Like the blueberry milk and strawberry milk recipe this recipe for cherry cola is also from The Sneaky Chef . Cherry cola is made at home by combining equal parts cherry juice and sparkling water. Unlike the store bought sodas which are flavored and colored artificially, this cherry cola is made from homemade cherry juice. Too much consumption of any soda is definitely not good, but this homemade cherry cola is an excellent alternative for sugary sodas. At least we can consume it without the risk of caffeine overdose and sugar rush.

The basic cherry juice can be mixed with chocolate milk and kids won’t even recognize it. The cherry juice gives a very nice color and flavor to the chocolate milk. My son absolutely loves it and he can’t differentiate the taste at all.

My son is 3 years and 3 months old and like many kids of his age he is also a picky/fussy eater. Meal time is definitely a battle time. The problem with him is, he doesn’t have a favorite food. If he had a favorite food, I would simply prepare it for him everyday until he is bored. Earlier broccoli, cauliflower and pasta were his favorite. But not anymore. I think I’m never going to understand his mind in this matter.

I have a very good desi neighbor, whose daughter R is also my son’s age. She also stocks up a lot of fruits and when my son goes there she offers him a fruit and he eats it very quickly without hesitating. So what I do, the very same evening I ask my husband to pick up that fruit on his way home and I give it to my son for breakfast the next day, and he disappoints me by not even taking it to his mouth. Last week I bought cherries for the first time, to try a cake recipe. I was sure that he is not even going to taste it. I was removing the pit in the cherries and I gave him one and he ate it and asked for some more to my surprise. This continued for sometime, I was pitting and he was asking for more. So what do I do, I don’t proceed with the cake. I simply put it back in the fridge and offer it again the next day and you know what, he didn’t even eat one piece. Kids, definitely have their own thought process and they want to show us that they are in control.

Now here comes the rescue in form of a book called “The Sneaky Chef” by Missy Chase Lapine. She discusses about various simple strategies for hiding healthy foods in kids’ favorite meals. She masks spinach and blueberries in brownies, cauliflower in Mac and Cheese, cherry juice in chocolate milk, white bean puree in chocolate chip cookies, etc just to mention a few. This book has definitely made me think outside the box.

I started with the cherry chocolate milk recipe first because he drinks chocolate milk daily in the afternoon after his nap and we had cherries at home. I’ll post this one shortly. Just as it was mentioned in the book, neither of us were able to taste the cherry juice in the chocolate milk. Both the flavors blended so well. So I decided to try the blueberry flavored milk next.

The blueberry juice when mixed with the milk gave a nice violet color. But it was not sweet enough, so I mixed in some maple syrup. I liked it very much. Of course, you will get a mild blueberry smell. I was really excited to see a purple colored milk, more than he was and I asked him if he wanted to drink purple color milk. He too agreed without fussing, but once he tasted he said that it’s not nice. So I had to get him all excited about the color, but no, he wouldn’t drink. Then I got this idea, I told him that his friend R’s mother brought it while he was sleeping and she told that R loves this milk and she drinks it very quickly. And that did the trick, he gulped it down very fast, telling that it was very good. Can you believe this? I’m not sure if this is right or wrong, or how long this trick will work, but I think we have to take baby steps when it comes to kids and their nutrition. We have to pick our battles and should also let them win sometimes. Now coming to the recipe:

This is my entry for Sunshinemom’s FIC – Purple and Black.

My friend Dee made the announcement for the event she is hosting for AFAM (A Fruit A Month), started by Maheshwari on 1st of May and I can’t believe it’s the 24th already.  She has chosen Raspberries as this month’s fruit.  I did spend a lot of time searching the net for interesting recipes and bookmarked a lot of them, but somehow it got delayed.  Finally here I am, with a recipe for a simple lemonade with raspberries.  Hope I will able to send another one too.

Before going to the recipe, a small trivia I found about Raspberry.  According to legend, raspberries were originally white. The nymph Ida pricked her finger while picking berries for the crying infant Jupiter, and raspberries have since been tinged red with her blood. (The botanical name of the raspberry is Rubus idaeus. Rubus means “red”, and idaeus means “belonging to Ida”).

