Baby Food

This is my daughter.  Her name is Genevieve (aka Baby G).  She is 17 months old.  Sweet seventeen!

Now that we have gotten the formalities outta the way.  Let's get down to my very 1st post.  My daughter has been exploring and exposed to the world of solid foods for the past 9 months or so.  So far we have given her various fruits like bananas, apples, mangoes and recently, even durian! (she has to start somewhere!)  Rice, noodles, pasta, porridge, sausages, pork, fish, beef, chicken, corn, peas, carrot, potatoes, sweet potatoes, the list goes on.  Pretty much whatever my wife and i eat and drinks, she has sampled them.

So for today's post, i'm gonna focus on her daily staple food. Porridge.  My mother-in-law is her primary care-taker and cooks her daily porridge.  Her porridge has evolved over the months  as we discover Baby G's eating habits and preferences.  We had to be careful as infants/toddlers may have allergies that we still unaware of.  Both my wife and I don't have any allergies, but we still had to be careful when it comes to children.

So far we have cooked her porridge with anchovies, lean pork, carrot puree, cod fish, wolfberries, marmite etc.  We discover that Baby G is slightly allergic to dark soy sauce,  the area surrounding her lips tend to have patches of reddish rash, though it didn't appear to be itchy or causing her any discomfort, we were still concerned and have removed it from her diet.

I will just share with you what i usually cook when i'm on "duty" during weekends.

The following is NOT a standard recipe:

1 cup of rice

20g of pumpkin, diced

15g of wolfberries

30 grams of lean pork (today i'm using pork neck)

1 tbsp of chicken stock concentrate

1 tbsp of abalone stock

Cooked the rice first with at least 3 cups of water (same measuring cup as the rice) over low fire.  Normally i would use my induction cooker, but it broke down.  I find that the induction cooker cooks the rice more evenly as compare to the gas burner.  Using a gas burner tends to burn easier if you're not watching the pot.

Add in the pumpkin, and after 5 mins add in the wolfberries.  Stir the porridge occasionally to keep the heat evenly distributed.  Add in both the stock concentrate together and adjust the taste accordingly.  I do not add in salt nor pepper.  I do add in more water to gauge its consistency.

After 20 minutes, you should get a nice, starchy, risotto-like, consistency.  Add in the pork, stir for another 3 to 5 mins.  Turn off the heat and...Viola!

- posted by Lim