Anu eating her favorite khichdi (sounds like kit-chari)
My daughter Anu just recently turned one in February. Like her brothers before her at this time in her life, she definitely has a favorite food, and it's only something her mama can make and deliver. For all other nibbles, she tends to prefer to feed herself... from our food. I learned one important lesson six years ago, when I was embarking on feeding solids to my firstborn son: don't sweat it. Of course it took me a few months to finally convince myself of that, but given the fact that all my little ones have had the convenience of mama's milk at their disposal and a healthy appetite (and baby rolls to show for it), we finally realized (with the comforting advice of our appealingly practical pediatrician) that it was quite okay that our kids just weren't going for the lovingly prepared and puréed organic sweet potatoes and what have you that I freshly ground through the vintage food mill I procured. Ettu's first "real" solid food was the semi-spicy mango guacamole that Nalin had prepared for a dinner party we were having with some friends. Ettu practically ate the whole bowl... cumin, garlic, perhaps even a chili. He wasn't quite one, but he was definitely way past six months. With Nooa, we didn't even bother with the homemade baby food. He was hand feeding himself daal and rice once he started to get interested in solids after 9 months or so. And Anu? Well, third child... she does love food, and is happiest with potatoes and cauliflower made with turmeric and salt with, of course, rice. I don't even bother sitting next to her most of the time. She's happy to eat well and often... if left alone that is.
Back in November, I was in line to pick up my sons from school, and on that day, like most days, I was listing to Fresh Air, which just happens to come on our local NPR station at that very hour. Terry Gross was talking with Roy Choi, the chef in L.A. semi responsible for the food truck craze. His Korean tacos have revolutionized the concept of fusion food in most major cities. The passage I got to hear completely and one that left an impression on me is when Terry asks him about his relationship to food from a young age. Roy was born in Korea and moved with his family to L.A. when he was 2. She asks him about "baby food," saying that he had written that in Korea at that time (and even now in many homes) there was no such thing as prepared baby food (as in many places in the world). She then states that he must have been fed pretty "adult food" really young. And how did that affect his palette and what he considers his comfort food? What he says is really beautiful, and is, mostly simply, the way Nalin and I have most often approached food for our little ones. He rattles off a long list of the foods he ate from the very beginning: bean sprouts, roots, kimchi, pickles, rice, fermented pastes, seafood, soups, stews, etc. He then says that it was
like being exposed to amazing jazz from being a baby... everything you experience from a young age influences who you are, I think... [I] started my life running rather than crawling.
Lunch on the deck
I never could quite figure out why Ettu, my oldest, would never eat those gloriously milled organic vegetables at 6 months like all the other babies I knew, but then at 11 months or so ate full plates of rice, lentils, and aloo gobi — spiced to the level of satisfaction for his parents (okay, so we started to leave out the green chilies). I think his palette was just open to more complexity. Now for the record, I'm not a nutritionist, and I'm not a doctor. I know that there are reasons why babies should be introduced to things in stages. But by one year, for certain, most things are on the table (excuse the pun), and I think our children are ready to explore the diversity of foods and spices, with all their varied and distinct flavors. To this day, Ettu and Nooa are ecstatic when they sit down to a bowl full of mussels, tofu, or a plate of fish with the head still on. Ettu, like his maternal grandmother (his dadi), favors the meat from the head of the fish above all else. They don't blink an eye having to eat brussels sprouts, sautéed kale, or completely vegetarian Indian curries. And Indian and most Asian foods are still their favorite of meal options. I don't say any of this to brag. God know there are days I can't get them to eat a thing on the table. And Nooa's sweet tooth for candy can rival the best of them. But for the most part, those early influences have shaped their palettes in significant ways. What I thought was a "lazy" move in parenting (just give him what we're eating; I don't feel like preparing something separate) has turned out to be a gift — for them and for us, for sure. As for Anu? She just pounds on the table with insistence. Pass the lamb curry; she's ready for more.