Baby Food 101

Because I am a stay at home mom, I make my baby's food at home. I must admit that at first, I was so nervous that I was not going to do it right. I researched online and found one website that I can rely on for tons of ideas and recipes. www.wholesomebabyfood.com

I'm enjoying making babyfood now. The best thing about it is that you can't really get it wrong. I mean you can either boil or steam your food, then blend it up into a puree using a scant amount of water. It's not so bad and the best part is the comfort in knowing that she is getting a hearty and healthy meal at each sitting.

Doctors generally say to begin the transition into solid foods for babies with fruits, then vegetables. We chose to begin with vegetables first because naturally, the sweetness of the fruits would turn any baby's head away when it's time to eat their vegetables. We started the baby cereal at about 5 months and then vegetables at 6 months. Of course, once she ate the vegetables, she refused to eat the cereal. Below is the breakdown of my babyfood making adventures.

Stage 1: Baby Cereal (rice first, then oatmeal, whole wheat)

Stage 2: Introduction to Solids- Vegetables

Natural sweeteners: carrot; sweet potatoes

Yellows: yellow squash, butternut squash

Greens: green peas, green beans

Other: potato, cauliflower, broccoli

Stage 3: Fruits (apples, pears, banana, peaches, plums)

Stage 4: Rice with Toor Dal (pureed with a little ghee: clarified butter)

Stage 5: Finger Foods (not there yet, but soon!)

The key is to introduce the baby to one food at a time and feed for up to 3 days. This technique helps to pinpoint food allergies, if any. If baby has no allergies and each has been introduced, then comes the fun part- mixing and matching the vegetables and fruits. I'm trying out different variations, but I'm coming to find out that with vegetables, it's best to mix one sweet vegetable (like carrots or sweet potato) with like a green (green beans, green peas) that the baby does not necessarily like. Every day is an adventure. Soon, she will be on to finger foods, and that will be a whole new adventure in itself. I can hardly wait!

My New Inspiration .. and Rave over Tastebook

Over the past few weeks, I've been working against the clock to experiment with new and innovative recipes. B and I have both been enjoying the variety of cuisine that I have been trying my hand at, and no one's complaining, that is for sure. The reason for this is quite simple - to finally make that cookbook that I've been saying that I will make and make this blog come full circle. At first, this blog served the purpose of hiding my insecurities and low confidence in my cooking abilities. I was never one to cook much before I got married, for many reasons - school, work, and too many other people around the house to do it for me! My grandmother and mother have been teaching us girls for years, from our teens, how to make traditional Indian dishes. For that I am deeply grateful. However, living in America, life catches up with you and with all of the demands of school and work, it's not possible to cram in cooking sessions. So, you forget how to make things that once came so easy. And after marriage, like any typical Indian girl, I feel like I have to be "domesticated". If I don't know how to make this and that, then it reflects badly on my parents. Okay, that part's probably all in my head!

The year away in India served as my introductory year to cooking. Cooking is definitely a fine art, but once you figure out a technique that works best for you, then the rest is easy. We were also very limited in the foods we could eat overseas. Any baked foods were not an option as we had no oven. The Western foods that are inexpensive here are twice maybe three times the price overseas. Sometimes, they were not an option either. The routine was I make dinner and leftovers would be eaten for lunch. I would pack B his lunch in his tiffin. B discouraged away from taking the typical sandwiches for lunch for fear of his colleagues labeling him as a "typical Western-influenced Indian." I made Indian foods during the week and tried international cuisine on the weekends. We watched a lot of Nigella Feasts while in India as there was no Food Network.

It's been about nine months since we made the move back to the States, and we are all settled down- in a house with a family. Just like in India, I have to find ways to pass my time. In India, I could be out and about. In Chicago in the middle of winter, not much so. I pass my days looking after my babygirl and watching FoodNetwork. Speaking of my babygirl .. while cooking dinner, I put her in her carseat in between the kitchen and dining area, and that is the most peaceful that she is all day- just watching her mommy cooking away. It's our bonding time, I guess. Thus, she has become my new inspiration for this project that I am undertaking. I want to construct a cookbook filled with family favorites so that I can pass it down to her, and hopefully, she can pass it down even further. It's a gift that not many Indian girls like me were fortunate to have. Cooking was like a chore, with so many different ingredients and the method was never written down in stone. Life needs to be much easier than that, and for that reason, I have joined Tastebook.

Tastebook is a great online service for recipe collection and recipe sharing. You can either create your own cookbook from scratch, by choosing a cover image, title for book and adding on your personal recipes or your favorite recipes from affiliated websites. It even has a fancy dedication page. How cool is that?!

I've shared a few recipes with my close network, and I'm hoping that they join Tastebook as well so that they can be a part of my journey and maybe even a part of the finished product. I look forward to updating you all on how the book is coming along.

Dining In: Spanish Tapas

I will never forget the Spanish tapas restaurant that B took me to when we were first dating. It was called Mirror located close to downtown Nashville. It was my first experience eating tapas cuisine and boy, did I enjoy it!! Who wouldn't?! I mean you get to taste a little and order a lot!! Of course, our order was limited as there were not many vegetarian options on the menu. There were just enough, though. Since then, we have visited several other tapas restaurants and it's always the same drill. We order about 5 classics and enjoy family style! Our all time favorite is the Patatas Bravas (crispy spices potatoes), of which I will attempt to imitate at home. A few other items we order are the hummus, pa amb oli (or Spanish bruschetta), queso de cabra (goat cheese baked in tomato sauce) and of course the cheese plate. The menu varies place to place but these are pretty much staples at any tapas joint.

