Customer Reviews

From Animal Crackers to Wild West Beans

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Cute little drawings all over, easy to read. No nutritional info for each recipe. The recipes are organized by age of the baby. For instance, one chapter is called "First Flavors: 4-6 months" and another is called "Texture and Taste: 6-9 months."

The basic baby purees are pretty much vegan. Once you get into the recipes at 6 mos and over, there is a lot of egg, milk or dairy and will require adapting for a vegan family. Some of the adaptions are simple -- just using rice or soy milk instead of cow milk, others will require more experience with vegan cookery to make it come out right like in the baked goods.

I wonder about some of the selections because they use strong tasting ingredients like cabbage, curries, etc. An adult might enjoy them but I wonder how agreeable it would be for a baby? There is an effort though to keep the tone of the recipes simple and appealing to the average person.

The little smiley and unhappy faces with the boxes under each recipe is useful to check off how baby reacted to the food for future reference. Not a whole lot of margin space to write adaption or more comments though. Because a babies tastes change over time, I would have liked more space to note when I tried it again how baby reacted. Maybe several lines of happy and unhappy faces with a space to add the date?

Overall, it's a cute collection, and looks fun, but while I appreciate the effort to put together something that babies could deal with and create meals for adults that "pull out baby portions" easily for a toddler, I would have found it more useful if it had these things:

Notations for nutritional info per recipe.

If the recipe was vegan, ovo-, lacto- or lacto- ovo- with some kind of symbol

If the recipe freezes well with some kind of symbol

Space in back to write down allergies, etc.

More margin space to write down comments

If you love to cook, this book is for you! Adorably illustrated and laid out in an easy-to-read format, it makes a nice addition to your cookbook collection. It was written with babies and toddlers in mind, and all the recipes were tested on the author's own son. It is a bit short on quick, throw-together recipes once you get past the baby food section, though, so if you're short on time, this may not be the resource for you. There are some really good recipes that your child will love if you have the time to spend in the kitchen. Vegans, note that many of them require eggs and/or dairy.

This is a wonderful collection of vegetarian recipes for babies and children, in a clear and easy to use format for busy parents! Mostly recipes, with a wonderful section explaining how to prepare single food items. There is some solid information and advice about feeding, very brief and to-the-point. I would highly recommend this book to anyone feeding a baby, vegetarian or not.

I was given this book by my lovely sister in law for my 2 children. Unfortunately, whilst the recipes sound lovely and they do work out, my family disliked all of them! I liked them but I am the only vegetarian in the house. I guess it depends what type of food you like. If you like the ingredients you will probably like the recipes. So if you are a vegetarian you will probably think it is great! Otherwise you may have a lot of converting to do.

When my family and I became vegan, I needed some help with recipes for children. I found very few specifically vegan resources, and hoped that this book might have some vegan recipes.

It doesn't, and since it doesn't claim to be vegan that isn't a problem.

The problem, for me, is that the ingredients butter, cream, whole milk, and cheese are all throughout the book, most recipes containing more than one of those ingredients. I really can't imagine a baby or toddler being healthy eating SO MUCH saturated fat and cholesterol. Yes, their dietary needs are somewhat different from adults, but not so very different.

I was not able to try the recipes, but I rather think it should be a recipe book celebrating dairy and eggs. If you want to feed your kids lots of full-fat dairy and egg products, this is the book for you whether you are vegetarian or not.

If you want low-fat, whole-grain, vegetable-containing foods children will eat, skip this book altogether.

I like this book for the most part and have gotten some good ideas from it but I only gave it three stars because it's confusing.
For example, in the 9 to 12 month section there is a recipe for honey glazed corn. Both of which are potential allergens. I'm pretty sure the US recommendation is not to give kids raw honey until after a year. There's also a lot of cheese, butter and milk in recipes in the 6 to 9 month section. Also confusing to me. Other books I have say to avoid dairy, especially milk until after a year.
The author is British, so maybe things are different over there? Whcih I also find confusing. The whole allergy thing is confusing to me and the introduction of certain foods. No baby food I've read does an adequate job of explaining the introduction schedule. Is the delay of certain foods because of the likelyhood of survivial if the baby has a serious allergic reaction of is it more to do with the ability to disgest certain foods due to maturity of the digestive system? Does any one really know? I've heard that in India watery peanut butter is baby's first food!
But any way, there are some good ideas in here, although I have largely ignored the age sections.
I also agree with the other posters and would like some healthier ideas, including more vegan alternatives and baking with whole wheat, flax, less sugar! How about no sugar.
Cathe Olson's books: Simply Natural Baby Food has some great ideas and she also has a good family cookbook called Vegetarian Mother's... something. Good healthy ideas for the entire family.

I read and re-read this book for the first year of my son's life. I got wonderful recipe ideas and advice on freezing, too. My son enjoyed my purees very much. I always get compliments on what a "good eater" he is.
As we're not vegetarians, I also used, "Healthy Baby Meal Planner". These two books were a perfect pair for me.
A very pleasurable, informative book. When I have number two, I'll go right back to page one..no new books necessary!

i LOVE THIS BOOK. iT IS THE COOK BOOK FOR VEITARIANS. I LOVE IT. YOU MUST BUY IT IF YOU ARE A VEGITARIAN. IT WILL BECOME YOUR ULTIMATE COOK BOOK.