Starting Baby-Led Weaning (& a recipe)

Guess what?! I suck at blogging. Maybe it isn't my forte. Maybe...? No, it's definitely not. My time management skills seem to be lacking. But only because there's a little person who is quite the time suck these days and he's much cooler than blogging. Sorry guys!

So why am I here about to blog if I suck so badly at it? Well, that's a great question. It just felt right. Owen is napping and I'm listening to music and sipping my daily iced coffee. All those circumstances make for great blogging time. However, I feel by just typing the words, I send signals to Owen in his sweet slumber to wake up. Don't do it, child.. stay asleep for mama!

 
Okay, so updates... Owen is pretty much an adult now. 6 months and a half months... He eats normal people food (well he practices.. he's still an avid milk drinker though, in case you needed to know?) We have decided to skip the purees and do Baby Led-Weaning (what the heck is she rambling on about...?) I know, I must be crazy... But hey, being a parent rocks because I get to raise my child whatever way I want.

Anyways, I have had lots of people ask me how BLW works and I figured this would be a great blogging opportunity. Let me start off by saying, I have absolutely no problem with mama's who decide to feed their babies purees. That is what they choose to do and if that works for them, then that's okay, too! We are all parents and we get to make those decisions for our children.

I decided to do BLW because I'm a weird mom, some would call me "crunchy". I wouldn't say I'm at that point, just yet, but I'm getting there. Haha. Anyways, BLW... it's the idea that your baby is able to eat normal food from the get go. It makes meal times much more enjoyable for the family instead of having to feed the baby something else, while everyone else is eating. BLW lets your baby take control.

They (who are these people anyhow?! The American Association of Pediatrics, or simply, AAP) recommend you wait until your baby is 6 months because that is generally the time when your little one is able to sit up without help and bring things to their mouth without missing. It's also when their digestive systems are geared up and ready for solids, which is the most important part. Now, you may be like... well what about cereals?! Feeding your baby cereals is absolutely unnecessary! It has little to no nutritional value for your baby. The only thing that your baby needs for the first 6 months of life is breast-milk or formula. Again, if you feed or have fed your baby, cereals that's totally okay, I'm the odd one out!

Now you're probably wondering how babies eat solids without teeth?! Babies gums are incredibly strong (if you've ever had a your finger gnawed on by a teething baby, you know this..) and they can mash foods up pretty well. There are some foods that are going to be harder for babies to eat, so you're not going to be able to give your baby a raw carrot and expect him to eat it, sorry! But, you will be able to give your baby soft foods and they will be able to eat it. Foods that Owen loves right now are avocado, peaches, cucumber, baked zucchini, bell pepper, and toast. He has even sucked a piece of steak dry; again, he can't eat it but the juice of the steak is high in iron which is amazing for babies!

Here's a video of Owen eating solids for the first time! It's in fast-forward mode but it's hilarious to watch.

So here are some pointers that helped me immensely:

• If you don't have a history of any food allergies, you don't have to wait to offer wheat, dairy, or  egg products but if you are concerned, discuss with your pediatrician first
• Nuts, honey, and peanut butter should be delayed until after 2, or after discussion with your ped
• Cutting fruits & veggies into fry-sized pieces with some skin on helps your little one be able to pick up and grasp them easily
• The first couple weeks to a month of BLW it's more of getting to know the food and playing with it, your baby doesn't realize that it's food, so allowing more opportunities to "play" with the food will allow your baby to quickly realize that its food to eat
• Gagging and choking are two VERY different things, babies gag VERY easily as their gag reflex is right at the front of the tongue, so naturally, when a piece of food is on it, they will gag, the more opportunities that babies get to eat, the more their gag reflex will adapt and move back 
• If your baby is gagging and you are worried, don't be afraid to offer a little sip of water to help wash the food down for them 
• Brush up on baby CPR and print out step-by-step instructions to put on the fridge or somewhere nearby, this will ease your mind in case something does happen
• Try to limit salt intake to little to none; if your baby does have something salty (like ham) just make sure they up their fluid intake
• Never substitute a meal for a milk feeding and remember "food before one is just for fun." Babies still need all the condensed nutrients that breast-milk and formula offer until they are one; around 9 months they will naturally start eating milk less and solids more but milk will still be the primary form of nutrition 
• BLW is MESSY! Buy a high chair that is easy to clean! 
• Don't overload your babies plate with foods, they will get overwhelmed easily, start by offering just a couple pieces of food
• Do what works for you, BLW is very lax and doesn't need to follow a bunch of exact times. We try to have breakfast every morning right now and that is what is working for us. If lunch or dinner work for you, that's great, too!
• If you have any questions, feel free to contact me! There is probably a bunch of stuff I'm leaving out and I'll edit as needed.

With all that said, I wanted to share a waffle recipe that Owen & I both love and eat on a regular basis.

