Contents

Foreword by Ella’s dad

Our easy family cookbook

Fun family mealtimes

Illustration Get-up-and-go brekkies

Illustration Take-a-break lunches

Illustration Family feasts

Illustration Tasty treats and puds

Illustration Funtime family food

Index

Acknowledgements

How to use this ebook

Select one of the chapters from the main contents list and you will be taken to a list of all the recipes covered in that chapter.

Alternatively, jump to the index to browse recipes by ingredient.

Look out for linked text (which is in blue) throughout the ebook that you can select to help you navigate between related recipes.

Foreword by Ella’s dad

When I think about family mealtimes, I see my young self with my parents and my brother around the same table; I see my own kids and my wife and the myriad occasions that we have sat together to eat. I think of those special occasions when, often with others, we have celebrated a birthday or an achievement.

Alison and I have always put the highest value on organizing our lives so that we can have as many family meals with Ella and Paddy as possible. Ella talks about the security of our Sunday pancakes routine, and Paddy enjoys getting involved in the day-to-day cooking. They have memories that hinge on family mealtime experiences – like the time we made a warming stew to eat outside in the February snow! And the time a trained cook came to Ella’s birthday party and used garlic butter in the cookies. YUCK!

Ella and Paddy have become talented cooks, which I am sure is partly down to our family culture of offering them what we want to eat and of eating together. It hasn’t always worked: I can think of meals they’ve walked away from having barely eaten a thing – but they survived! It’s much easier to cook one meal for everyone and it’s worth being brave. With that in mind, we hope this book will optimize both your own time and your quality family time. Alison, Ella, Paddy and I, along with the whole Ella’s Kitchen gang, hope you enjoy using the recipes as much as we enjoyed creating them.

Keep smiling,

Paul, Ella’s dad

Follow me on Twitter: @Paul_Lindley

Our easy family cookbook

A bit about using this book

At Ella’s Kitchen we love it when families enjoy good food – from choosing what to cook and shopping for the ingredients to making the meal and spending time around the table – together. These shared experiences teach little ones that mealtimes are about more than just what they’re eating. They learn that food creates social occasions during which we can share stories, connect with each other, and have fun! We believe that if children learn from a young age that good food is for everyone and that mealtimes are positive experiences, they’ll go on to develop a healthy love of food that will last a lifetime.

Look out for our handy ‘What shall we eat today?’ guide – use it to help plan your week around the family table.

Feeding a family

We know, though, that it’s not always practical for everyone to sit around the table to eat at the same time every day. As well as recipes that are good to eat together, we’ve included lots that we hope are brilliant for when you need to feed the kids an early tea, and keep portions back for the grown-ups to eat later. Every recipe tells you how many it’s intended to feed (see icons). Serves 4, for example, approximates for two adults, one hungry older child and one toddler. However, every family and every appetite is different. You know your family best, so use your judgement and adjust the quantities to suit.

We commissioned the British Nutrition Foundation to review lots of studies about the best ways to help children develop a healthy relationship with food. The Foundation found that involving children in cooking, and eating together as a family can help to establish healthy eating habits. Encouraging children to explore and play with food using all their senses was also found to help.

Babies can join in, too!

Once weaning is established (that is, you’ve moved on from offering your baby simple veg or fruit purées), look for the recipes with the special bowl icons (see box), as these are recipes you can blend or mash just as they are (we’ve listed the 10 month recipes in our pull-out, too) to give to the littlest members of your family. Occasional pop-up boxes give you pointers on how to adapt other recipes for babies. Use your judgement when deciding what is suitable to feed your baby, and remember:

☺ Mash, blend or chop all food to the texture suitable for your baby’s age and stage – adding a little cooking water or their usual milk, if necessary.

☺ Before your baby reaches six months old, avoid all dairy or other allergens, such as gluten, egg, soya and nuts.

☺ Until your baby is 12 months old, cook unpasteurized cheeses, including parmesan, and don’t give him or her runny eggs or any honey.

☺ For older babies, even past 12 months, leave out nuts and seeds if you think they might pose a choking risk, or chop or grind them very finely until you’re confident they’re just right.

The best ingredients

All of our recipes have been approved by the Ella’s Kitchen nutritionist. We’ve avoided adding extra salt or refined sugar, and instead we’ve used lots of herbs, spices and natural sweeteners (such as honey and maple syrup), to make sure everything is reeeally tasty, but also as good for you as it can possibly be. When we can’t avoid using sugar (like in some of the treat recipes), we’ve always reduced the overall sugar content so that even the treats and cakes are better for you. Yippee!

We recommend that you use organic foods, especially for fresh ingredients. We believe that organic farmers produce their foods using the purest farming standards and that organic farming is better for the planet.

Finally, all the ingredients should be available in your local supermarket and you may even have lots of them in your cupboards already.

Key to icons

At the top of every recipe, you’ll find a combination of the following symbols to help make feeding your family as easy as it can be.

