Hiding vegetables

[nekhbet]

I'm still a thermomix newbie. One of the reasons I got it was to encourage our family to eat better and healthier foods. I do have a vegie phobic daughter and husband though and was wondering what everyones favourite thermomix dishes are for hiding vegetables? 

Sorry if it has been asked many times before  I had a look with the search feature and couldn't see any threads covering it.

Thanks

[jkmt]

Well, not so much vegetables, but I do hide lots of good stuff in 'chocolate banana smoothies' which my kids love. Throw in some almonds or cashews, dates, a bit of water, some baby spinach, bananas and a teaspoon of cocoa powder to hide the dates and greens.Whiz it all on speed 10 for a minute, and no one is the wiser. Don't go overboard on the spinach though, or it will take a lot of cocoa to hide the green!

Otherwise, rissoles made with lots of vegies pureed in them are good. And lovely smooth soups. I like the vegan-style cashew-based soups from the Rainbow Recipe book, which uses a cashew, onion and water base with any kind of vegetable mix you can think of.

[Bella6]

I have both Deceptively Delicious and Double Delicious by Jessica Seinfield.  I too am a newbie and had these pre TM, she uses alot of purees in her recipes so I plan to look at these cookbooks closer now.  Cauliflour, pumpkin, brocoli puree etc.  My kids would pick out the grated vegies in bolognaise but not when I've done it in the TM and pureed them!

[Vivaroo]

Hide veggies by all means to make meals more nutritious, but don't give up on normal veggies either, have both on the plate.  They need to learn why veggies are the best food, teach them nutrition and what it does to our bodies.  Would never force them to eat all on the plate but always try and never give up because they need develop a taste for it.  Are you in a position to grow things like sugar snap peas, baby carrots or cherry tomatoes?  Kids love growing and then eating their produce.  For something different here's a link to a healthy chocolate cake I haven't tried this yet but looks good.  Keep trying and the best way to influence is by showing your love and enjoyment of good food, good luck and yay for the TMX.

[faffa_70]

would you believe I still have to hide food  But Viv is exactly right and now he is slowly coming around to eating what he believes he has never eaten before (insert wicked cackle here) This was all new to me having 3 kids prior that ate everything!

I either great really fine that it can't be found or use the purees like in "deceptively delicious" etc.

In a spag bog you would be surprised how much you can hide when you finely grate your veg  in the TMX - believe me they won't be able to pick it out! I use about 50% meat to 50% veg now and a good rich tomato sauce 


Same as when I make a tomato sauce for over pasta or steamed meat I just throw all the veg in and grate it down fine. My older kids quietly call it the "clean out the fridge sauce" but of course NEVER in front of Mr Fussy's ears 

[Vivaroo]

Clean out the Fridge sauce !  Love it, can you post a recipe & photo 

[gertbysea]

I love this recipe for hiding veggies.

http://www.superkitchenmachine.com/2012/15926/mock-rice-thermomix-recipes.html

Gretchen

[andiesenji]

Way back when the kids were in high school, I used to hide veggies in sausages.
Making link sausages is not all that difficult and you can get fairly inexpensive sausage stuffers that operate by hand and the casings are available online (the artificial ones as well as the natural).

You can mince the meats with the vegetables half and half and if they ask about the colored bits in the cooked sausages, tell them it's the flavorings. 
I managed to feed the kids a lot of broccoli, carrots, cabbage & etc., using this method. 
If you grill a sausage, slap in in a toasted bun and slather it with mustard and relish, they really won't know the difference.  Even better if topped with chili and grated cheese. 

I have even made vegetarian sausages that I have served to vegan friends in recent years. 

[EmeraldSue]

One of my children will eat almost everything and try everything. My other is completely the opposite.  A couple of years ago I enrolled my son in a vegetable liking project trialled by the CSIRO. One of the main findings was to regularly offer children small amounts of vegetables chopped into small pieces on their plate. You need to offer it to them many times, but not make a fuss about it.
I've also bought a book called "Cauliflower Conspiracy" by Jo Fiedler (ISBN 978-0-646-48326-9) which has advice and recipes for parents of fussy eaters. I adapted my son's favourite meal which is pasta carbonara. I made a white sauce to which I added 1 cup of pureed cauliflower and bacon, and then served over pasta. He hasn't noticed the difference. I'm also in the habit of adding grated veges to sauces like spaghetti bolognese, rissoles etc to bulk them out. Last night I made the Beef enchilada recipe from this forum and added carrots and zucchini, and served it with raw capsicum and cucumber . It was delicious, and my son demolished it. You could also try replacing the white sauce in lasagne with pureed cauliflower.
You can also try baking some vegetable into cakes and muffins. I've just posted a recipe for a chocolate cake that contains chick peas as the main ingredient.
Goodluck!

