What can I feed DD (10 months old, vegetarian, avoiding cow's milk)

[nickeldaisical]

please help :)

DD is quite happy to shovel food into her own mouth.

she's got eczema and although she hasn't been advised to avoid cow's milk, we figured it wouldn't hurt.

God, I miss milk chocolate. :(

she's still BF.

I'm rather stuck for food ideas, really. We made some goat's cheese biscuits and she likes cream crackers.
she doesn't seem to care much about toast, but anything biscuit textured she devours.
she likes broccoli and other veg - doesn't seem to care if it's cooked or not
she also loves apples. but doesn't like cooked courgettes.

I'm just running out of ideas, really. Because I work, we end up eating breakfast at the shop, and it seems to always be cream crackers (dry because she won't eat it with spread on it), and I'm worried she's not getting a proper balanced diet.

examples of typical days:
milk feed before waking, cream cracker for breakfast, apple mid morning, water, goat's cheese biscuit, goat's cheese on toast for lunch, then only milk till tea time. (she'll have carrot or broccoli as a snack too)
when she's hungry she'll choose milk first, but then she falls to sleep.
tea-time she'll have generally what we have, just small bits of it (last night it was pizza, about 2/3 slice in total, the other night it was a mild curry, so quite a few chunks of veg and potato)

what else could I think of for daytime?
tia :)

Yes, you do need to batch cook for the freezer. It's such a lifesaver. The lentil stews freeze beautifully, as do tomato-based sauces (just don't freeze the pasta). Breast milk storage bags are really handy for portions.

Your DD sounds like she loves finger food though. Salad of baby potatoes, hard boiled egg, feta and spinach? Tossed with olive oil and lemon? Store in a lunchbox for two days' worth. Lots of iron and protein.

Full-fat coconut milk banana and cocoa powder milk shakes? You don't need to add sugar, just let the bananas get really brown.

Food prices are going up and food shortages are on the way. It's a very good idea to have several go-to balanced vegetarian meals for children in your repetoire whether you eat meat or not. (I do for the record!)

Totally agree

We do eat meat but for weight reasons have started limiting it to twice a week and I am really enjoying it. I keep pasta sauces, mashed potatoes, lentil stews etx in silver foil trays in the freezer and life is easy when we get home from work.

Also my DS likes hard boiled eggs which might be an option

:)

Totally agree

We do eat meat but for weight reasons have started limiting it to twice a week and I am really enjoying it, as well as our food bill being about £20 a week cheaper now . I keep pasta sauces, mashed potatoes, lentil stews etx in silver foil trays in the freezer and life is easy when we get home from work.

Also my DS likes hard boiled eggs which might be an option

:)

Sorry, haven't read the whole thread, so apologies if I'm repeating what someone else has said!

You said she likes finger foods, so how about falafel? (My two love them served with avocado & pitta bread) or veggie burgers? Lentils are a great way to get protein - I've got a pot of veg & lentil soup on the hob right now & will serve with some wholemeal bread. Dishes like chili & spag Bol are great too, you don't have to use meat substitutes in them, just beans, lentils & veg. Serve with some brown rice & you're getting complete protein in one meal.

I've been writing down everything we eat for over a year now (DD2 is 1.5) - if you pm me, I can send you the link to my blog and you can have a nose at my meal plan for 2012!

nothing wrong with being veggie. My DD is now 15 months and never touched meat. Got little help from an eczema specialist so like you I cut out milk for a bit and other stuff without their help. guess what? I found my way worked!

Could you try a little rice milk with added calcium? or coconut water (not milk). Pasta with tomato sauce can be great for hiding veg that would otherwise not be eaten. Broccoli with cheese on it, humous, a little marmite for vitamin B12. A little quorn wouldnt hurt tbh. If you are worried someone may go against your wishes and feed your child meat then I would advise not to leave them with that person! I would go nuts.

Thank you for all your ideasa. :)

I haven't read the weekend's posts yet, but I just wanted to say (before I do) that we batch-cooked spinach cheese muffins and courgette & carrot muffins. DD devoured one of each and we've frozen the rest.

She's currently hunkering down on breakfast muffin with avocado/banana mush on it, and seems to be loving it.

so thank you :) and i'll read the rest of the posts now.

PeachTown we're currently on Aveeno (the beige one) by prescription but we also have to use a steroid to keep it under control (we're down to 1 day in 6 now!)

Milk is not always linked to skin complaints and I wouldn't be cutting out whole swaves of food on a hunch.

