The Trojan Hamburger
Sweet Girl is not a vegetable eater. At about the age of 10 months she started turning her nose up at anything green. Then 3 months later she gave up orange vegetables as well. I tried. Really I did. But she can be somewhat stubborn, not to mention volatile on occassion. But a year in to the gluten and casein free diet, she's getting a bit more adventurous. She'll try just about any piece of fruit on a toothpick in the grocery store, she loves "yettuce" (mostly as a salad dressing delivery device but I'll take what I can get), and she's recently fallen head over heels for hamburgers. Alas we're still greatly lacking in the vegetable department.
There are too many good nutrients in vegetables to give up on getting her to eat them though. I don't want to have to give her a million supplements for the rest of her life, so I've decided to try to alternate methods. A couple of different cookbooks have been published detailing ways to hide vegetables in kid-friendly foods. Sounded too good to be true. Let's not forget that gfcf substitutions would have to be made. Not sure if baked goods can be gfcf AND full of hidden vegetables. We'll have to see. And I do have some qualms that Sweet Girl won't ever eat veggies unless they're hidden in something, but at this point I'm really just trying to get ball rolling.
Experiment Number One: Oatmeal Raisin Cookies with zucchini and banana purees
Notes: I substituted the Gluten Free Gourmet's four flour mix plus a teaspoon of xantham gum for the all-purpose flour and I used cf margarine in place of the tub spread in the original recipe. The oats were certified gluten free too.
I chose this recipe to try first because it's a cookie (appealing to Sweet Girl's Sweet Tooth) but still relatively low in sugar. The cookies turned out light and pretty fluffy. Aunt Carrie approved of both the taste and texture, but Aunt Carrie is a pretty good vegetable eater to begin with. So the real test came when Sweet Girl grabbed one off the cooling rack. Gone in 20 seconds. And the next two were gone just as quickly.
Experiment Number One: Success
Experiment Number Two: Beef and Broccoli Hamburger
So this isn't actually in a cookbook, but I figured if I'm officially hiding vegetables I might as well go all in. Sweet Girl loves her a good hamburger. And by love I mean that deep-seated, never able to shake, can't get you out of my mind kind of love. Adding about a quarter cup of broccoli puree to the hamburger before I made it in to a patty resulted in a somewhat green burger that was devoured by Sweet Girl. She ate it with a fork and then licked the plate. That's my girl.
Experiment Number Two: Success
Up next trying to fry up some cauliflower battered bacon. Just kidding, but if someone has as a recipe for that you'll be Sweet Girl's favorite person.
There are too many good nutrients in vegetables to give up on getting her to eat them though. I don't want to have to give her a million supplements for the rest of her life, so I've decided to try to alternate methods. A couple of different cookbooks have been published detailing ways to hide vegetables in kid-friendly foods. Sounded too good to be true. Let's not forget that gfcf substitutions would have to be made. Not sure if baked goods can be gfcf AND full of hidden vegetables. We'll have to see. And I do have some qualms that Sweet Girl won't ever eat veggies unless they're hidden in something, but at this point I'm really just trying to get ball rolling.
Experiment Number One: Oatmeal Raisin Cookies with zucchini and banana purees
Notes: I substituted the Gluten Free Gourmet's four flour mix plus a teaspoon of xantham gum for the all-purpose flour and I used cf margarine in place of the tub spread in the original recipe. The oats were certified gluten free too.
I chose this recipe to try first because it's a cookie (appealing to Sweet Girl's Sweet Tooth) but still relatively low in sugar. The cookies turned out light and pretty fluffy. Aunt Carrie approved of both the taste and texture, but Aunt Carrie is a pretty good vegetable eater to begin with. So the real test came when Sweet Girl grabbed one off the cooling rack. Gone in 20 seconds. And the next two were gone just as quickly.
Experiment Number One: Success
Experiment Number Two: Beef and Broccoli Hamburger
So this isn't actually in a cookbook, but I figured if I'm officially hiding vegetables I might as well go all in. Sweet Girl loves her a good hamburger. And by love I mean that deep-seated, never able to shake, can't get you out of my mind kind of love. Adding about a quarter cup of broccoli puree to the hamburger before I made it in to a patty resulted in a somewhat green burger that was devoured by Sweet Girl. She ate it with a fork and then licked the plate. That's my girl.
Experiment Number Two: Success
Up next trying to fry up some cauliflower battered bacon. Just kidding, but if someone has as a recipe for that you'll be Sweet Girl's favorite person.
The cookies were quite tasty and provided no taste or textural clue that vegetables were lurking within.
ReplyDelete