Fast Food for Toddlers

No - not that sort of fast food!

The two problems with feeding a one-year-old, so far as I can see, are that a) they go from happy to starving in three minutes flat and b) once they are hungry, they are grumpy and don't want to play happily while you prepare their food.

I'm sure every mother knows that it is entirely possible to create a vegetable omelet with one hand, while balancing a wriggly toddler on the opposite hip.

Now that Tabitha only naps once a day (12pm for between 1.5-2 hours, normally, although right now it is 2:50pm and she's still asleep!), and is quite demanding of my attention when she is awake, I have to be more clever with my time management.  I try to do as much food prep as possible during her nap.  Some of the most useful things I do include:

• Cutting up a whole head of broccoli into florets, and storing them in a tupperware veggie keeper in the fridge.  I used to just cut up broccoli when I was about to cook it, and steam the whole lot in one go, but Tabitha loves broccoli, so being able to quickly pluck out a few florets to steam for her is very handy.
  
• I roast small pieces of potato, sweet potato and pumpkin around once a week - they re-heat easily, and a small handful of these (roasted with olive oil, rosemary and a little salt and lemon) is a yummy side of veggies for Tabitha.  I keep them for a few days in the fridge, re-heating small amounts as needed.
  
• Frozen corn and frozen peas are always on hand in my freezer - I used to buy canned corn, but not only do I find frozen corn to be of superior quality (and apparently nutritional value), I love the ease of being able to shake out a few tablespoons for Tabitha, instead of opening a whole can.
  
• Preparing meat / protein under time pressure can be difficult, and because toddlers (like us) only need a small portion (the size of their palm, roughly, of red meat), I find it much easier to divide meat and proteins up into single servings ahead of time, and freeze them.  For example, today I bought a large veal schnitzel, a thick eye fillet steak, and a really lovely locally made lasagne.  I cut the schnitzel into 4 pieces, cut the steak into 4 smaller 'mini steaks', and divided the lasagne into 6 serves.  I wrapped each serving in cling-film, and popped them all straight into the freezer.  It took less than 10 minutes, and now I have 14 Tabitha-sized serves of red meat ready to go.

Veal schnitzel portions - our local butcher crumbs them with fresh breadcrumbs and parsley:

Eye fillet portions - I got 4 thick-ish pieces out of the 3" high steak.  I then butterfly each one before cooking, so I can get it medium-rare in next to no time.

The lasagne I like to buy contains, in order, organic beef, gluten-free pasta, tomatoes, cheese, white sauce (milk, flour, butter, bay), Shiraz, onion, garlic and salt.  I choose this one because it contains plenty of beef for a nice hit of iron and protein, no nasty additives, and most importantly, it tastes and smells incredible - just like bolognaise you would make yourself, at home.  It's a nice easy 'cheat' meal, full of good things without having to make it from scratch yourself.  To serve, I heat it up and chop it, so that it can be eaten with a spoon or a fork, and I add some veggies (peas or corn stirred through, or else a side of broccoli or beans or something).

14 serves of meat ready for the freezer - schnitzels, steaks and lasagne:

• Other nice and quick proteins that I rely on are:  eggs (scrambled, fried or omelet), seafood (canned salmon, tuna or sardines, or simple salmon or white fish to pan-fry, as well as prawns, scallops and yabbies), poultry (roast chicken, pan-fried duck breasts or chicken thighs and breasts cooked in all sorts of ways) and also beans, pulses, natural yoghurt and cheese.  Between these, and red meat a few times a week, it is easy to offer a diet with plenty of variety.  Of course, you can stash fish portions, prawns and chicken pieces in the freezer.
  
• When time is critical, the simplest emergency meals for Tabitha seem to be either some eggs scrambled with cheese, peas and corn, a veggie-burger with cheese or a fried egg, or some microwaved lasagne.

While Tabitha normally eats dinner with The Daddy and I, or just myself, I tend to prepare a separate lunch for her - she has lunch at 11:30am, which is a bit early for me, so I just sit with her and pick at her meal (so she's not eating alone).  Some of the most common lunch time meals that I cook for Tabitha at the moment include:

• A jaffle on wholegrain bread with Gruyere, green tomato pickle, canned tuna (Sirena in oil) and a good amount of corn.
  
• Salmon and rice with some teriyaki sauce and green veggies.
  
• Beef stew from the freezer (beef with a few veggies, normally carrot, onion, potato tomato and celery) or other cooked-in-advance and frozen meals such as chicken provencale.
  
• A small veal schnitzel or piece of eye fillet (both very tender meats for her little molars) with some vegetables.
  
• Scrambled eggs or omelet with cheese, peas and corn, sometimes spinach, capsicum, mushrooms or some shredded meat from the fridge).
  
• Beef lasagne with veggies, or vegetable lasagne.
  
• A veggie burger (as I've mentioned here before, I use the incredible VBK Foods ones, which are 85 per cent vegetables, with wholemeal flour and rice bran oil - we love the sweet potato ones.  These are sold at our local farmers' market, but are also available at an increasing number of outlets) with some nice cheese or a fried egg.
  
• Leftover roast meat (such as lamb shoulder, pork, beef or chicken) served hot or cold with veggies.
  
• An avocado and cheese sandwich on wholegrain bread.
  
• Pasta (penne or spirals, wholemeal or not) with basil or coriander pesto.
  
• Some white fish, tossed in seasoned flour, pan-fried and served with lemon butter and veggies (normally asparagus or broccolini).
  
•  As a treat, I cook some Maggi-type noodles (plain, with no flavouring).  I add a beaten egg, and some peas and corn, while they cook.  I drain them, then stir through a little ketchup manis (Indonesian sweet soy sauce) or oyster sauce, sometimes some sweet chili sauce as well.  She really loves these, and it is super-cute watching her eat the noodles with her hands.  I must point out - you need to chop up the noodles, because long noodles are easy to choke on if they start to swallow one without chewing properly.
  
• If we have gone for a nice long walk before lunch (often we do a morning walk from 9:30-10:30am), I will often buy her a couple of sushi handrolls from the shops nearby.  Tuna and avocado handrolls are probably her favourite food at the moment - she recognises the sushi shop, and flaps around madly in her pram as we approach.  She points at all the handrolls and when I buy them, she gets mighty upset if I don't hand one over straight away!  Two handrolls - normally tuna/avocado and omelet/cucumber or vegetable - make a nice quick, easy 'treat' lunch.

I'd be thrilled to hear any other fast-food ideas...