Great Cookbooks and Recipes by Brenda Bradshaw

I unknowingly became a Brenda Bradshaw fan after realizing that 2 of my favourite cookbooks were co-authored by her.  I purchased The Baby's Table when my first child was getting ready to eat solids.  I had wanted to start making my own baby food and didn't know where to start.  My friends were raving about the book and I being impressionable went and bought it immediately.

I found The Baby's Table very useful.   It guides you through each stage of your baby's nutritional needs and gives recipes, tips, suggestions and important information for feeding them.  As a mom with very little sleep, I really could not put my thoughts together and this book did all of the think work for me.  Some of the recipes are very simple, like the apple recipe that requires you to cook apples and blend to make a puree.  The individual recipes can be combined with a few other ingredients or other solo recipes to create a combination of flavours for yummy meals.  This book gave me great guidelines for what to introduce next into my son's diet.  There are other great recipes that the whole family can enjoy, like the Minestrone Soup and Veggie Primavera.  There is also a toddler section that has recipes that appeal to all ages.  Some examples are Crispy B.C Salmon Balls (I love fish!) and Veggie Ragout.

Sometime in between the birth of my son and daughter (3 years), the World Health Organization decided to make changes to their previous recommendations on infant nutrition.  Knowing this, I headed to a local presentation by a nutritionist on what to feed your baby.  It is funny how quickly things change.  It is kind of alarming how many "rules" we seem to have about infant and child related issues.  I understand that allergies are definitely something to be concerned about, but I feel like mothers are given such an onslaught of information and then they walk around feeling overwhelmed, paranoid and most of all, guilty if they aren't following all of the "rules" exactly as they should be.  I went to the doctor and mentioned something to him about giving my daughter eggs and the doctor told me I should wait until she is a year, but the new "rules"say it is OK to introduce most foods, including egg after 6 months.  Argghh!

Sorry!  My point was that the change in the recommendations also required an updated version of the outdated version of The Baby's Table.  After this ramble I checked out Brenda's website and found that they released an updated version of The Baby's Table last year.  Yeah!!!  If you find a copy of the old version, it is still worthwhile to grab it and make adjustments according to the new "rules" or however you see fit.

 

My husband regularly requests new books from the library.  He requested a book called "The Good Food Book for Families" by (you guessed it) Brenda Bradshaw and Cheryl Mutch.  I loved the book so much that I bought it.  I have a difficult time trying to cook something that I think everyone will like.  My husband and I eat a lot of spicy food, salads and meals that aren't that great for a preschooler and infant.  This book has great meals that we all like and best of all the recipes are healthy.  This book was inspired by the new Canada's Food Guide (2007).  It is divided into the meals of the day and even goes as far as giving recipes for weekends and weekdays.  My favourite recipes are steel cut oats with caramelized apples, carrot zucchini breakfast muffins and cranberry flaxseed cookies.  I still have a ton of recipes to try and look forward to exploring this cookbook even more.  You can check out a few of the sample recipes on their website.

 

I am very excited that Brenda and Cheryl are coming out with a new book in August 2011 called  Good Food To Go: Healthy Lunches Your Kids Will Love.  It is just in time for my 4 year old, who will be requiring lunches for daycare.  I'll keep you updated and review the book once I get it into my greedy hands:)

The main reason that I really like these books is because of their simplicity.  They are ingredients that are found in my kitchen, they are healthy and they are easy.  Oh yeah.. and my kids like them and so does my husband!

Bradshaw, B. and C. Mutch, (2008), The Good Food Book for Families, Random House Canada.

Bradshaw, B. and  L. Bramley (2004), The Baby's Table, Random House Canada