Yum For BABY

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

Chicken Cheese Ball (Toddler appetizer)

This is a wonderful appetizer to cook with your little one. As always I say, it is so much fun when you cook with your kids. It will help to improve their logic skills. I never noticed my son was watching all these cooking shows on TV when I watch. But yesterday, he took three disposable plates from my cabinet and made strawberries and grapes and few more things with his play dough and said “Mama it is time to taste my dishes”. I really got surprised, wow this is the way they do taste test at cooking shows. So once in a while give them a chance!

Ingredients

Chicken- Medium size thigh

Cheese, Parmesan- 1/3 cup

Carrot- 1 small

Potato-1 medium size

Shallots- 3

Egg- 1

Bread crumbs

Salt and pepper, to taste

Method

Step 1: Cook chicken, carrot and potato by adding salt and pepper.

Step 2: Heat a large pan and saute minced shallots. When shallots start to turn brown add all cooked ingredients in the pan and mix for another 3 more minutes.

Step 3: Now grind all the ingredients together in a blender, like the way we make minced chicken.

Step 4: Add cheese to the ground ingredients and make small sized balls.

Step 5: Beat egg in a small bowl and add chicken cheese balls into beaten egg and then roll them in bread crumbs.

Step 6: Heat oil in a pan and fry chicken cheese balls until they turn golden brown color.

Serve warm with mayonnaise or ketchup.

Heat all cooked ingredients in a pan

Add cheese to minced ingredients

Dip Chicken Cheese Balls into beaten egg

Roll balls into bread crumbs

Chicken cheese balls are ready to fry. Fry them until they turn golden brown.

HAPPY COOKING!

Funnel Cake

Whenever I think about Funnel Cake, my mouth will be drooling always, because Funnel Cake is one of my favorite Carnival foods. Whenever we go to Carnivals, the first thing I do is, run to a food truck and stay in line to buy Funnel Cake. I never tried to make it at home. But few days back, while I was watching a Cooking show on TV and my little boy was with me. That show was about Carnival foods, and they were showing variety of foods and while they were showing about Funnel Cake, my son was telling me, “Mama I want to go inside TV and eat that Funnel Cake”. So I thought, why should I wait for next carnival? Let us make it at home.

Cooking funnel cake is easy if you have the ring and Funnel Cake pitcher or Funnel. So I bought it from store. So it was very easy for me to make it.

I hope you all will try to make this Funnel Cake and hope your family will love this.

Funnel Cake

Wishing all my readers a MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Ingredients:

All-purpose flour- 1 cup

Baking soda- ½ Tsp

Salt- ½ tsp

Sugar- 1 Tsp

Egg- 1

Vanilla extract- ½ Tsp

Milk- 1 cup

Powdered sugar

Method:

Step 1: Mix all the dry ingredients together (All-purpose flour, baking soda, salt and sugar).

Step 2: Mix all the wet ingredients together (Beat egg and mix with milk and vanilla).

Step 3: Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients. Mix them using a whisk or hand mixer until you get a smooth batter (Pancake batter consistency or little thicker than Dosa batter consistency). Transfer batter into pitcher.

Step 4: Heat oil in a pan and when oil becomes hot, insert the ring into the oil and pour batter into oil. (If you don’t have ring, just pour batter in a zig zag way and across). Cook until one side becomes golden brown and then flip it. When both sides cook very well (golden color on both sides), transfer Funnel Cake to a paper towel and sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Ahhh the famous Funnel Cake is ready to serve!! Don’t forget to have a bite before you serve!

Dry ingredients and milk

Mix egg, milk and vanilla extract together

Mix dry and wet ingredients together

Funnel Cake pitcher and Ring

Cook Funnel Cake until both sides become golden brown

HAPPY COOKING!

Pomegranate Apple Smoothie

If you are looking for a finger food for your little one, pomegranate is the best. They are delicious, at the same time nutritious too. It has great antioxidant, antiviral and antitumor properties. I started giving pomegranate to my son when he was 1 and half years old. He loves pomegranate. I usually give him fruit (seeded) as such and sometimes I make smoothie by adding another fruits along with pomegranate. Juicing is a great way to get lots of healthy fruits and veggies into your family diet. This time, I am sharing “Pomegranate Apple Smoothie” recipe with you all. Hope you will enjoy this!!

Ingredients:

Pomegranate: ½ cup

Apple:1

Milk: ½ cup

Almond or cashew: ~4

Sugar (optional): 1 Tsp

Method:

Step 1: Peel, core and cut apple.

Step 2: At first blend pomegranate alone until the seed completely grinds. Then add all other ingredients and blend until you get a smooth smoothie.

Serve fresh

HAPPY COOKING!

Pasta Marinara (For Toddler)

Before I talk about my recipe “Pasta Marinara”, I need to tell you about Marinara sauce. It is an Italian sauce made with tomatoes, onion, garlic and herbs. You can easily make it at home. But I usually buy organic marinara sauce from grocery store. If you have marinara sauce in hand, you don’t have to worry about kids’ dinner and for their lunch box too.

