Chicken

What a week this past week has been!!! Lexi's First birthday was Saturday, and her birthday party was on Sunday. Talk about a lot of planning!! Luckily I had off, spring break, to plan for it. Of course I didn't have time to write about much. I'm nearing the end of making my own baby food though. Lexi is eating table food and as I said before, she is refusing to eat when I feed her. Who knows what I will talk about next??? =o)

Anyway, After tofu, Chicken was the next "protein" that I introduced to Lexi.
I wasn't sure how I wanted to cook the chicken. At first I tried to boil it in a little water and the baked it. It worked just fine for cooking the chicken, but I think it ended up being  a little tough. When I tried to "puree" the chicken, the chicken was very piece-y and not the texture that Lexi liked. The next batch I decided to just boil the chicken. This made the chicken softer and easier to "puree" in the food processor. It was easier to incorporate into the other purees and Lexi liked it better. I also thought about if I should freeze it, so I tried it. It worked out just fine, the only thing was this the chicken was a little dry. But by mixing it with purees, after defrosting/heating, that were a little more watery, i.e. fruits, it worked just fine.

So here is the procedure:

• Cut up chicken breasts into strips, or use chicken tenderloins. (I found that the strips made it less likely that the chicken would over cook.)
• Boil some water, put enough in the pot so that it looks like it will cover the chicken.
• Put the chicken in and boil for 15 minutes. (I forget the exact time, but just take a piece out and check it for 'done-ness'. [Remember the keep the cooking liquid. I actually froze the cooking liquid to be used when cooking other things like lentils in.]
• Place the chicken in the food processor and "puree". (Puree is in quotes because it doesn't really puree completely.)
• Put in ice trays and freeze. 

Have fun!! =o)
-Mindie