The best oats porridge you will ever eat!

I love oats porridge! I know it is not every ones cup of tea, but for me, it is the ultimate breakfast indulgence! Warm, creamy, healthy goodness in a bowl! I have been making this for Bump and I for breakfast just recently and he LOVES it!!! Makes my heart very happy :) So, if you want to make the the best tasting oats you have ever had....here is my recipe:

You will need:

1/2 cup oats (quick cooking or whole rolled oats - whole rolled will just take a little longer to cook) 

1 cup boiling water

2 T raisins or sultanas

1/2 cup milk

Medium sized apple grated (you can peel or not peel before grating)

1/4 tsp cinnamon 

Brown sugar or honey to taste (If you are going to feed this to your little one, PLEASE DO NOT ADD HONEY unless they are a year old!!! Although rare, honey can contain spores from the bacteria Clostridium botulinum which can make your baby very ill!!)

1 tsp peanut butter (a generously heaped teaspoon...or tablespoon....your call!) 

In a medium saucepan put the grated apple, oats, cinnamon and the raisins or sultanas. Pour over the boiling water. Add the milk and stir the mixture. Cook on a medium to high heat, stirring frequently until the oats are soft and creamy (the quick cooking oats took under 5 minutes cooking on gas).

Stir in the peanut butter and sugar or honey (if you are using) while the oats are still hot. 

Now you can sit down and enjoy! (Obviously allow to cool down before feeding to your little one - the raisins can stay hot for quite some time after being removed from the heat). 

This recipe should make enough for you and your little one. Hope you enjoy!

Keep smiling!

Jax

Make your own baby food: carrot purée

Bump really enjoys carrot purée (and thin slices of carrot if I am patient enough to slice them thinly and cook them until they are super soft) 

Making your own carrot purée for your baby is really easy! What I usually do, is I cook extra carrots when I am preparing them for dinner for my husband and I, then it does not feel like extra work.

So to make your own carrot purée:

You can cook as much as you like as it freezes well. I wash and peel the carrots and then slice fairly thinly (I aim for about half a centimetre in thickness or less, but rarely achieve perfection.., my knife skills are lacking). The reason that I want them thin, is they cook faster and are easier for Bump to eat should he want some whole. I rinse the carrot slices with boiling water and then steam until  tender. Steaming carrots can take some time if you steam using a colander over a pot of boiling water with a lid. However, steaming is well worth the wait! The carrots just taste so much better than when they are boiled. I put it down to steaming keeps all of the delicious goodness locked in! If you are lucky enough to have an electric steamer, please feel free to use it!

Once the carrots are tender, dish up what you are having for dinner and then purée the remaining with a blender for your Bub. You can thin the consistency out with boiled water, breast milk or formula. However, if you are freezing the purée, I would not recommend thinning it out until after defrosting.

Well, there you go! Could not be easier! Hope your little one enjoys!

Keep smiling,

Jax

Make your own baby food: Pear and apple purée

Buying baby food puree's for every meal can end up costing a small fortune! Buying is super convenient, but spending  30-60 minutes once a week to prepare food is all you really need, to do it yourself. Making baby food yourself is really easy too! I make this apple and pear fruit purée for Bump which he loves!

Ingredients:

3 medium sized washed red apples

3 medium sized washed ripe pears

1 cinnamon stick or a generous pinch of ground cinnamon (optional)

Boiled, cooled water

Method:

1. Peel and core the apples and pears. Cut into thin slices (You can roughly chop or cut the slices thicker, it just cooks quicker, the thinner the slices). 
2. Place the sliced fruit in a colander and rinse with the boiled, cooled water. Place the fruit and the cinnamon (if you are using it) into a pan. Cover the bottom of the pan with water so the fruit is slightly submerged (it is better to use a smaller pan as you use less water).
3. Simmer, covered for approximately 10 minutes until the apple and pear are soft. Drain the fruit, reserving the liquid. Purée the fruit with a blender. I use a stick blender. Use the reserved liquid to thin out the consistency of the puree if neccessary. Any remaining liquid can be diluted 1:1 with boiled, cooled water and given to your little one to drink provided they are over 7 months old.
4. This freezes well. I freeze in cleaned, sterilised glass jars (used Purity bottles) or in ice cube trays.

