✓ Weaning, freeze the gruel / broth

The question is frequent. There is a friend who looks at you with an accomplice air and she asks you. There is the mother at the first "pappa" that attends Il Cucchiaino (www.ilcucchiainodialice.com). There is the one, merciless and true fundamentalist, who is “only fresh, every day”.

A homemade base

We clear the field and confess: I play with broths and colored baby food as if it were the wardrobe for the change of season. It is the only way, at the moment, to offer a genuine base, homemade and with some variety to the smallest of the house.

Taking advantage of the season I then cook vegetables in different combinations and in great abundance to improvise even the dinner of mum and dad and sister.

Plenty of broth to have the baby food almost ready

As in this moment in which I am writing and on the fire they mumble carrots, a piece of pumpkin, a couple of potatoes and a few leaves of lettuce. A part of the broth will be Lea's porridge for tonight, another part will be used for an excellent and tasty pasta risotto and creamed with fresh growth for us, and another microportion is crammed into a jar, left to cool and then duly frozen. It will be a great lifeline for tomorrow when, struggling with a morning of washing machines, changing diapers and deliveries of work, I will do a lot, but a lot of effort to get ready for lunch. Not mine, of course, but the pupetta's.

How to freeze

A long preamble to say that preparing broth bases or fresh purées, with seasonal products, is good and right. Freeze a part of it as well.

Just follow correct procedures and rules. The first? Keep in mind that freezing and freezing are two different things. In the first case it is an industrial process that preserves the nutritional properties of food, to be used directly without first defrosting them. At home, with our freezer, it is only possible to freeze: here, this process will be your best ally to get those ten minutes, ten for you and only you. :-)

Some rules to respect

The rules? Few and simple.

Chill the broth or purées before freezing them
Use convenient single-portion containers: there is no need to look for something special for babies, for example, ice cube containers, suitably covered, rather than containers for aromatic herbs or simple freezer bags will be perfect.The only caution? Labeled, as if they were the shoes in the wardrobe: in case two weeks, you will have forgotten what that "save the day" cube contains :-)
Broth and baby food can be kept in the freezer for about three months. Then they expire.
In this case it is good to remember that there are time limits in use (the broth will last about 3 months).
It thaws in a couple of ways: passing the container from the freezer to the fridge and letting it defrost for a few hours, or in a bain-marie. Not at room temperature.
Piesse: Someone also defrosts with the microwave, I have no preconceptions about it but personally it is a way that I do not use.

Read all the episodes of the weaning agenda. For information on pediatricians read the Weaning Guide

Miralda Colombo she is a journalist and author of the blog www.ilcucchiainodialice.com, born on the occasion of the weaning of her daughter Alice and from which the recipe book for children "The spoon", ed. Gallucci.

In recent months the weaning adventure with the second child Lea has started again and has agreed to accompany the mothers of mymodernparents.com with practical advice, tricks and indications from the most accredited scientific societies on baby feeding.

The photos are from Cevì (Cecilia Viganò), artist, photographer and illustrator graduated from the Brera Academy.