Deceptively Delicious Saves Dinner
The book, Deceptively Delicious, by Jessica Seinfeld has done more to take stress out of my life as a Mom than any parenting book I’ve read. A big thank you to PBN for sending me this book. As Mothers we are hard-wired to care about the health and safety of our children. Getting good nutrition into our kid’s diets has never been harder. Junk food tastes really good; it’s very convenient; and it’s everywhere. In the forward, Dr. Mehmet Oz, a heart surgeon at Columbia University refers to the alarming treatment of “too many young patients with early blockages of the arteries.”
Bribing our kids to eat their vegetables does more harm than good. My wish is for my children to grow up enjoying good nutritious food; I want the short time I have with them at my dinner table to be pleasant; I want my children to eat healthy meals, without stress. Using the recipes from my wish has come true. Like Seinfeld says in the book, “I had begun to dread meal time.” Those days are over, thanks to this amazing book.
During the last several weeks that I’ve had the privilege to work with Deceptively Delicious, I’ve found that this cookbook is more like a how-to manual. Yes, there are amazing recipes in the book, but that’s only part of the gift this book brings. Follow one or two of Jessica’s recipes, and soon, you’ll know how to sneak nutrition into anything your kids are eating — including hot cocoa. (The secret? Just add sweet potato puree. “It makes the cocoa thick and creamy, even made with skim milk.” )
For example, her recipe for pink pancakes is simply a basic pancake mix, with the addition of pureed beets. Lots of vitamins; and no one can taste the “beets” in the finished product. Using Jessica’s method, I took a simple white box cake mix, and added the pureed beets to the cake. The cake was an instant hit — even without the icing. My kids HATE beets. But they are FULL of vitamins — I REALLY want them to like beets. So, instead of serving them a plate of beets, and pleading with them to “just try one bite!” I served it in a cake. The loved it, and asked for seconds. Thanks to Deceptively Delicious, beets are now a part of my kid’s diet. No bribing involved. And now, our blueberry pancake recipe includes a 1/2 up of beets.
Seinfeld’s book has an introductory chapter that shows you her four-step method to make the purees for 20 different vegetables and fruits. These purees are then stored in the freezer in zip-lock bags. This is one weak spot in the book. I can easily see many Moms not having the time to puree the veggies every week, but more importantly, not having the time to defrost the veggies for a quick cup of hot cocoa. So, I offer you this. Just keep baby food jars on hand. Already pureed, the perfect serving size, and full of nutrition. Baby food, like most frozen and canned vegetables, has not been sitting on grocery store shelves, and then in your vegetable bin. Seinfeld also offers this short cut in her book; canned vegetables. Just puree them in the food processor. And did I mention the book has a hard-wire binding? The book is built for the kitchen. It is awesome in every way.
So, here’s my only complaint about the book. Despite all the emphasis on nutrition, there are no nutritional numbers for any of the recipes in this book. How much am I gaining by adding one or two tablespoons of pureed cauliflower to our mac and cheese? I’d like to know.
For some kids, it’s the “texture” of food that makes them “repulsed.” Pureeing foods they don’t like makes the vegetables go down much easier. For years, I’ve tried to get my 9-year old to eat my chicken noodle soup. He prefers the Campbell’s soup variety instead of mine. This time, I tried the Deceptively Delicious method and pureed the vegetables — all the onions, celery and carrots. (Seinfeld adds pureed butternut squash). I added the broth and the noodles, and finally I had a hit. So simple. So logical.
There are many recipes in her book that are so completely off-the-wall, that I just had to try them, out of curiosity. I did not expect to like a chocolate chip cookie made with un-mashed garbanzo beans. But, these cookies were nothing short of awesome. My kids ate them before I could help myself to thirds. I found myself wanting to make a second batch, because, if it’s full of healthy garbanzo beans one more cookie won’t hurt the waist line that much. Right?
But my favorite “recipe of deception” of all is the chocolate fondue. The “fat” in this scrumptious dip is avocados. Avocados, pureed carrots, cocoa powder and powdered sugar make the most amazing chocolate fondue you’ve ever had. How ingenious to figure out that avocados also turn brown when they’re mashed — just like chocolate.
So, when you pick up your own copy of Deceptively Delicious, your biggest problem will be stopping yourself from eating up all that fondue. Because, after all, you can eat as much as you want, because it’s SOOOO healthy. Right?
already loaded with their favorite memories.
of their life so far. One for them to keep, in their own room.