August Cooking
A new Friday tradition (stolen from Christine at Slow Living Essentials). The Big Bowerbird is cooking us dinner for pocket money. Her first meal - vegetarian Thai green curry with rice and garlic chicken (for little ones that don't like curry).
It was pretty spicy but she and her friend were determined to eat it, and soldiered on with a glass of milk to kill the burn beside them.
French toast makes a perfect after school snack and does a great job of using up all the little bits of left over bread.
Finally using our humongous pumpkin, Blue Ballet, came in a Diggers Pumpkin mix. It's totally delicious and a wonderful rich colour. Has been eaten roasted, in pasties, and in quiche.
The little one likes to munch on it raw while I'm chopping.
Potato Latkes from a winter potato harvest, delicious served with smoked salmon, chives and sour cream.
Some yummy cinnamon scrolls the Big Bowerbird made from a new cookbook.
Making Julie Goodwin's tasty Flat breads was a big hit with the kids, lots of kneading and rolling.
You would think with all this good eating that our children would be thriving.
Unfortunately behind those gorgeous smiles is some serious tooth decay. I'm suffering from terrible mother guilt about it ,after a visit to the dentist yesterday. "That is some of the worst decay I have ever seen in a 3 year old" is not what you hope to hear from your dentist, parenting fail. I'm really not sure why they are so bad, but all the kids have had major problems with their teeth. We eat biscuits and cakes, but in moderation, we rarely have lollies, and water and milk are the main drinks in our house. We brush teeth, we eat lots of home grown vegies, cook most things from scratch, and our town water is fluoridated. I am so sad for the little Bowerbird, as I know it's going to mean lots of dental visits, and a road that her big sister went down of teeth being removed, fillings, and infections. Sigh, there are worse crosses to bare, but I feel terrible for them. The big Bowerbird has a new molar just coming up that is already getting some decay in it.
We now have tooth mousse to use and were told the little Bowerbird needs a sugar free diet. Making a concerted effort to rinse with water after all eating as well. Any other suggestions?
Your sad tale of tooth decay despite all round healthy diets makes me wonder if it has more to do with in utero diet or genetics. My teeth were always extra tough and I remember my mum saying that her teeth were shocking after I was born??
ReplyDeleteYes I think we've shared a dud batch of genes on the teeth front. There's heaps of grooves and pits for food to get caught in - not nice smooth teeth. In utero, I'm doubtful, I always ate pretty healthily when I was pregnant.
DeleteYour foods are making me hungry. My boys also helped in the kitchen when little then took it upon themselves to inform me that they wanted to make a meal a week each. We had a wonderful cookbook from the laLeche league which listed alternative ingredients for each recipe so it saved me running to the store when they informed me we didn't have a particular ingredient.
ReplyDeleteMy boys had trouble with their teeth until my youngest was diagnosed with a food allergy to milk. When we removed the milk they boys teeth became harder and no more cavities. Don't know if you want to give up milk, but it worked for us.
I've never heard of that, would be interesting to see if it's allergy related.
DeletePity about the teeth (and I don't have any advice sorry) but I had just been thinking what a happy post it was with all those smiles! The cooking turned out a treat.
ReplyDeleteThey are delicious smiles, and lots of tasty things to eat this week.
DeleteI have ridiculously good teeth cavity wise - I still don't have any despite being on this earth for 40 plus years. I put that down to the little blue or were they green flouride pills my mum gave me when I was little - this was pre flouridation. My mum puts her incredibly bad teeth down to sucking on too many lemons as a kid - apparently the acid wears away at the enamel making them more susceptible to decay. But the truth is despite both my parents having bad teeth mine are good so I'm not sure about genetics and really no one seems to know why some turn out good and why some bad. My personal strategy is to blame my partner for all possible genetic flaws and I would highly recommend the strategy - very self affirming...
ReplyDeleteOh how I envy those teeth Liz, you hit gold in the tooth jackpot. Lemons, that's a new one.
DeleteI do like the blame the partner approach, what aren't they responsible for really? Probably something to do with his smoking, that's the cause of all ills.
Oh and can I borrow big bowerbird for my next dinner party - I do like the look of those cinnamon rolls.
ReplyDeleteshe was too sick for cooking tonight, you might not want her all grumpy and red nosed. Cinnamon scrolls were lovely - a no yeast recipe.
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ReplyDeleteHmmm, not sure what I can offer you in the way of teeth advice. Only that I believe that these things can be in the genes? It's not fair that you're leading such a healthy lifestyle and setting the example for your little ones and they are lumped with this, yet others can munch on chocolate till the cows come home and not suffer a single filling. Weird.
ReplyDeleteYour eldest's curry looks magnifico...does she do take away orders? ;)
We're not perfect with our diet, but I know many worse eaters with perfect teeth so it does seem very unfair.
DeleteAh, nothing your eldest couldn't handle.
How brave were they persisting with the hot curry - they look so cute with their red cheeks! You poor thing, not a nice trip to the dentist, especially when you are doing all that you can to prevent it.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the kind words Kimbamel, I'm sure we could do better with prevention, I'm becoming the brushing teeth vigilante now.
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