Turtle Soup

No, that's not a play on words. I'm not kidding. We made turtle soup this week and it was an interesting experience. 

Ethan caught several turtles and decided that he wanted to see what they tasted like. We've both heard of turtle soup, but never actually knew anyone who's eaten it (that we know of anyways), so HE decided to try it. You start by using your wife's meat cleaver to behead your subjects (make sure it's one she doesn't want back, because it just may not stand up to the tough little guys).  Now, you need to watch out, because these things have crazy reflexes and will keep trying to bite you even after their heads are long since severed. Okay, next you have to detach the breast plate from the bottom of the turtle using a sturdy saw (warning, those crazy reflexes will kick in here, and the little guy will try to kick your hands away as you're doing this, watch out for the claws!) Now you can proceed to harvest the neck, leg, and loin meat from your victim. Basically, the easiest way to do this is just to cut the legs and neck off and then say to heck with the loin meat because in order to get it off the underside of the shell, you'd need to pull the spine out with a pry bar.
Now that you've butchered your turtles, here's what you do for your soup.

What you need:
Turtle meat
chicken broth
assorted veggies (carrots, onion, celery, etc...)

What to do:
Boil your turtle's legs and necks in the broth until the meat is tender enough to remove from the bones. Two turtles will produce about this much meat:

Return the meat to the pot, along with the veggies. Cook until everything is done, and then enjoy!
Okay, well unless you like to eat fishy tasting leather, I would recommend skipping that last part. I finally worked up enough courage to taste it, and it wasn't terrible, flavor-wise. I chewed and chewed that little hunk of turtle and after some serious chewing I finally spit it back out and looked at it. It looked just like it had before it went into my mouth. At least I can say I've eaten turtle, but can you?

More Baby Finger Foods

Well, maybe I'm the only one out there who is desperate for baby food ideas, but just in case, here's a few more things Erik likes to eat. 

 ENGLISH MUFFIN PIZZA
What you need:
English muffin (preferably whole wheat), sliced in half
Spaghetti Sauce
Mozzarella Cheese
Pepperoni (or lunch meat, or whatever you want to top your pizza with)
What you do: Spread the sauce on the english muffin, then sprinkle shredded mozzarella over the top of that. Top your pizza with whatever you've chosen, but make sure it's cut up into small enough pieces for you baby to handle. Place on a baking sheet and put in the broiler until the cheese melts. Cut into bite size pieces for a smaller baby, or leave whole for an older one, and serve.

 BAKED POTATO
What you need:
1 potato (I've been using sweet potatoes for this, but you could use regular ones as well)
What you do: You can just bake your potato like you would do for any old baked potato, but if you're like me you never plan that far in advance. So, I slice my potato into ~1/2 inch slices, spray them with cooking spray or brush them with butter(or oil, or whatever), and then bake them at 350 until they are soft enough for Erik to chew (15-20 mins). Once they've cooled enough to eat, I cube them up and they're ready to go. These store well in the fridge and taste yummy the next day

 ITALIAN TOFU TREATS
What you need:
Firm tofu, cubed
spaghetti sauce
bread crumbs (either pre-seasoned, or you can mix in some garlic and onion powders, basil, oregano, parsley, etc...)
What you do:
Roll the tofu in the spaghetti sauce, then in the bread crumbs. Bake at 350 until they are warm and crunchy.

Pickled Cantaloupe

Abigail canned pickles for our county fair yesterday. She made Spicy Pickled Cantaloupe for the pickled fruit category. If you are interested, go to Miss Abigail's Hope Chest for the recipe. You wouldn't expect canned cantaloupe to taste this good. She pickled some cherries also, just because we had some sweet cherries ready to can.

Black Bean and Corn Salsa

Okay, so I know the picture isn't the greatest, but I forgot to take one before we started dishing up. I was looking for something to help fill up our taco bowls, and decided to give this a try. I just threw this together with what I had around the house, but there are lots of fun recipes online for things similar to this online that included yummy things like avacado, fresh cilantro, green onions, etc...

What you need:
1 can black beans
1 can corn
Diced tomatoes (preferable fresh, but canned will work)
1 can green chili
diced onion
salsa
red chili poweder
garlic powder
ground cumin
oregano

What you do:
Dump everything together into a bowl, tasting the seasonings as you add them. Serve with tortilla chips, on tacos, in burritos, or in any other way you think sounds tasty.

