Preschooler menus

This week on Kelly's Korner the topic is "what to feed your toddler/preschooler," and that is a great question, indeed. Most of us will agree that the short answer is: whatever they will eat.

In parenting, it becomes apparent that there are specific, unique challenges, and then we learn that we have all been given certain freebies with our children in the form of an easy task here or there. Maybe you have a child who slept through the night at six weeks, or perhaps your child embraces all new activities with no ambivalence whatsoever. One of our big blessings is that both girls, our twins who are approaching 4 1/2, have had good appetites and are considered good eaters. In fact, they have the appetites of NFL players. From the time those first foods were introduced, there has been no looking back, and we know we are incredibly blessed with that. However, we definitely live with the challenge of coming up with a menu day after day, week after week, month after month, and year after year. And we have learned that even children with good appetites resist the introduction of new food. We strive to add new ideas, and we work even harder to persuade our children to try new food.

At any rate, here were/are some of our favorites:

Breakfast options:

1) Scrambled eggs were a huge hit for quite a while. When our girls were first starting to eat actual food, we pureed the scrambled eggs in our Magic Bullet (add a little milk and shredded cheese), but they quickly progressed to managing the eggs just fine on their own.

2) Yogurt was/is an ongoing staple, and it is definitely worth looking for a brand that does not have high fructose corn syrup.

3) Waffles or pancakes are a special treat.

4) Don't forget fruit!

5) My only breakfast regret is that I have not been able to sell the idea of oatmeal. I think oatmeal and some fruit makes for a power breakfast.

Lunch/Dinner:

I remember being at a complete loss when we transitioned to real food. I scoured stores for ideas, I looked at websites, and I purchased a copy of Jessica Seinfeld's "Deceptively Delicious". The premise of the book is to incorporate pureed vegetables into regular, child-friendly dishes. We were already incorporating a lot of veggies into our diet so the recipes made sense to us. Mostly, it is a quick reference for kid-friendly suggestions. I have not yet tried her follow up, "Double Delicious," but will definitely peruse it in the future for meal ideas. In short, I am constantly seeking to add variety, especially if it means something other than chicken nuggets is served for dinner.

Some of the girls' favorites include:

1) Spaghetti has been a favorite from way back. I don't remember when we first served spaghetti, but I know the girls were heartily eating p-sketty by 18 months.

2) Buttermilk mashed potatoes with chicken is a concoction we created when the girls became obsessed with the chicken and mashed potato meal packaged/sold as a "Graduate" meal. We modified a Martha Stewart mashed potato recipe, incorporated chicken (shredded into bite size morsels) and -- voila! -- a new favorite was born. We made this in enormous batches, packaged individual meals in storage bags, and froze them for later use.

3) The Jessica Seinfeld meatloaf recipe is another big favorite, and we usually make a double batch for packaging/freezing as indicated above.

4) Finally, as soon as we could, we simply served the girls whatever we had prepared for dinner. We lightly seasoned food so that their fare would be more bland, and we continued to try to introduce whatever we were eating so that they would have greater variety.

Those are some of our go-to ideas. Thanks for visiting, and I look forward to picking up new options/ideas from others.

Have a great weekend!!!