PerryWinkles Kids Blog

I love Quinoa. I eat it for lunch at least once a week and serve it to my family also at least once a week, as a rice or pasta replacement. I love Quinoa for its taste, but I think more importantly for all the nutrition it provides my family of 2 little girls and my husband and the ease of cooking it. A main food staple of the Inca civilization in Peru (where our little girls’ smocked dresses are made), quinoa has been cultivated for more than 5,000 years and has fed millions of people.

Quinoa is known as a wonder food, the “Mother Grain” or a “super crop” thanks to its great nutritional value. Quinoa contains more protein than any other grain (an average of 16.2%, compared with 7.5% for rice, 9.9% for millet and 14% for wheat). It’s also a good source of dietary fiber and is high in magnesium, potassium and iron and a good source of phosphorous, calcium, vitamin E and several B vitamins. Quinoa is also gluten-free and easy to digest and it contains an almost perfect balance of all eight essential amino acids needed for tissue development in humans. Quinoa has been a great addition to my family’s diet; my little girls have been eating it since they were infants starting to eat solids.
My favourite ways to cook quinoa are:

• Quinoa salad - mix the cooked quinoa with pretty much anything in your fridge. I love tomatoes, feta cheese, sundried tomatoes, toasted pine nuts, left over meat or firm tofu, corn, fresh herbs. Pour some freshly-made salad dressing and you have a great-tasting and filling lunch or dinner accompaniment.
• Quinoa as a side dish - Serve quinoa instead of pasta or rice with all your favourites meals like meatballs or oven-roasted salmon.
• Quinoa in salad - Make up your usual green salad and ad some cooked quinoa to make your salad more filling (and tasty and unique!).

One of the latest recipes I’ve tried for quinoa comes from 101 cookbooks. Definitely worth the try! Cook quinoa the same way you would cook rice and be sure to remember to rinse your quinoa before using it, as the saponin on the quinoa makes it taste bitter if not rinsed off. I truly believe this is a miracle food - extremely nutritional, tasty, and very easy to cook and integrate into your family’s diet.

Maria

PerryWinkles Kids - fine little girls’ smocked dresses

Last night I attended a lecture called “Freedom of Choice & Development of the Will” at my daugther’s Montessori school in Toronto.  The speaker was Sandra Girlato, who is the director of training at The Foundation for Montessori Education in Toronto, Canada. Sandra proved to be a very entertaining speaker who inspired me to want to be a better parent.  Her parenting tips, for children between 1 and 6 years old, based largely on the Montessori thought, were just amazing.

The main theme of the lecture was the idea that children, even as young as 1 year old, need to be given the opportunity to make choices.  We as parents cannot do everything for them.  These choices that we can provide our children with come in the form of whether she will wear pants or a skirt today, to what colour socks he/she will wear, to what they want on the dinner plate from the choices you offer….just small choices, or choices about things that might seem trivial to an adult.  The younger the child, the simpler the choices you give them of course.  But by putting your child in a position where she or he will have to make such choices in their every day lives, you are promoting their ability to think and will eventually lead them to be confident, intelligent adults - with a strong will in them.

There were a few things that really brought the point home to me.  She said, for example, that most of our homes are not built for little kids, which is pretty obvious.  But she said if you want your children to be a little more independent and, for example, help themselves to (healthy) snacks, set up your pantry so that these choices are accessible to your kids.  She also mentioned that small children do not deal well with too much choice - she said that, for example, having too many toys at home creates bored children because it presents them with too many choices and they are almost unable to make a decision as to what to play with.

Sandra’s insight, and delivery in a very engaging and entertaining manner, provided me with amazing practical suggestions to improve my parenting.  All in all I took away the fact that children have a lot more ability than what we accredit them with…and slowing down can do wonders for little children and their families.  Let them butter their toast (even if they butter it on both sides), let them choose their clothes (even if the clothes don’t match)…it might make for a slower morning at the beginning, but it should be well worth it down the road.

Maria

PerryWinkles Kids - fine girls’ smocked dresses

My two young daughters are pretty good when it comes to eating, but I must say that it becomes challenging to try and feed them balanced meals every single day.  I feel very proud on the days when I was able to be creative and provide them with a great-tasting and healthy meal.  Here are a few quick solutions to include vegetables in your kids’ diets, especially for those children who are picky eaters that would rather think they are not eating vegetables.

Shredded Zucchini - I use zucchini on many things.  One of my kids’ favourite meals are cheese rice cakes.  I make these whenever I have leftover rice (or pasta).  I beat a couple of eggs, add milk, cheese and the secret ingredient - shredded zucchini.  Peel the zucchini and it will be even better disguised from your picky eaters.  I fry them up like an omelette and my kids love them, while I’m happy that they are having a nutritious meal.  Shredded zucchini is also great in muffins and breads (my favourite zucchini bread recipe is from 101cookbooks).

Shredded Carrots - Whenever I make spaghetti meat sauce, I shred a few carrots, very thinly, and throw them into the sauce.  Even my husband doesn’t notice there are carrots in the sauce when I serve this meal.  The carrots get disguised with the colour of the tomato sauce.  Shredded carrots are also great in soups - my kids love chicken noodle soup, so I just shred a couple of carrots and throw them in while I’m cooking the soup.

Rice & Lentils - Although lentils are not a vegetable (they are a legume), I feel very good when I get my kids to eat some as they are packed with iron and lots of other goodness.  I have a great way of including lentils into a meal - lentil & rice casserole.  You can go low on the lentils so your kids don’t necessarily notice the lentils, but once you’ve baked the casserole, the taste is so great that they won’t even ask what those little brown spots are.

Hope this makes dinner time a little easier!

Maria

PerryWinkles Kids - fine girls’ smocked dresses

I feel very fortunate that my two young daughters were not born with any life-threatening allergies. A very good friend of our family - Elise, a little girl of 5 - has multiple life-threatening allergies (to peanuts, tree-nuts and eggs) and I see first-hand on a regular basis how challenging living with these allergies can be. Her parents are still learning how to provide Elise as normal a life as possible, given that she could be in contact with potentially dangerous foods every single day. Our friends face this challenge every day. A routine boat ride for example this past weekend to go get ice cream with the kids, to them turns into a complicated task - they had to buy plastic spoons that have for sure not touched any other food, boxed ice cream cones and a tub of Chapman’s ice cream that they trust has been manufactured in a nut-free facility. They (and us in sympathy) did not even look at what the ice cream parlour had to offer.

Elise’s mom has done extensive research as to what foods her daughter can eat. One of her favourite finds is Cherrybrook Kitchen. This company, based in Burlington, MA, provides nut-free egg-free dairy-free baked goods mixes. They have baking mixes for every baked good you would want and need (while keeping your family and friends safe) - brownies, cakes, frostings, pancakes. They also have some gluten-free goods. Cherrybrook provides you with the mixes for all these fabulous baked goods; you just have to mix the ingredients in the box with a few extra items and bake. I have tasted a few of their goodies and I must say that they are delicious! They sell in stores all over the U.S. and deliver to most of Canada and Europe.

Maria

PerryWinkles Kids - fine girls’ smocked dresses