But to your question

Breakfast: cereal with water/expressed milk/ goat milk based formula or toast with butter/marg/fruit puree/soft cheese then yoghurt and fruit

Lunch/dinner: baked beans, Dahl, pasta and sauce, sandwiches with advocado/banana etc we give DD what we had for dinner the night before for her lunch.

I would speak to a dietician for advice on protein and this milk thing as it's very limiting and you might need to put in a lot more effort than lazy people like me to making sure she has a balanced diet.

Netto - yes, you're right.
I don't like the texture, so I lump them all together

I'm more concerned about you saying that she can't have cereal for breakfast because you can't feed it to her because you have customers.

My DS is now 3 and still, on occasion, asks me to feed him and I have no problem doing so. your little girl really shouldn't be limited to just foods that she can stuff into her mouth, such as muffins, because you're working over breakfast. Can you get her up any earlier so she can have some food with you where you can feed her, before customers arrive?

we tried to find the oat milk in sainsbury's but they didn't have it.
have other supermarkets to try, but will also look at holland and barrett :)

yes, she does like hard boiled egg :)

falafel is a good idea, too. that should be easy to make (i hope!) and i can use that hot in dinners as burgers. I will PM you about your blog, thank you :)

LilQueenie - i do worry about people. i don't think anyone would do it on purpose, but i know a few people who can't understand. I do try to tell them not to give DD anything, but when they see other people (who are allowed) giving her food, they don't understand that they can't (learning difficulties, not NT - people at church. Lovely people, but hard to explain things to)
And sweets will be tricky, too, as she gets older.

StrangeGlue - thank you - i know i'm making it hard for myself, but it's more the laziness than anything - this is good because it stops us from automatically giving her ready-food that might have too much salt!

Fire - I really don't want to spoon feed her. the customer thing was a red herring, really

Dairy and soy intolerant 12mo here. Um veggie, he isn't but eats a lot of veggie food.
We were advised:
Oatmilk ok for cooking now, as a drink from 12mo.
Don't use rice milk under 3.
Almonds have loads of calcium so we use them in weetabix.
Nut butters are great.
Figs are good.
DS loves quorn scotch eggs. I know you say you don't want to use quorn Incase people deceive your dd but at 10mo I think the lack of protein in her diet is more a risk than others trying to sneak meat into her.
And tidy sausage type things make fabulous finger foods.

I second the quorn eggs DD loves them

Read most of this thread and my tip re the exzema is cut out bananas from her diet for a month and see if it improves.

My DS's face was literally peeling off with exzema when he was about 10 months old, his lips would crack and bleed, his cheeks were rough and peeling.

I cut out bananas (read it on the net somewhere) and his life was transformed. Honestly, within a month his facial skin was healed.

I hope it helps.

strawberries are a problem area for us too. Just the juice of one leaves a visible red area for hours and its not staining either.

I think DD is okay with strawbs.

they're out of season now, so it doesn't matter, but she had some at the end of the season and didn't seem to react.

golemmings - thank you for the rice milk thing, I didn't know that. Is rice as a food okay, though?

Kbear - she hasn't had banana for a very long time (apart from a bit in with that avocado yesterday) - we had given her some before, but it got all over my favourite babygrow and stained it black, so I was reluctant to give it her again until she could it it without squishing it everywhere.

today, we've had (with BF inbetween)

pancake with houmous
carrot and courgette muffin
apple
slice of avocado
cheese sandwich
roast veg

does that sound balanced?

I think you could do with a little more protein in there but otherwise great. Buckwheat is a good source of protein, I buy buckwheat flour and mix it half nad half with wheat flour.

thank you.
the muffin had egg and goat's cheese in it.
I need to add pulses as well, don't I?

I'll put Buckwheat on the list (do I use it like normal flour?)

Yes, just like normal flour, just rest your batter a bit before cooking as it absorbs the liquid a bit slower.

You probably do need pulses - you can add cooked red or yellow lentils (my girls love dhal) to pancake batter too to make little dhal pancakes, serve with goats yogurt to dip.

or make dhal and use buckwheat pancakes to dip in it.

A mixed bean salad goes down well here. We usually add Tina but you can leave out.

Mixed beans
Grated carrot
Grated/ chopped cumcumber
Chopped pepper
Sweet corn

Or any random things in the fridge that go with it!

*tuna!

Sweetcorn fritters are lovely and can be frozen individually so just take one out when ready for it and 10secs in microwave to defrost. It's an annabel karmel recipe but don't let that put you off!

30g flour, 1 egg, 1 tin of sweetcorn (200g), 2 spring onions. Whizz everything in blender, fry a spoon full in a little oil for 1 min each side. Makes 15 little pancake/fritters.

Careful, they're moorish, you may need to double up the quantities