[Cornish Cream]

My kids were very good at eating veg when small especially salad but the one vegetable they could never stomach was sprouts.Even now they hate them

[Merlin]

My kids adore the bolognese ragu from the EDC and one of my twins loves "visible" vegies whilst the other runs a mile. At the stage of putting the carrot, bacon etc in I also put in whatever vegies are in the fridge at the time ie broccoli, mushroom, zucchini, pumpkin etc and totally blitz  so that no one can identify what's gone into the sauce. I think my record so far is about twelve kinds of vegies! The end result is still tasty- I would much rather have them eat vegetables this way as they still get their vegetables in other dishes but not in the same quantity. I agree that it is important to actually present kids with vegetables on the plate but when I have two starving 5 year olds at the end of a busy day at work and it is the dreaded witching hour, I  would rather put something on the table that I know will get gobbled up with no complaints rather than wrestling with any moral decision about to hide or  not to hide vegies!!

[gertbysea]

Well Merlin I like your style. I never had a problem with food with my children but  if I had I would have adopted your "attitude". Life is too short to worry about the vegetable police.

Gert

[faffa_70]

I agree Merlin and I have found that when I do put them on the plate I don't feel pressure on me to get Mr Fussy to eat them, I just keep presenting them knowing what he doesn't know  He is starting to come round with a few things (now 7) so hang in there!

[KerrynN]

My kids are pretty good eaters generally but have become a bit fussier as time goes on. DS6 will eat broccoli, cauliflower but no avocado while DS10 won't touch broccoli or cauliflower but loves avocado. Neither of them will willingly eat mushrooms, zucchini, tomato, capsicum, spinach (but they will have this fresh if I force them as 'salad') or pumpkin. I take the devious track, figuring that as long as they eat it they have time to learn to like them - I didn't like any of the same things they both don't like (except pumpkin) when I was a kid either.

My favourite "if only you knew" recipes:
* Bolognaise sauce - I add every vegetable I have at the start with the onion and garlic and blitz them before cooking. Pre TMX I used to put their serves into a baby mouli and whizz them before serving anyway, while DH and I had the chunky version. I also use this for lasagna. I love the idea of putting cauliflower in too.
* Homemade pizza - I blitz mushrooms, zucchini and capsicum and put this on top of the tomato/BBQ sauce based. Then cover with what they really like - ham (which is also mixed with egg so they don't know about that either), cheese, and cabana or bacon. We call it Aussie and they rave about how it's the best pizza in the world.
* Spanish mince (http://www.forumthermomix.com/index.php?topic=5391.0) - I add mushroom, zucchini, capsicum, spinach, and celery if I have it with the carrot, and I also add frozen peas and corn in the last 5 minutes.
* Savoury quiches (aka zucchini slice) - I make into muffins so they can go into lunch boxes, and make sure there is bacon in there in big pieces so they focus on that.
* Sausage rolls (http://www.forumthermomix.com/index.php?topic=5582.0) - I often add a few extra vegies to this depending on what is in the fridge
* Soup - all different kinds that if I blend completely can hide lots of stuff.
* Honey mustard chicken (http://www.forumthermomix.com/index.php?topic=5129.0) - I add carrot and zucchini with onion, and then cauliflower with the cream. Even on reverse the cauliflower disappears so they don't know it's there. At times I have also added mushrooms with the carrot.

Really, I add extra vegies to anything that I can. I still serve them visible vegies and while I don't make them clean their plates I do insist they try at least one bite of everything I put on their plates. I am very partial to the all-in-one meals and these always lend themselves well to a bit of hidden nutrition.

I hope that helps.
Kerryn

[judydawn]

You are a very clever, crafty Mum Kerryn - your children will thank you for it one day and may be able to use the same ideas with their children