How many pieces the recipe makes

How many family members the recipe serves

How long the ingredients take to prepare

How long the recipe takes to cook

Whether the recipe (or part of it) is suitable for freezing

Baby age bowls:
Suitable from 7 months old
Suitable from 10 months old

Fun family mealtimes

We all know that little ones pick up even the teeniest habits from us as they watch and learn. Eating together is a great way to embed some good eating practices – from the importance of munching on veggies and exploring food with all our senses to how to hold cutlery and to chew before swallowing! Here are our top tips for making sure family mealtimes are as fun and as positive as can be.

Research from Harvard University in the USA shows that the best way to boost a child’s vocabulary is to talk to them at teatime. Take a look at our activity on Time for table talk for some ideas to get the conversation flowing.

Get everyone involved!

Learning to love food is not just about eating: getting little ones involved in buying, preparing and cooking it from an early age is important, too. Find your local pick-your-owns, visit local farmers’ markets (marvel at the colours and smells, perhaps even have a few tasters), and use a trip to your supermarket as a voyage of discovery. The more you do together, the more your whole family will feel part of the foody gang, and so all-the-more excited about what you eat.

Cooking together is especially important. Even toddlers can help roll, weigh and stir, and lots more! Look out for our Can I Help? boxes throughout the book for other ideas on how to make cooking together part of your family time.

Keep feet on the ground!

Research suggests that if a little person’s feet dangle, he or she will feel imbalanced and is more likely to fidget. If your little one’s feet don’t touch the floor at the table, pop a box underneath them as a foot rest, or come down to ‘little’ level and eat around the coffee or play table.

Inspire good little eaters

Lots of our Ella’s Friends ask us how to help little ones learn to love a wider range of food. Here are our top tips:

☺ Do nothing When mealtimes become a battleground, they stop being fun. Tell any fussy eaters that it’s fine to leave their meal, but they must still sit at the table with you while you eat yours. Hold your nerve – most little ones will start to nibble on something (and then gradually more and more) if only to pass the time…

☺ Give little ones some control If you’re preparing a veg that can come several ways, allow them to choose which way (potatoes can be boiled, mashed or baked; carrots can be raw or cooked, and so on). Present veggies on a dish to allow self-service – offer three kinds with a deal that everyone must choose at least two to eat. (You can use leftovers in stews and sauces.)

☺ Keep portion sizes small and appropriate Little people have little tummies – an overloaded plate can feel off-putting. Offer small amounts with the option for more (and lots of praise) when it’s all gone.

Make time!

Mealtimes may not always be able to include every member of your family, but try thinking of some creative ways to have more meals together than you do now. For example, if one of you works, could you all meet for lunch (a picnic is lovely) near the workplace? Could you have breakfast together – even if it means getting up 15 minutes earlier? If you can’t have weekday family teatimes, are there evenings when just one of you could eat with the little ones? And, of course, earmark a time (probably at the weekend) when you all promise to eat a whole meal together. It might be Saturday supper or Sunday lunch, but whenever it is schedule that time as an appointment that you always do your best to keep.

No distractions!

Mealtimes are the perfect times to be together. Turn off the television, put away all smartphones and tablets, and make sure all little people have been to the toilet before you start. Talk about the food, engaging all the senses (what does it look like? How does it smell? How does it feel? What does it taste like?), talk about the day. Try to make sure everyone gets a turn to talk, respond and share.

What shall we eat today?

Looking at pictures of yummy food is a great way to get tummies rumbling! Use this chart to choose lunches and dinners that are super-speedy, suitable for babies, or can be cooked in bulk (one less meal to cook next week!).

Fridge to table in under 25 mins

Bubbly green soup

Dragon omelette rolls

Moon + star flatbread pizza

Little monster chickpea stir-fry

Eye-spy eggs

Zesty prawn pasta salad

Wiggly chicken noodles

Sunset jerk chicken

Seaside fish + creamy corn dip

Punchy Italian lamb

Zingy Thai turkey noodles

Make more to freeze

Hearty red chicken soup

Bubbly green soup

Fill-you-up tomato + lentil soup

Dunkable cheesy broccoli fritters

Build-it bean burgers

Cauliflower pizzette

Eastern chicken pan-fry

Carnival curry + sunshine rice

Three-step easy coconut dhal

Warm + scrummy meatballs

Ultimate beef hotpot with gnocchi

Baked mushroom-y pasta

Sunset jerk chicken

Zingy Thai turkey noodles

Goat’s cheese tart

Dig-in salmon lasagne

Slowly-does-it beef pot roast

Laid-back crustless quiche

Dino ribs in Chinese sauce

Stacked-up chicken + quinoa burgers

Crisp + crunchy cauliflower tabbouleh

Good for baby, too! (10m+)

Spiced brekkie hash-up

Zoomy mushrooms

Carnival curry + sunshine rice

Dunkable cheesy broccoli fritters

Three-step easy coconut dhal

Warm + scrummy meatballs

Pop-it-in-the-oven risotto

Ultimate beef hotpot with gnocchi

Baked mushroom-y pasta

Punchy Italian lamb

Crispy topped pork stroganoff

Dig-in salmon lasagne

Slowly-does-it beef pot roast

Laid-back crustless quiche