Hey foodies!

If I was a baby I wouldn't get enough of this Banana Quinoa Baby Mash. It's so delicious. Because I'm no mother I tried it out myself as I created this recipe. It's a perfect sweet but still healthy treat which is also suitable for adults.

This Banana Quinoa Baby Mash is ideal for babies older than 7 months. Because there's no diary and gluten, this recipe is perfect for babies that are at risk to develop allergies. In general this recipe constitutes as the perfect beginning to start to feed your baby solid food because there are no allergens in it and therefore it's well-tolerated.

As I thought of the ingredients of a suitable baby food I came up with fruits and cereals (or pseudo cereals) because the challenge said that you should be able to stand behind your idea in a way that you could eat it with appetite. Complementary feeding also consists of vegetable and meat or fish purees. I know that. But that's nothing for me. So I decided to make a fruit and cereal mash.

Next, I wanted to create a recipe which is well-tolerated and suitable for all babies but also provides sufficient amounts of important nutrients. So, I came up with the idea to use quinoa which is a pseudo cereal which means that it includes no gluten. Also, it is packed with plant protein and a lot of vitamins and minerals. The perfect food for a baby in my opinion. When it comes to the matter of flavour and texture, quinoa is really great because it's quite flavourless but gives a nice chewy texture to fruit mashes depending on how long you cook it. So, any fruit you will mix with cooked quinoa will provide most of the taste of the end product.

There are a lot of possible combinations you could try. I decided to mix it with a ripe mashed banana. The banana makes it really creamy without the need of adding any dairy like milk or yoghurt. Using a ripe banana will give the mash the perfect amount of sweetness. So, I definitely recommend to use a ripe banana. It's also better to digest for your baby in comparison to an unripe banana.

Banana and cinnamon are a match made in heaven so I decided to put in a dash of cinnamon. It makes it taste like a chai tea mash which is so delicious in my opinion.

This recipe make 2 servings. Adjust the amounts depending on how much you need for your baby. You can easily place the rest in the fridge or make even more and store a few servings in the freezer so you have some of it on hand when you need it.

If you're an adult like me, make the full recipe as a healthy snack. ;)

Banana Quinoa Baby Mash Recipe

Ingredients (for 2 servings)

50 g quinoa
125 ml water
1 ripe banana
1 dash of cinnamon

Directions

Rinse the quinoa with hot water to get rid of most of the saponins.

Place rinsed quinoa with water in a small pot. Let it start to cook.

Place the lid on and cook on medium heat until the quinoa is fully cooked. Adjust the amount of water and cooking time depending on how you want the texture to be. With the amount that I used the quinoa was "al dente".