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Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Bananarama

Once every few days or so, I get a little bored with our lunch options, so I make something different. Usually, this means we have the same foods, but I arrange them into the shape of a face on J's plate, and then he eats twice as much as he usually does. I know, I know, I should do this more often, as his skinny bones will attest, but I've only got so much in me, people. Believe it or not, food styling was not in my previous training!

This week, I had another of those urges, so I decided to make a banana caterpillar. It is very simple, which I why I decided to try it, and involves slicing a banana, reattaching the slices with peanut butter, adding pretzel legs and antennae and raisin eyes, and sprinkling it all with coconut fur. I've included the exact picture I modeled mine after below, which I found in one of my two kid cookbooks.

It turned out great, actually, and the caterpillar was accompanied on the plate by fruit roll up mushrooms (which sort of looked like logs, which is what happens when I try to do something without a picture) and little mini grilled turkey and cheese sandwiches made using mini waffles, which were delicious. J loved the caterpillar...but refused to eat it. I eventually got him to eat ONE slice, which he declared "not bad," but that was all. E hasn't had a lot of (any??) peanut butter yet, so he couldn't eat the rest so I had to, making me wish I had used lowfat PB instead!

My poor caterpillar was the victim of my son's fickle eating habits, which he inherited from his father. When we were first married, I would go buy groceries, guesstimating based on our consumption in the past week or so what we'd need for the next week or so. Let's say, for example, that I ate yogurt three times and the husband two, so I'd get five containers of yogurt. But then the husband would decide he LOVED yogurt and eat one a day and then ask for more, so the next time I'd get 10 and he'd eat one a day, and the next time I'd get 10 and he'd eat...NONE. This happened over and over with all sorts of foods until I realized my husband has cravings in cycles, and there is virtually no way to predict what he will like eating at any given time. It turns out, J has adopted his father predilection for cyclical eating. For example, he will eat bananas for weeks on end, then declare himself through with them for months until he has another banana eating urge.

I thought we were in the time of the bananas. I was wrong. But it was cute, regardless!

1 comment:

joyful704 said...

we left off the coconut but my boys loved this! do share the titles of your fun ids cooking books?