FYI: Please note that it is often recommended that purees be passed through a mesh sieve to make the puree very smooth. I have never done this for Bump, as I do not own a sieve! He has been absolutely fine without sieving! In addition, his paediatrician recommended that he started rice cereal 4 months (very watery consistency) and then progressed to vegetable purées at 5 months. I was told to only introduce fruits and fruit juices (diluted 1:1 with water) at 7 months and meat and eggs also only from 7 months. I was also told to start off with very smooth purées and slowly increase the texture of the purées as this helps with speech development later. It is a good idea to feed the same food for four days in a row when first introducing it, to  ensure your little one has no allergies to the food. 

Well I hope you feel inspired to make your own baby food and that your little one enjoys this apple and pear purée! 

Keep smiling,

Jax

P.S. My apologies, I forgot to mention how much this recipe makes! I ended up with 4 servings of 125 ml and approximately another 60 ml or so.

Copy Cat Skebanga's Pizza

Whenever we go on holiday to the beautiful Cape, we always try to find this wonderful little gem of a pub called Skebangas. You will find it located upstairs from The Red Herring restaurant in Noordhoek. Skebangas has the most charming, warm and friendly ‘locals’ feel to it, stunning views, great food and beer, and there is usually at least one dog and/or cat sunning themselves out on the deck, which makes the crazy cat lady in me happy! The pub was actually named after one of the very first locals in the pub, a whiskey drinking Jack Russell dog, who spent most of his time there. 

When we were last there, I ordered a delicious pizza called Skebangas pizza. It was light, tasty and more-ish! I just had to have this pizza more often, but living over a thousand kilometres away in KwaZulu Natal, I could not just dash over whenever I felt like this delicious pizza, so my copy cat version was born. I think it is too good not to share....I am hoping you think so too and that I don't have super weird taste buds or something! So here goes…

Ingredients:

Wholewheat pita bread (I had a pack of 6 – I only used 3 and popped the rest in the freezer for the next batch!)

Olive oil to brush the pitas with

Garlic cloves, 2-3 (according to your taste)

Baby spinach (I had a 500 g bag and used what was left to make a salad to eat with the pizzas)

A jar of whole peppadews, mild ones (you will have lots left over – pop them in the fridge for the next time you feel like this pizza)

Feta cheese (I used  low fat, but feel free to use the yummy goodness of full fat feta or better still... I wonder how delicious buffalo mozzarella might be instead….or as well? Please let me know how it turns out if you give it a try!)

Method:

1.   Warm the pita breads briefly in the microwave/oven according to the packet instructions. Halve the pita breads horizontally, so that you end up with 6 pita ‘pizza’ bases. NOTE: from here it is best to assemble the pita pizzas on the oven wire rack that you are going to grill them on….I did not do this (as you can see in the photos) and trying to put them on after all the delicious ingredients are piled on gets a bit messy, so trust me…assemble them on the rack you are going to put in the oven - you'll thank me later.

2.   Brush the pita halves with olive oil. Chop the garlic finely and sprinkle over the pitas.

3.  Wash the baby spinach leaves and arrange them on the pita halves. My ‘baby’ spinach leaves were not so ‘baby’ so I tore them into smaller pieces.

4.  Roughly chop the peppadews and sprinkle them over the baby spinach. Even the mild ones can be a little hot, so add these according to your taste. I love the flavour of peppadews and I am trying to train my taste buds to eat hotter food, so I went to town with these spicy little numbers!

5.   Now to add the feta (and/or the buffalo mozzarella if you’re keen to try it). I just broke the feta up into pieces and scattered it over the pitas. Does that not look good to eat already?

6.  Place the pita pizzas onto an oven proof rack (if you haven’t already!) and grill in the oven until the feta has melted slightly and the spinach has wilted.

7.    And you're done! Time to enjoy!

Well, I hope you enjoy making these and of course eating them, as much as I did! I would love to hear how yours turned out. And if you ever get the opportunity to visit Skebangas and Noordhoek, don't hesitate! Both are gems in my book. The beach is like heaven on earth, would you not agree?

Keep smiling!

Jax