Sneaky

So, since Seinfield was such a phenomenal hit, wouldn't it make sense that when Jerry Seinfield's wife, Jessica, wrote a cookbook about sneaking veggies into her kids' food, that it would be a hit too? Ok, maybe not necessarily. But I've become quite intrigued with the book, Deceptively Delicious...afterall, it is a cookbook, and have tried a few of her recipes. Funny, I imagine Jerry sitting at home eating some of these foods. And, of course, they invite Kramer over to eat too. Riiiiight.

In fact, I spent the morning pureeing veggies.

So after trying a couple of recipes, I really like them. The Graham Cracker Sandwiches trump the Pumpkin Crunchers, big time...although they're probably not as healthy. The Chocolate Peanut Butter Dip was super yummy too. I'm slightly conflicted because my kids actually do eat veggies and fruit. So, I'm not sure how much I really need these recipes, but I am interested in ways I could add some additional veggies into their food, and, at the same time, get them to eat new foods. I'm disappointed that her book doesn't include nutritional info - that could make or break some of these for me. But, read on and see for yourself.

Notice the flowers I got from J for our anniversary!

Graham Cracker Ice Cream Sandwiches

2 cups lowfat plain yogurt

1 cup sugar

1 cup lowfat buttermilk

2 tbl lemon juice

grated zest of one lemon (I skipped this)

16 lowfat graham crackers, broken in half to make 32 squares

Whisk together the yogurt, sugar, buttermilk, lemon juice, and lemon zest. In as small of a bowl as practical, cover the mixture and freeze for 1 to 1.5 hours until the mixture starts to thicken. Once the mixture has thickened, scoop out and press about 1/4 cup of the mixture between two crackers to make sandwiches. Wrap each sandwich in waxed paper and freeze about 30 minutes or until firm.

My notes: Like I mentioned above, I skipped the lemon zest. If you don't like/want to use lowfat grahams, regular would obviously work just fine. I started out making a 1/2 batch of these, but after tasting them, made a second batch. I made the second batch with orange juice instead of lemon and it was just as tasty! Jessica (she's totally my BFF now) also suggests you could roll the sides of the "sandwiches" in coconut. I skipped the coconut and gave the kids chocolate sprinkles to roll them in instead. You could really get creative on these...you could flavor the yogurt with almond extract and roll them in chopped nuts, or roll them in just about anything...crushed candy bars, mini chocolate chips...you get the idea.

My dilemma: This book doesn't provide nutritional information, so I'm curious how these compare to other treats my kids might have. Plain yogurt is great, buttermilk is fine, but there is sugar in here. Is it better or worse than a bowl of ice cream, flavored yogurt, cookies...wish I knew!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Dip

1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup (4 oz) fat-free cream cheese
6 tbl chocolate syrup
1/4 cup carrot puree
1/2 tsp salt

Stir the peanut butter, cream cheese, chocolate syrup, carrot puree, and salt together in a bowl until smooth. Use as a dip for fruit.

My notes: I actually used a hand mixer to mix this up and it worked very well. This took about 1 minute to make (I'd already pureed the carrots). Believe me, you CANNOT taste any carrot. My kids gobbled this up with slices of apple. It was delicious. It's a really yummy dip for pretzels too!

My dilemma: My kids eat plain fruit just fine. So, we don't really need to be dipping our fruit in chocolate, but I guess this can just be a once-in-a-while treat!

Here's a pretty line of the purees. I pureed carrots, cauliflower, broccoli, zucchini, butternut squash and yellow squash. They really are quite lovely...they also remind me a lot of baby food. I never even considered making my own baby food. If I had another baby, which I won't, I'd consider this. In the meantime, I'll sneak it into my family's food.

I'm curious, has anyone else tried this concept before or used her recipes? Side note, sorry if the spacing is dumb on some of my blog posts...I am not a big fan of the ultra-long paragraph, especially in recipes, but it formats itself sometimes and I can't fix it. Grrrr...