Ingredients:
Frozen or Fresh Raspberries – 2 cups
Juice of 1 big Lemon
Water – 5 cups
Sugar – ½ cup

Procedure:
1.  If using frozen raspberries, thaw them as per the instructions in the package.
2.  Blend it using approximately 2 cups of water.
3.  Strain the raspberry juice using a fine sieve repeatedly to get rid of the seeds. (that’s what it’s called right?)
4.  In order to dissolve the sugar, I added the sugar, lemon juice and a little bit of the raspberry juice in a blender and blended it thoroughly.  To this add the remaining 3 cups of water, raspberry puree and mix it well.  That’s it, Raspberry Lemonade is ready now.  Serve it in a glass with ice cubes and garnish it with mint leaves.

Alternatively you can also pour the lemonade in ice pop moulds and freeze it, for a cool popsicle.  My son loved this version.

And this will be a lovely treat for summer.  Enjoy!

Sangeeth has passed me the “You Make My Day Award”.  Thank you very much Sangeeth.  You also make my day with your lovely comments in my blog.

Yesterday we had lunch in an Indian Restaurant.  Whenever we have lunch buffet, the following evening, we just have either oatmeal,  cracked wheat kanji (porridge) or plain yogurt rice for dinner.  This time I wanted to try something else and was browsing Jai and Bee’s blog.  I’m very glad I did that,  because I found an excellent recipe for Barley Thayirchadam.  It’s pretty much the regular South Indian yogurt rice, but prepared with barley instead.  This was totally new to me.  I use barley only in soups.  My husband is a big fan of barley.  Whenever I make soup he keeps telling that I should have increased the quantity of barley.  So I wanted to try this recipe atleast for his sake.

The beauty of this recipe is it has 2 uses.  With the pressure cooked barley we can prepare the main dish and with the excess water we can prepare a refreshing lemonade.  Jai and Bee had used 1 cup of pearl barley in their recipe. I thought I will try with half a cup.  When I measured the barley I had, there was only 3/4th of a cup left in the packet, so I decided to cook it.  The taste was excellent.  It was a very satisfying meal.  This measurement was perfect for both of us.  Half a cup would have been less and 1 cup would have been more. 

My Notes:
1.  I cooked the barley directly in a small copper bottomed pressure cooker and left it for 3 whistles.

2.  Whenever I prepare curd rice, I cut a maavadu (south indian style mango pickle, where small mangoes are pickled as a whole without cutting them) into small pieces and mix it with the rice along with the carrots and cucumber.  Since my husband doesn’t eat anything spicy, I lightly wash the maavadu and then cut it.  This gives a nice surprising crunch and tanginess.  So I did the same with this recipe. 

3.  I also prepared the barley lemonade.  In addition to the ingredients mentioned, I also added grated ginger.  I kept it in the fridge overnight, so that the lemonade would absorb the flavors of the lemon zest and grated ginger.  The next day morning I strained the juice before drinking.  It was so cool and refreshing.  I think people in India should definitely try it this summer.

Thank you very much for the recipe Jai and Bee.  This is going to be a regular in our house.  Your recipe rocks!

I came across a recipe for mixed fruit juice in my grocery store’s magazine.  The original recipe called for fresh/frozen mangoes, fresh/canned pineapples and freshly squeezed orange juice.  Since I had mango pulp which I got from the Indian store and orange juice in hand I thought I could use them instead and get canned pineapples alone.

Ingredients:
Mango pulp – 1 cup
Canned pineapple chunks in juice – 1 can (20 ounce)
Orange Juice – 1 cup

The measurements really don’t matter, you can change the ratio as you wish.  

Procedure:
Empty the canned pineapple with its juice in a blender and blend it smooth.  Then add the mango pulp and orange juice and blend it once again.  That’s it.  The fruit cocktail is ready!  The juice tasted very good but the flavor of mango was dominant.  I personally like mango juice very much, but if you don’t like it you can decrease the quantity of mango pulp.

This is my entry for Barbara’s A Taste of Yellow Event.