What it's all about

I’m a mom on a mission to be creative with feeding my itty bitty 20 month old picky eater. I was blindsided by my little nugget’s pickiness when suddenly she turned her nose up at all the foods she had previously happily gobbled down. Up until she was about a year old, she happily downed broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, peas, chicken, fish, turkey, beef, you name it, she ate it. Maybe it was getting a taste of that birthday cake, because it was around then she declared an end to the bland, unseasoned (homemade) baby food she’d been so happy with before by unceremoniously spitting out whatever food she was offered. I knew it had to come at some point. Who really wants to eat unseasoned pureed food on a continual basis? I just wasn’t prepared for it. When she was younger, I briefly dragged her to a play group where one of the moms bragged that her two year old loved sushi (though not the raw fish variety) and I wished then that my daughter would grow up to have similarly adventurous taste buds. At the time it looked like she was well on her way to reaching that target.

So, here I was faced with a new challenge: how do I develop my little angel’s palate while providing her with healthy, delicious food? Did I mention I’m no gourmet cook? I mean I like to watch cooking shows and all and imagine myself whipping up delicious meals, but that’s about it. I just can’t plan ahead enough to be able to buy the ingredients to make meals. I usually wind up peering into the fridge and pantry a little before meal time to see what I can put together to make an acceptable meal. That’s fine for me and my frozen pizza loving husband but not OK for kids in my book. With baby number two on his way I need to get comfortable and more than competent with cooking and making sure my little girl will eat whatever I offer, especially when I consider that in another year I’ll be starting with the mushy peas and pureed sweet potato routine again. It’s time for me to start emulating some of my favorite Food Network chefs and get cooking.