BLW-friendly Blueberry Waffles
// makes about 3-4 depending on how much batter you use

1/2 cup whole wheat flour (or all-purpose, do what works for you)
1/2 cup oatmeal (we used quick cooking)
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
2 eggs
1 tsp olive oil (coconut oil, grapeseed oil, vegetable oil, could all be substituted)
1/2 cup milk (coconut, soy, almond, even breast-milk can be substituted)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp of water (if your batter is looking a little thicker, you can put a bit more)
& blueberries to top when baking, I put about a 1/4-1/2 a cup per waffle

I usually just put all the ingredients into my magic bullet and give it a whirl. But if you don't have a mixer, just combine all the dry ingredients in a bowl and mix until combined, then add your wet ingredients and mix until no longer lumpy. Pop about a 1/2 cup of the mix into a griddle or waffle iron and cook about 2-3 minutes. Let cool slightly (for baby) and cut into thick strips (again, for baby) and enjoy! These are super healthy for you and baby and can be whipped up relatively quickly.

Baby-Led Weaning has worked really well for us, but I absolutely understand that it doesn't work for everyone. I just wanted to share these tips for starting BLW. These are the tips I wish I knew when I started and I thought I'd share with other moms who might be wondering the same things.

Thanks for reading!

 xx

update //
I just received a comment from an anonymous person telling me that I should be careful about what I post on my blog and that someone should call CPS if they know what's good for me. I am really offended for someone to think that I would ever even think about endangering my child! If you do not agree with BLW, that's 100% OK, but don't come on my blog and threaten me. Just because it is different from what you would do, doesn't make it illegal or wrong.

Something Sweet Sunday

Hello everyone! I hope you all had an amazing week. Things were pretty boring in the Johnson household (well as boring as they could get with a newborn), but we enjoy the slow life here. Before we get started here are my favorite pictures from our week. The many faces of Owen. Life with a newborn is so much fun... we are getting good at this!

 

 

  

He cracks me up! 

Anyways, for this week's 'Something Sweet Sunday' I made a blueberry-cream-cheese-croissant-bake! For names sake, let's just call it Blueberry Bread Pudding, because that's what it pretty much is.

This was such an easy dish to pull together and with my little guy, easy and quick meals are a necessity. My favorite part about this is that it serves well as a breakfast or dessert dish (at least it started out as breakfast and I found myself eating it later for dessert.. Haha). 

Okay moving on to the recipe.

Blueberry Bread Pudding:

• 3 large croissants (I had 6 smaller sized ones)
• 1/2 cup of honey
• 3/4 cup of milk
• 1 16oz package of cream cheese
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon 
• 2 eggs 
• 1 package of blueberries (8oz, fresh or frozen but, fresh is best, frozen blueberries tend to retain a lot of water)
• Powdered sugar
  
  ** if you want to use regular sugar it's 3/4 cup of sugar and 1 cup of milk

 I'll start with my ingredient picture, doesn't it all look so pretty together? Haha, anyways, preheat your oven to 350 degrees and gather all your supplies! 

Now get to whipping your cream cheese (so there's no clumps!) and always make sure it's room temperature.

Mix in your honey with the cream cheese until combined, then add the rest of your ingredients. 

Then put your croissant pieces in a bowl (or you can put them in an 9in square pan and skip the nonsense) and then add your cream cheese mixture and let sit for 20 minutes.

Then sprinkle your blueberries all over. I put half the blueberries in first and kind of mixed it in with the croissant pieces and then topped the rest with the remaining blueberries. Then put in the oven for 20-25 minutes. YUM! Almost there...

Okay, now let your beauty cool just a bit... and get the powdered sugar ready! (I love my oven mitt and I thought it looked good with the picture :])

Cut a nice slice out and powder it up! Of course you can always put maple syrup as well, or you can eat it plain. Either way, it will be great! The cream cheese definitely makes this recipe shine. Yum, yum, yum! 

Next step, EAT and enjoy!

Something Sweet Sunday

Hello everyone. I hope you are enjoying your Superbowl Sunday (& Groundhog Day, too!). This week I have been wondering what to post about and while I came up with a couple good ideas (I'll save those for later), I wanted to find something to inspire me to continue to post on here and I thought what better way to do that than by baking!

Over the past few months, I have found that I have not been baking nearly as much as I'd love to and of course since having the little guy, there really is not a ton of time to get that done. So, my recipe collection has continued to grow. To eliminate this problem I have decided to set aside one day a week (or maybe more) to make one of the delicious foods I've been meaning to! So, this Sunday will mark the beginning of that journey for me and I thought that it would be a pretty great thing to blog about since there's no better inspiration than food.

This Sunday I made Oatmeal Cake w/ Coconut Pecan Frosting! Ahhh, I have been meaning to find a recipe like this since me and Tyler went to San Francisco for our anniversary this past July. We stopped by an adorable little (seriously.. it was maybe 150 sq ft) coffee shop, Hollow. At Hollow, we enjoyed this cake, coffee, and endless conversation. Ah, I love San Francisco. It brings out a whole new personality in me and Tyler. We need to go back soon!

Anyways, this past week, I saw that a friend had pinned a recipe for that cake that I forgot about and I knew I had to make it this week!