"Pasta Marinara" is an incredibly easy pasta recipe and you can make it for your whole family and kids. Enjoy!

Pasta Marinara

Ingredients

Pasta- 50 Gram (I chose shell pasta, tricolor)

Marinara sauce- 4 Tbsp

Parmesan cheese

Salt and pepper, to taste

Method

Step 1: Cook pasta for about 10 minutes by adding salt.

Step 2: Drain water from pasta and keep it aside.

Step 3: Heat pot over medium heat and add marinara sauce and pepper (1/3 Tsp). Stir sauce until it thickens and all water evaporates.

Step 4: Now add cooked pasta and stir very well. Turn off heat and add cheese.

Step 5: Check for salt and pepper. Pasta Marinara is ready to serve. How easy this recipe is!!

Sprinkle some parmesan cheese just before serving. Your kids will love that!!

Ingredients: Pasta, marinara sauce, parmesan cheese

Add marinara sauce in a pot and boil it until it becomes thick

Mix cooked pasta with sauce and stir very well.

HAPPY COOKING!

Popcorn Chicken (For Toodler and Family)

Kids love to eat food from outside. Yes, I am talking about fast food. I am not arguing whether fast food is healthy or unhealthy, but I usually don’t take my son to eat fast food. I always prefer homely food. But once in a while eating from out is fun. Few days back while we went to KFC, I noticed that my son was eating Popcorn chicken and he said “It is yummy Mamma”. The same day during dinner time he asked for Popcorn Chicken. So I thought I need to try it at home. Super easy, almost same taste KFC Popcorn chicken I could make at home. This is great for family too. Hope you will enjoy this recipe!

Ingredients

Chicken- ~250 Gram, Boneless chicken fillet

All purpose flour- ½ cup

Egg-1

Paprika or chilly powder- ½ Tsp

Turmeric powder- 1/3 Tsp

Fennel seed powder- 1/3 Tsp

Pepper powder- ½ Tsp

Salt, to taste

Lemon Juice- 2 Tbsp

Vegetable oil, for deep frying

Method

Step 1: Wash and cut chicken into small cube shape pieces. Marinate chicken with paprika, turmeric powder, fennel seed powder, pepper powder, lemon juice and salt. Mix it very well. Keep it aside for 10 minutes.

Step 2: Beat egg and pour it into chicken pieces. Mix them very well.

Step 3: Spread all-purpose flour in a baking pan or sheet and coat each chicken pieces with flour. Coat them very well.

Step 4: Heat oil in a pan and deep fry each chicken until they turn golden brown in color. Drain them on a paper towel.

Step 5:Popcorn chicken is ready to eat. Serve warm with ketchup.

Cut chicken into cube shape pieces

Marinate chicken with spices and lemon juice

Beat egg and add this to chicken pieces

Coat each chicken pieces with all-purpose flour

Fry chicken until they turn brown in color

HAPPY COOKING

Peach Cobbler (For Toddler)

I love seasonal fruits. Because seasonal fruits taste great since they are freshly harvested. Peaches are very much seasonal, right now in Texas we have peaches everywhere in farmers market. My son is not a big fan of fresh peach, so I was looking all over my recipe books for peach fruit recipe. As you all may know when you look for a peach recipe “Peach Cobbler” would be in first place. As always I read lot of peach cobbler recipes but I made my own "Peach Cobbler" with some modifications. It was really good, my whole family loved it. So I thought OK, I need to share the recipe with all my readers. Hope you will enjoy this recipe. Let me know if you try this recipe.

Ingredients

For making Peach filling

Peaches- 5, Medium size

Cinnamon-1 Tsp

Nutmeg- ½ Tsp

Sugar-1/3 Cup

Vanilla- 3 drops

Salt, a pinch

For Batter

All-purpose flour-1 Cup

Butter- ½ cup, unsalted

Egg- 1

Milk- ~1 Cup

Sugar- ½ cup

Baking powder- 1 Tsp

Cinnamon- a pinch

Method:

Step 1: Wash peaches, peel off skin and slice them.

Step 2: Add peaches, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla and sugar into a sauce pan and mix them very well. Cook them for about 2 minutes.

Step 3: Now turn on oven to 350 degrees.

Step 4: Add butter into baking pan and melt it. I kept it oven for 30 seconds and got it melted.

Step 5: Now take a large bowl for making batter. Add all-purpose flour, egg, sugar, a pinch of cinnamon and milk into bowl and mix them together until you get a medium thin batter (idly consistency or thinner than pancake).

Step 6: Now add batter into baking pan over melted butter. Add peach mixture into the batter and bake it for about 30-45 minutes or until you see golden color crisp on edges or on top.

Note: In my experience, if your batter is thick, it won’t come upside to cover the peaches. So it will look exactly what you see in my recipe. But I tried with thin batter too and it came upside and covered all the peaches. Both ways it tastes great!