Soups: My New Craze

I recently discovered that I have a new craze- Soups! Over the last week, I've made a version of kidney bean/minestrone soup, butternut squash soup, and today I made a Tuscan butter bean soup. Each one turned out pretty well. The recipes will be posted up soon. There's a few more that I will try out in the next few months. Now's the perfect time, too. From what I hear, I have quite a bitter cold winter to look forward to this year. Brrrr!!!

Out of Tiffin Series

I am really excited about finally getting to use a tiffin. A tiffin is basically an Indian lunchbox. I pack my husband a tiffin every day. He comes home with stories of how he and colleagues eat their lunches, and I have always wanted to do the same. Here is my chance.

This weekend, we will be attending a seminar from morning to night. As I will not have time to cook, I put a few items together for lunch and snacks.

Among these are: Macaroni Salad; Mediterranean Chickpea Salad; Soji Dhokla; and Khaman Dhokla. Enjoy!

On Giving Credit Where It Is Due ...

Back in English class, we learned about plagiarism, which means the act of copying someone else's thoughts and ideas and taking credit for them. I have never been a plagiarist and I do not want to start now. In this post, I want to give credit where it is due.

Despite what some people may think after looking at my recipes or pictures, I am not that creative when it comes to being in the kitchen. Throughout these past several months, I have gotten many ideas and recipes from other people's blogs. I spent so much of my free time and energy trying to research innovative menu items. Many times I wrote down recipes where ever and when ever I could find some place to jot them down, but I never wrote out which "food blog" was the source of my inspiration.

Below are just a few of the links to food blogs that I have browsed through. I hope they can be helpful to some of you to find your own recipes.

www.manjulaskitchen.com
www.showmethecurry.com
http://jugalbandi.info
thespicewholovedme. blogspot.com
www.hookedonheat.com
www.monsoonspice.com
onehotstove.blogspot.com
www.sanjeevkapoor.com (just click on Khana Khazana and then Recipes)

Check them out for yourself! I am a regular peaker at these blogs, and I often feel guilty of plagiarizing, even though I am not if I change a few ingredients around. I also sometimes Google image recipes and build my own recipe from there.

So, I'm not sure if this qualifies me as "foodie" blogger, but I guess I do not mind. I mean I do love food and I love to write about it! Now, that this is off my chest, I feel so much better.

Happy Holidays!

I will be taking a mini-vacation away from the kitchen for a few short weeks. Don't get me wrong. I will still be cooking, but just not experimenting with anything new. That is why I had to get the "steaming experiments" over and out of my system. They turned out pretty good, giving me the confidence I very much needed. We have pictures of the latest cooking escapades, but just have not had a chance to post them. I promise the pictures will be posted up soon.

In the meantime, I wanted to wish you all a Christmas full of good food, good company and good cheer. I hope all of you also have a spectacular New Year, and I will be seeing you all next year!

Kitchen Temporaily Closed

We are off to America. Thus, the kitchen is temporarily closed. We will reopen on December 3rd as we will be getting in late December 2nd, (IST) Indian Standard Time.

Cooking is definitely an unrecognized art form. It's been really neat experimenting with different styles of cooking. Thank you for all of your support. It will be nice to take a few weeks away. I'll be back soon, though, and ready with more recipes to make life more Hearty. Healthy. Homemade.

Kitchen Temporarily Closed

The kitchen has been temporarily closed. Since we have been out and about for the past few days, I have not really had a chance to try out anything new. Now that I am home and settled, I am feeling under the weather. I might try something new while I am home alone so keep a lookout.

Star Ratings

As I was doing some cleaning up on this blog, I noticed how much better the pictures are looking. In the beginning, we were taking pictures off of a mobile camera, and they would turn out blurry. Now that we are taking the pictures from a real camera, you can photograph the dish at better angles to get a better shot, all thanks to Bhavnesh.

I added new labels to help you browse my recipes better. Bhavnesh and I sat down together, and with his suggestions and help, we rated the dishes based on the overall physical presentation, taste and our own preferences. I do not want to deter any of you from experimenting with the recipes yourselves. Please keep in mind that we could have rated it poorly because it did not suit our taste.

1 star means it was a flop; needs much more improvement if we ever try it again.
2 stars means it was a little better and we may or may not try it again.
3 stars means the dish was okay. We will probably try it again, and revise the recipe.
4 stars means we loved the dish but it could use a little bit of improvement.
5 stars means it is a favorite in our kitchen and we will be having it very often!

So you see how useful this blog is for future experimentation. Even though a dish did not turn out quite like I expected, I most likely will try it again and strive to improve it so that it will eventually enter a 5 star rating! That is my goal, after all.

Compliments to the Photo Guy

I have to give compliments to Bhavnesh for taking such deliciously mouthwatering pictures of the day specials. He genuinely takes his time to catch the perfect shot, and it shows!

Join Me in My Kitchen

Welcome to my kitchen! I love cooking, and I thank my mother and grandmother for teaching me the art of cooking delicious Gujarati homemade food. Now that I am cooking for two, I almost always run into road blocks trying to decide what to make for dinner the next day. So, I spent much of my free time researching new recipes and began experimenting with these new and interesting ideas. With this blog, I will share with you my cooking experiences. Not only will this blog be a creation of my personal cookbook, but it will also serve as a valuable resource for improving and expanding on the little knowledge that I have on cooking.

I would love to hear your comments or suggestions. It would also be great to receive some of your own recipes that I can add to my cookbook. I hope my recipes will help inspire some of you out there to cook hearty and healthy homemade food.