Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Truly "Green" Beans

So, you'll have to just entertain me for a few minutes. I am so excited tonight! After successfully making some pureed peas for Evan that he gobbled up like cake icing, I decided to try to make green beans tonight. A friend of mine had warned me to be sure to cook them for enough time to make them soggy, because the skins on green beans (and peas for that matter) can make the baby food gritty. So, I popped some organic green beans in the microwave (probably for a total time of 7-8 min) and tossed it in our food processor.

After adding some water and formula to help thin out the consistency, I could NOT believe how truly *beautiful* the puree was! I mean, the green beans were GREEN! Have you seen the Gerber brand green beans? They resemble an army green. I don't know that I've ever called a vegetable color "beautiful," but that's the only way I could describe it. I was so excited that I made Marc get his butt off the couch (watching America's Got Talent...hey! Your wife's got talent now too!) to look at my creation.

So here are the pictures to show how it all turned out and how it compared to the stuff I bought at the store. Sorry for the blurry pictures...I was in a hurry!



Doesn't that look like something you'd actually want to give your baby? I figured out the cost. For 7oz of Gerber organic baby food, you'll pay $1.49 (21.4 cents/ounce). For 16oz of frozen organic green beans, you'll pay $1.49 (7.5 cents/ounce since it makes 20oz of puree). You pay roughly a third of the cost. Also factor in that you don't have to throw away all that packaging and keep it all in your cabinet. Now I can have more space for my boxes of Honey Bunches of Oats...but I digress...

Since Evan is already eating 5+ ounces of veggies/fruits a day and we're only a week and a half into introducing solids, I think it's worth it. And it really didn't take me any time at all and actually gave me satisfaction at the end. I made some of Julia's baby food, but for some reason never had much confidence. But now I do!

Maybe I could turn this into a part-time job like Diane Keaton in "Baby Boom"!!!

2 comments:

Sweet Pea Chef said...

I remember thinking the same thing about the color--holy cow, it is so vibrant! Kudos to you!!

Anonymous said...

Makes you wonder what's really in those prepackaged ones. That really is a pretty color on yours -the images helped!