Ahmed - Easy Indian super meals: simple recipes prepared with naturally flavoursome ingredients

MORE FLAVOUR = FEWER FUSSY EATERS!

Flavour-led weaning expert Zainab Jagot Ahmed offers simple, delicious recipes suitable for weaning babies (stages 2-4) right the way through to the early school years, all inspired by the aromatic tastes of Indian home-cooking.

Adding mild spices to your childrens food is a great way to add flavour without the need for salt or sugar. Watch them eat virtually everything, enjoy a range of tastes, textures and ingredients and look forward to every mealtime.

Zainab advises on her favourite Super Foods and Super Spices that make up her nutritious Super Meals. All recipes adhere to the UK Department of Healths guidelines for weaning and beyond, offer lots of variety not just curries and oodles of flavour your whole family can enjoy.

Zainab is first-time mum to daughter Aaliyah, and currently resides in Leicester, England, with her husband and two cats. Prior to becoming a mummy, Zainab a passionate home cook worked in marketing in London for over 10 years in the fashion, entertainment and retail industries. And after the birth of her daughter, felt inspired to turn her attention to cooking nutrient-rich, homemade baby food. Zainab was keen to introduce Aaliyah to aromatic Asian flavours early when she began the weaning process, both to broaden Aaliyahs palate allowing her to create lots of tasty meals without the use of salt or sugar and to introduce Aaliyah to her culinary heritage. However, she soon discovered there were no dedicated baby and toddler cookbooks with Asian or Asian-influenced recipes. After researching aromatic spices, dietary recommendations and various Super Foods, Zainab began inventing her own Indian-inspired baby-friendly meals, and soon friends were asking for recipes. Now shes giving everyone the chance to try them at home.

Keep up to date with the latest news and recipes from Zainab
Twitter: @ZainabJagAhmed
Facebook: facebook.com/ZainabJagotAhmed
www.ZainabJagotAhmed.com

This book is very special to me and I am hugely grateful to everyone who has helped me along this journey. Thank you to my original team of colleagues who helped me get to this point Simon Maylott, Lee Smith, Greg Warner, Helen Lewis and Claire DeCiacco. This book wouldnt have been possible without your help and expertise. Double thanks to Simon Maylott for the introduction.

Special thanks to Sarfaraz Aziz of Photoshootr for the beautiful front cover photography and the original book design, and to baby sis Zaheera Iqbal for the great photography of yours truly inside the book.

Thanks to all the lovely folks over at Ebury who have worked really hard to make this edition possible, especially Rebecca Smart - thank you for the opportunity, Laura Higginson, Jessica Barnfield, Kealey Rigden and Claire Wharton. Big thanks to Smith & Gilmour for their updated design.

Thanks to my family, hubby Omar Ahmed for the support, encouragement, and for putting up with all the evening and weekend work. My parents, Kulsum and Haroon Jagot, sisters Zeenat and Zaheera, brother-in-laws Sham and Arif. This truly has been a family affair! Thank you for all your encouragement and help.

My most important thanks go to my reason for writing this book, my little princess, my daughter Aaliyah.

Thank you for the inspiration.

You may need to increase or reduce the amount, depending on your little ones appetite.

Storage Advice

Store individual servings in good quality freezer bags, label them with the contents, date them and place them in the freezer. A flawless way of effectively rotating frozen freshly cooked food. Furthermore, freezer bags are handy for squeezing into corners if you are tight for space.

Alternatively, freeze baby food in flexible ice-cube trays, but ensure the tray is covered with either a lid or placed inside a freezer bag, before it is placed in the freezer; it must be clearly labelled with the contents. Once frozen, remove the baby food cubes from the tray, place them in freezer bags, label and date them, then pop them back in the freezer.

Veggie Super Meals

Stage 2 | 7 Months Plus
Stage 3 | 10 Months Plus

The Stage 2 recipes in this chapter are the scrumptious vegetarian Super Meals I fed Aaliyah when she moved on from Stage 1 pured fruits and veggies. I mashed the vegetables within these meals to achieve those much-needed soft lumps to help her learn to chew.

Chewing, an essential motor skill for baby, gives the jaw, lips and tongue muscles an excellent workout. A crucial skill to master, because the muscles used for chewing are the same muscles required to help baby develop speech later in childhood.

Dont worry if your baby is still a gummy baby (doesnt have any teeth) at this stage, her hard little gums will be able to power through soft lumps easily enough.

You can offer meat and poultry to babies from 7 months of age in cooked, pured form only, as meat proteins are not as easy to digest as vegetables. For this reason, I chose to wait until Aaliyahs digestive system had matured before introducing meat into her diet. In the meantime, I fed Aaliyah fish, eggs and lentils to ensure there were no protein shortfalls in her diet.

Milk feeds are still a huge part of babys diet. She will need 500600ml (18fl oz1 pint) per day to ensure she receives the necessary amount of calcium required for healthy growth. So continue feeding your little one either breast milk or formula.

Stage 2 | 7 Months Plus

Dhal (lentils) are a staple in many Indian and Pakistani households and are highly recommended for those following a strict vegetarian diet. The lentils provide a valuable source of protein that babies need for healthy growth, ensuring vegetarian babies do not miss important nutrients from the protein-rich food group.