The Epicure Mommy: March 2012

So since I have a 7 month old - his food intake has become a constant thought throughout my day. Of course, I always think about food. I read food blogs, I watch Food TV, I plan out weekly menus so I can shop more efficiently, and really, I just love food.

I've never been an extremist about any type of food, but I do like to make my own meals as much as possible. The whole convenience food movement that started 60 or so years ago in this country is just starting to wane, I think. Those TV dinners are scary looking and unfortunately so cheap that people begin to think they can't afford real food. (off soap box)

I hate canned fruits and veggies - but frozen works pretty well. I am aghast at the sodium content of the meals you can buy - I do my own version of the cheeseburger pasta meal that my family loves...but one thing I didn't stress over a lot was baby food. With my first, I made a few things on my own - like mashing up a banana or when she was self-feeding I gave her frozen peas - but I loved the convenience of Gerber small packages...that way you knew how much they were eating, AND they were so easy to just throw in a diaper bag with a bib and a spoon. And don't get me wrong, I still buy those little Gerber packs - they are great. That said, making your own baby food is EASY, and cheaper.

I'm making strained prunes. You can use this process for any baby food you want to make, peas, carrots, apples, green beans, etc. I just happen to need to get my kid some prunes...if you know what I mean.

You need a food processor, a food sieve, a small sauce pan, some H2O and prunes.

Here I had about 4oz. of prunes and just enough water to cover them. Bring them to a quick boil and then turn off the heat - allow them to cool to room temp.

They will rehydrate a little and look like this:

Now just throw 'em in your work bowl of the food processor along with all the water. You might even need more water as you begin to process.

Here they are just whirring away. I didn't pulse them, I turned that sucker on and let them whir for about 15 seconds,

Opened them up and looked like they needed more whirring...

15 seconds later (so a total of 30) I felt they reached a good consistency and I spooned some out to push through the sieve.

It's hard to hold the sieve, push the prunes through, and get a picture, but here ya go.

It should look like this as it strains out.

You'll have a lot of fiber, skin and occasionally a pit left over.

And this is the glossy puree.

And the amazing fiber/skin left over. You could keep this for yourself, mix it into yogurt or a smoothy, on a day you might need to get things moving. *wink wink.