I’m sure soon half birthdays will no longer seem like milestones worth noting, but this week, Theo turned one and half.
This week, he also mastered the art of saying “NO!” which is both incredibly amusing and means that he’s most definitely a toddler. Give him something he isn’t pleased with and you’ll get some serious pouty lips and a big fat “NO!”
On the food front, we’ve gone back and forth between devouring everything in sight and subsisting on a diet of watermelon and milk for a week. It seems that at his nanny’s, he eats everything with joy, but at home, where he can test his boundaries and doesn’t have other kids to influence him, we definitely get a bit more resistance.
That being said it seems like the one thing that’s been a consistent hit is vegetables fritters. Perhaps it’s that I’ve let him watch me make them a couple of times and he enjoys watching the vegetables shred in the food processor and then fry up in the skillet.
Something about seeing vegetables transform keeps him interested, and he usually dives right in. The beautiful thing about vegetable fritters is that they’re infinitely versatile. Below I give you a rough outline of a recipe, but really it’s about binding vegetables with a little bit of flour and egg for a meal that is simple for a toddler to eat. I’ve made these with just about every vegetable combination you can think of. In the pictures here, he’s gnawing on carrot and kale fritters.
Speaking of eating skills, Theo has come leaps and bounds in feeding himself over the last couple of months. He would like to eat everything with a fork (blueberries included) and can drink out of a real cup, although the curiosity to turn the cup over to see what happens is sometimes too strong. We’re working on it.
With all the vegetables we’re getting in our CSA this summer, fritters are a natural fit for Theo’s lunch and dinner, followed by watermelon for dessert, of course. Curious – what are your kids eating this summer?
- ½ pound vegetable like carrots, zucchini, squash, broccoli, sweet potatoes, or potatoes; peeled if skin is tough and shredded
- 2 stems or 2 handfuls of greens like kale, swiss chard, spinach, beet greens, or collards; chopped
- ½ small onion, 2 scallions, or 1 shallot, minced
- Pinch of Kosher salt
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ¼-1/3 cup all purpose flour
- 1 egg, whisked
- Olive oil or vegetable oil for frying
- Greek yogurt, plain yogurt, or sour cream for serving
- If you're using a wet vegetable like zucchini or squash as your main, you'll want to squeeze out the liquid. You can do this by wrapping the shredded vegetable in a cheese cloth or clean kitchen towel and wringing it out.
- Combine vegetable, greens, onion, salt, and baking powder in a large bowl. Stir in ¼ cup flour and mix until flour is well incorporated into vegetables. Add in egg and mix. If mixture feels too wet, add in additional flour, 1 tablespoon at a time.
- Heat a tablespoon of oil in a heavy bottomed skillet over medium high heat. Drop in 2-3 tablespoons of fritter batter and push down gently with a spatula. Fry until golden brown on one side, about 2 minutes. Flip and brown on remaining side. Repeat until all of batter is used up.
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