Quick food preparation is vital to making your life flow smoothly when you have small children

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An efficient, quick, simple food plan and quick food preparation plan is vital for busy parents.

PLANNING is probably one of the most efficient things you can do in regard to meal preparation. Plan menus ahead weekly or monthly. From various options, you can develop a method that works for your life syle.

If you devise a plan that is heavy on vegetables, with some form of protein and carbohydrates and light on sugar and white flour and Trans fats, you will have a good food plan for your entire family. Of course, special needs have to be taken into consideration.

GRIND up food for fresh, wholesome baby food. Grinding is a consummate way of quick food preparation for baby. Pretty well any food that you prepare for the family can be ground up for baby to eat--provided you follow the rules of baby requirements appropriate for the age of your baby--for example, a new baby should not be fed honey.

I have friends who have followed a program to cook a month’s worth of meals which are then FROZEN. This is useful for older people or for periods of convalescence or for parents with young children. It is possible to have aging parents as well as young children in your family so, it helps to have an organized plan and quick food preparation plan for feeding the family without having to spend in-ordinate amounts of time with food preparation.

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An EXAMPLE of a SIMPLE quick freezer MEAL:

Shopping List (have on hand or already cooked)

--Chosen protein (meat, fish, poultry, beans, etc.)

--Bag of frozen vegetables

--Noodles --there are organic, whole wheat, flax, sunflower seed, barley—many varieties available nowadays

--Sauce-- in a can or homemade frozen in meal size packets

--Fresh veggies

Preparation:

--Thaw and heat a pre-sized to your family size, cooked package of buffalo --or whatever protein is your choice.

--Cook elbow noodles or rice --which can be made ahead and frozen.

--Cook peas from a bag of frozen peas. note: other than fresh foods, frozen foods retain the most nutrients

--Add a homemade sauce or a commercial tomato sauce or creamed soup sauce. --Serve with a handful of fresh veggies such as carrots, celery, red and yellow pepper strips, etc.

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Another example of a quick food preparation MEAL plan:

Shop for or have on hand:

--Red, green and yellow peppers.

--Chicken or turkey chunks-- or have in one of the packets of meat frozen and pre-cut and/or pre-cooked in your freezer.

--Canola oil --olive oil is the healthy choice for everything but hot cooking.

--Chinese noodles.

Preaparation:

--Heat canola oil in Wok hot.

--Cook chicken or turkey chunks until there is no pink.

--While chicken cooks, slice peppers. Toward the end of the chicken cooking, add peppers-which will steam.

--Add Chinese noodles on top of the other cooking ingredients and steam ‘till tender.

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---and if you like those, you can tell me and I can devise more to add here.

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Pre-planned monthly MENUS allow you to easily make up a grocery list to minimize time spent in the grocery and ultimately, in the kitchen. Plan according to your family's tastes and needs.

If you are concerned about cost, make the majority of your shopping in the vegetable aisle in order to get the most nutrients out of your purchases--shop mostly the outside aisles.

For quick food preparation, stack your freezer in such a way that each item of a menu can be easily found.

Freezer Map Example

Divide into 4 sections

Lower shelf port side: Meals pre-made

Lower shelf second section from left: Misc.

Lower shelf section third from left or second from right :-) : Meat --unless you are vegetarian--a week’s worth of frozen meats, poultry and fish --pre-cooked or not depending on the plan you have devised

Lower shelf starboard side : A week worth of bags of frozen vegetables. (supposedly there is the most nutrition in frozen vegetables as they are flash frozen. However, there is some controversy about that, in that, fresh vegetables have no nutrient loss from blanching. You have to make your own decision about that, but your baby will not likely be able to digest most fresh vegetables.)

Handy kitchen gadgets and utensils for quick food preparation are:

--A baby food grinder

--A wok

--Zip lock bags, all sizes

--Spices—especially turmerick

--A pressure cooker-if you’re comfortable with pressure cooking

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If you are not the most fond of cooking, some streamlined modifications can help make quick food preparation easier and more palatable.

Again, PLANNING a week’s worth of menus and a ready made shopping list to match can ease cooking stress.

If you are a gourmet cook and cooking relaxes you, keep cooking! And ENLIST your TODDLERs HELP in any appropriate tasks.

Baby can participate by OBSERVATION and PLAYING with SAFE kitchen objects while you work.

Feeding your baby and your family.

There are so many excellent sites on the web concerning feeding your baby and nutrition, that I will leave further specifics on that subject to them.

Just one mention:

AVOCADOS are quick food preparation and a great finger food and for a baby who is learning to feed herself. It’s full of nutrients (the fat is an okay kind of fat) and it’s easy to use. Cut one in half lengthwise, remove seed and slice in small pieces. Or when little fingers get more dexterous, give baby half-or less depending on his size- an avocado and a little spoon. The rind makes a nice little dish and clean-up is easy.

Okay, one more. A Frisbee makes a great feeding dish. It has nice little sides for scooping against and it’s not breakable so no broken glass worries.

Well, okay, maybe one more. Wash-cloths can be turned into bibs with the addition of a little piece of Velcro on either end. Sew two together for a bigger bib. And if you’re going to a restaurant with baby, a pre-wetted and wrung out wash-cloth taken along in a zip lock bag makes clean-up easy.