rice in the fridge at all times.  If seven cups of rice seems like too much rice to store, you can freeze it (I learned this nifty trick from that clever little minx Nigella Lawson).  Just be sure to freeze your rice in small portions so that it is easy to thaw and use when you are ready.

 

 

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too tired (or not inspired) to cook?

There are days you feel like cooking and there are days you don’t.  That’s what delivery is for, right?  Well, that works for you, but might not work for your baby, as baby food menus may be the one delivery menu niche NYC has not yet comprehensively filled. 

There are a few ways to manage these types of situations.  I always, always, always have a beautiful package of steamed organic beets in the fridge.  Tofu is another no-cook go-to food.  Both of these items are vacuum packed which gives them a fair shelf-life.  I like to keep chops and purees in the freezer or fridge to give me some flexibility, variety and save me from cooking every meal, every night, twice.

Here’s a list of fresh and packaged foods to have on hand that can be easily turned into improvised no-cook meals. 

Fresh

Avocado – just cut and scoop.

Fruit salad composed of:

• Banana
• Bluberries
• Mango - slices in a snap with this amazing OXO tool.  (Watch the video. Normally, I'm not a single-use gadget kind of gal. but a mangophillic friend suggested it to me so I watched the video and the product sold itself.  And yes, it it really is this easy to slice mango with the magical OXO tool)
• Apple - slices in a snap with a handy apple-corer.  I like Rosle, but there are certainly less expensive versions of this type of tool out there.
• Mixed with a dollop of plain yogurt or kefir

Packaged

• Plain yogurt (add nearly any fresh fruit)
• Silken tofu
• Frozen peas (simply defrost under warm running water) -- When our daughter was really small, I would scatter a 1/2 cup of peas on her tray. She loved picking them up one by one and feeding herself.  
• Steamed beets

Delivered

• Mexican or Cuban = Order a side of red or black beans.  Share your rice and guacamole, or order a plain quesadilla.
• Thai or Chinese = Share your rice and puree (or chop up) an order of plain, steamed vegetables.
• Japanese = Share your rice and order tamago (egg sushi)
• Indian = Share your rice and saag paneer or puree a portion of a mild vegetable curry entrée. Yes, curry.  You might be surprised that your baby will eat and love curry!

While we're on the subject of rice ... do you ever feel overwhelmed by the amount of rice that comes with take-out/delivery?  Don't discard it!  Transfer that rice to a ziploc bag and dole it out to baby for meals.  Heat up a tablespoon of stock or plain water in a small frying pan and drop in a 1/4-1/2 cup of leftover rice mixed with a vegetable chop for a minute and presto, you have dinner for baby.  The same trick works with quinoa.  Our two year-old loves quinoa, chopped beets with finely grated grana padano cheese.

Sorry for the silence over the past few weeks!  I'm working on a from-scratch rice post for next week -- one that will please your little one/s and all of the big people too!

Posted via email from citybaby

ain't nobody here but us chickens

The kind folks who raise the pen-free chickens that lay the eggs we feed citybaby (and ourselves) put a little one minute video together set to a James Brown song documenting a day in the life of the ladies who nest.  

If you are wondering, yes, citybaby loves her eggs.  They are not just for breakfast in our family!

Posted via email from citybaby