Dessert Apple Rolls

So, this one was on my personal blog and I thought I had it on here, but apparently I don't...so here it is. It's SOOO yummy.

Ingredients:
2 8ct. cans crescent rolls
2 granny smith apples (tastes best with granny smith, but we've used all kinds)
1 1/2 c. sugar
2 sticks butter or margarin
1 tsp. vanilla
cinnamon
1 can lemon lime soda (Sprite, Mt.Dew, 7up, etc)

Directions:
1. Peel apples, core them and cut into 8 wedges
2. Roll each apple slice into 1 section of crescent roll dough
3. Put in buttered 9 x 13 pan
4. Melt butter in sauce pan
5. Barely stir in sugar and vanilla (so the mixture is still grainy) and pour over the apples (make sure the dough gets a complete coating)
6. Sprinkle with cinnamon
7. Pour the can of soda around the edges, and NOT on top of the apples
8. Bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes.
9. You can eat them immediately or let them sit for a bit and the sauce will thicken up. Tastes great served with vanilla ice cream. Tastes great hot or cold. It just tastes great. Try it.

Taco Bowls

One of my favorite things to get when we got out for Mexican food is taco salad(I know, not the most authentic thing), but only when it come in a taco bowl. I wanted to make tacos the other day, but decided I was feeling more adventurous than just boring old taco shells. So I started looking around online, and realized that the taco bowls are super easy to make, and are not deep fried, so they're healthy, right?

What you need:
Flour tortillas (you could use whole wheat if you really want to be healthy)
Non-stick spray or veggie oil
An oven safe bowl, about the size you want your taco bowls to be.
Whatever you want to fill your taco bowls with. We used taco meat, lettuce, tomato, salsa, sour cream, cheese, and a corn and black bean salsa (guess what my post for next week will be). Guacamole would be yummy too!

What you do:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray both sides of your tortilla with the non-stick spray. If this sounds weird or you don't have any spray, you can just brush the tortillas with a light coat of oil. 
Place a tortilla into the bowl, arranging it how you want the finished product to be. Bake for 5(ish) minutes, or until the edges start to get brown and crisp. The bottom may not seem totally hard yet, but it hardens as it cools. 
Stuff your tortilla bowl with whatever yummy stuff you want and dig in!

Baby Finger Foods: Tofu Two Ways

I know this isn't quite the stuff we normally post on here, but I figured it was useful for me and might come in handy for someone else too. I actually have plans to do several more posts like this one as I get more ideas.  

Erik has decided that the only food he wants to eat is stuff he can put in his own mouth. He is done being spoon fed, which means I've had to get really creative. Finding things that he can chew with no teeth, but that will still fill him up and give him the nutrition he needs has been challenging. I started to look around online for ideas, and that's when I discovered tofu. Tofu is packed with protein and nutrients, but is very soft, so it can be easily mashed between a baby's gums. It has almost no flavor of it's own, but will take on the flavors of other things very easily. This makes it the perfect baby food, that you can use for any meal.

For breakfast: Cold Cereal Tofu 

What you need:

Firm tofu, cut into bite size pieces

A handful of baby's favorite cold cereal, we used whole grain Cheerios, crushed in a small re-seal-able bag.

What to do:

Toss the tofu in the bag of crumbs, give it a good shake, and then you're ready to go. You now have cheerio flavored tofu bites. Slightly crunchy on the outside, but smooth and creamy on the inside. Add some diced fruit (in this case strawberries and blueberries) and you've got a perfect way to start the day!  

 Now for tofu dinner: Crunchy Tofu Nuggets

You will need:
firm tofu, cut into bite size pieces
flour (about 2-3 TBS maybe more, depending on how much tofu you've got)
salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, or anything else you want to use to season the flour
Your baby's favorite crackers, I used gold fish, crushed up
milk (maybe 2 TBS?)
What you do:
Mix whatever seasonings you've chosen into your flour. Roll the tofu bites into the flour to coat.
Dip the bites into the milk, just long enough to moisten them, not long enough to soak the flour off.
Roll in the cracker crumbs, and place on a cookie sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes, or until nice and crunchy on the outside. Add some veggies and you've got a meal.


You don't think this sounds yummy? Well, let's see what the baby thinks...