Lunch on April 14, 2011 - with love from the farmer's market

I'm writing today's post quickly.  I took the morning off to hang out with Juju and I have a bunch of work to catch up on.  I apologize in advance for any typos.

This morning we headed to Santa Monica to walk around the farmer's market. I haven't been to that one in years and somehow remember it much bigger (maybe it's bigger on the weekend?).  But it was certainly big enough for our needs today.  And although her first choice was to go to the zoo, I think Juju was happy we went because she had her first taste of one of my favorite snacks, peas in the pod (or English peas if you prefer) and she is hooked!

I have fond memories of eating fresh peas as a very young child.  I remember at our old house in NY we had a vegetable garden out back (I think my Grandpa Leo who had a green thumb planted it for us) and we grew peas.  I loved running out there and eating the peas right off the stalk.  This reminds me I want to figure out a way to grow vegetables in our backyard.  We tried once with tomatoes but we live in a canyon and some of our animal neighbors kept harvesting everything for us before we could get to them.  I also want to compost since peas in the pod leave a good amount of waste.  I'll work on both of those ideas when I have some more time.

Juju wasn't interested in the peas at first but once I showed her how to eat them she was obsessed.  She ate the entire bag in about a block and a half so I had to go back and buy some more for tomorrow's lunch.  It was actually a great way to move around the farmer's market.  Her eyes and hands were so focused on not dropping any peas on the ground that she moved slowly and stuck by me stand after stand.  We also bought some beautiful strawberries.  They are finally starting to taste as they should which means summer will be here before I know it.  Time really does fly.

I made lunch ahead of time again; our mornings are just too crazy to make a fresh lunch and I certainly wouldn't have time to blog about lunch if I made it in the morning!  Joining the peas in the pod are clementine segments, strawberries, and cream cheese hearts.  I made the hearts by slathering a bunch of cream cheese on two pieces of whole grain bread and using one of my handy dandy Tokyo Japanese Outlet heart-shaped cookie cutters.  I've never given Juju a cream cheese sandwich before but my guess is she is going to love it.  I am concerned that the lunch might not have enough protein so I might throw something else in the snailbox like yogurt or hummus and carrots. 

 

When I asked Juju today what she wanted for lunch tomorrow she replied "carrots and ice."  Let's hope this is a welcome substitute.

Inspired by reading this piece on artichokes I bought some beauties at the farmer's market today.  I once had a fantastic raw artichoke salad.  Maybe I'll try making it but I'm guessing the taste will be a little too sophisticated for a toddler's lunch.

Pink Eye Picnic - faux sushi salmon cream cheese rolls

Today's lunch plans were thwarted by the fact that Juju is suffering from pink eye and won't be going to school today.  I had planned a lunch of an artichoke heart and faux-sushi salmon cream cheese rolls but instead I made the rolls for breakfast and will have to improvise a new lunch around the artichoke.

Yesterday's trial run of a salmon roll-up was a small disaster.  All of the salmon was eaten but as I suspected, Juju ripped apart the entire thing and it was a horrible mess.  I had higher hopes today as I cut the salmon wrap in thin pieces like sushi.  It looked like this:

 

But this clever design didn't fool her.  She sat down and proceeded to unroll each roll picking out the salmon and moving on.  It was however much easier to clean up this way so I still might consider sending a lunch like this to school in the future.

I used a whole wheat and corn tortilla, whipped cream cheese and two pieces of lox.  She wasn't as hungry today as she was yesterday so some of the rolls remained and might show up again at lunch.

Lunch dry run - salmon and cream cheese roll-up

Yesterday I mentioned I had the idea to make a lunch out of some sort of salmon.  I ended up buying lox, one of Juju's favorites and figured I should give her a test run before packing this dish as a lunch.  Juju actually has a problem eating sandwiches/wraps.  She doesn't really get that you're supposed to take one big bite and taste the flavors of the bread, spread, lettuce, protein, etc together.  This is why she is one of the few children I know who does not like grilled cheese.  She just pulls the bread apart and tries to pick at the cheese and seems disatisfied with the whole experience.

I am a little afraid to send her with a salmon and cream cheese sandwich because if she starts to pick it apart at school, the results could be, well, gross for all parties involved in clean up.  So, I made it for breakfast today and we'll see if she is mature enough to handle this lunch at school.