So here it is--

Oatmeal Cake:

• 1/2 cup quick cooking oatmeal
• 3/4 cups boiling water
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2/3 cups flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup of butter

Coconut Pecan Frosting:

• 3 tbsp melted butter
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup sweetened shredded coconut
• 1/2 cup chopped nuts
• 2 tbsp milk
• 1/2 tsp vanilla

Now gather all your ingredients and take hundreds of photos of them! Haha... I'm kidding.. sort of. ;)

Then combine your oats & boiling water and SET ASIDE.

 

Take the remaining ingredients and combine well. 

 Then add in your oatmeal mixture and it will look like this picture above. 

Butter & flour an 8x8 pan (square, circle, whatever floats your boat) and pour mixture in. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

Gather all your frosting ingredients!

And combine until it looks like this.. just take a spoon and mix it all together.

 Then once your cake is out of the oven, spread this on top and send it back in on BROIL until the coconut is browned (this part goes quick, so keep an eye on it), then VOILA, you have a cake.

 

Then the hard part comes and you have to wait for it to cool. Yep, awful.. to speed the process along, I usually just set it in the fridge because I'm impatient and tired of waiting! 

Once your cake is cooled, cut that bad boy up and serve with a couple shots of espresso or a big glass of milk. Or whatever you want. I don't mind.

Welp, that's all I got for this evening. Tyler and I loved it and I haven't officially had a slice yet so I better go do that before the babe wakes..

xo

Breakfast with the Johnson's

Such an old picture. We have always loved cooking together.

 As most of you know, Tyler & I love to eat. If you didn't know that, then well.. take one look at our Instagram's and you'll be in for a real shocker. But seriously, as much as we eat, we love to cook and cook together, at that. We are always scrounging up ingredients in the house to make something to satisfy our hunger pains or food desires.

So, while we love food, we love breakfast foods especially, though it's hard for either of us to get up and actually eat breakfast during "breakfast hours", we usually just make it for lunch or dinner. Maybe even dessert. It still counts right? ... Okay good. One our favorite things to make, aside from the classic egg over easy on toast with turkey bacon, is crepes!

The thing I love about crepes is that you can do pretty much anything with them and with all the berries in season right now, it makes for my favorite crepe which is raspberry & pastry cream. YUM! I could eat these all day. Tyler isn't a huge fan of raspberries, however he did have a few bites of mine and liked it. Tyler's favorite crepe is strawberries & pastry cream. And of course, Nutella & banana crepes are always a hit.

Another one of our favorites is puffed pancakes! We heard about these not too long ago from one of my favorite bloggers, LoveTaza. Since then, we have made them quite a few times and like crepes, they are pretty versatile, but we usually just stick to putting fresh fruit & syrup on them. (that sounds kinda funky doesn't it?, it's good. trust me.) Since I have been getting a couple requests for our recipes that we post, I figured I would kill a few birds with one stone by posting the recipe on here for everyone to enjoy. Here you are. Enjoy!




Crepes: makes about 12 crepes
2 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup water
1 cup flour
3 tablespoons melted butter
2 1/2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)

Combine all ingredients in blender and pulse for 10 seconds. Allow crepe batter to sit aside in fridge for about an hour, this allows for the bubbles to subside so that there isn't any tearing when you're cooking the crepe. If you're impatient, go for it. I've done it and haven't had any problems. (don't blame me if they don't turn out... you were warned)

Pastry Cream: makes about 3 cups (this will be enough)
2 cups milk
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/3 cup sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla

Crack eggs into a container and lightly beat, place these on the side. In a medium saucepan over medium heat combine milk sugar and cornstarch. Let the milk start to bubble but be careful because it is really easy for the cornstarch to clump on the bottom of the pan. Once the bubbles form, take off the heat. Before you add the eggs, you need to add about a 1/3 of a cup to the eggs to temper the eggs before the eggs can go into the milk mixture. If you don't do this, you will end up with egg whites in your cream. Once you have mixed the mixture into the eggs, add that to the milk base and continue to stir. Once stirred in completely, put the cream back onto the burner and let cook for about 2 more minutes; don't let it boil. Take off the heat and add vanilla.

*If you get egg whites into your pastry cream, strain mixture and it should take care of the little whites and it'll solve the problem for the most part.

Puffed Pancakes:
3 tablespoons butter
3 eggs
3/4 cup flour
3/4 cup milk *heated for 20 seconds in microwave
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
pinch of salt

 Preheat oven to 400 degrees. White you're doing this, put your 3 tablespoons of butter into a large saute pan (I use a clear pie pan). Meanwhile, combine ingredients into a blender and pulse for 10 seconds to insure that is combined well. If you mix by hand, make sure everything is combined and not clumpy. Take out your pan from the oven. Swirl butter to make sure it's coated completely and pour batter into the pan. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until it is golden brown around the edges. You can add fresh berries (or any fruit you desire), whipped cream, syrup, powdered sugar, or anything your heart desires on top! Enjoy!