How to make the perfect meat puree for children at home: tips and recipe from an expert

Meat puree is a fairly common baby food. Some people prefer the store-bought version of the dish, but its quality is very mixed. Products even from trusted manufacturers may not always bring maximum benefits and nutrients. Therefore, it is better to cook at home.

Baby food expert, nutritionist, and founder of the largest Ukrainian-language Facebook group on feeding Victoria Stelmakh told us how to make healthy meat puree at home.

Recipe for mashed meat, for 110-130 grams of pureed meat:

• medium chicken drumstick - 1 pc
• garlic - 1 clove
• onion - 1/4 small
• carrots 5-7 cm long - 1/3
• bay leaves - 1 pc
• butter - 1 cube
• olive oil - 1 tsp

Method of preparation:

1. Put a cube of butter in any dish of your choice (saucepan, cauldron or slow cooker).

2. Add garlic, onions and carrots. Chop all these vegetables randomly. Cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring occasionally.

3. Add the chicken and water. The liquid should cover the meat by 80-90%.

4. Close the lid, simmer on low heat for 60-90 minutes.

5. If you chose a slow cooker for cooking, set it to the stewing mode.

6. When the meat has cooled, a jelly-like gravy will form.

7. To mash one drumstick, use 2.5 tbsp of gravy.

8. Add the meat to a blender glass and the gravy, grind.

9. Pour the remaining gravy and a teaspoon of olive oil.

10. For a more liquid consistency, you can add more gravy.

The expert notes that it is important to clearly understand the composition of each product that goes on a child's plate.

Composition of mashed potatoes by Victoria Stelmakh:

• 80% meat
• vegetables - 10%
• water (animal fats) and oil - 10%.

Ingredients of store-bought puree:

• drinking water, meat - 30%
• corn and rice starch, rice flour, sunflower oil, lemon juice
• mashed meat - 55%.
• drinking water, corn starch
• water, organic chicken meat - 40%
• organic rice flour, organic rapeseed oil - 1.0%.

The importance of taste

When a child eats homemade mashed meat without flour and starch, he or she gets a mono product and gets acquainted with the pure taste of meat. All the additional ingredients better reveal this natural taste and in no way overwhelm it.