What I Made for Dinner: August 27, 2009

Tofu stir fry with peas, corn, and carrots over whole-wheat noodles.

I know this goes squarely into the "no one else cares" category, but: WAHOO!!! ELI ATE TOFU! ELI ATE NOODLES! WOOT WOOT!

See, for months he subsisted largely on whole milk and Pepperidge Farm goldfish. He ate the very occasional chicken nugget or tablespoon of macaroni. Our pediatrician told us to switch him to low-fat milk and/or cut back on the amount he drank. But really? At 24 months, the child weighed 26 pounds. I was too scared to cut out the only part of his diet I could depend on him to ingest regularly.

(Plus, I had a nagging feeling, based partly on a vague memory from Alex's toddlerhood, that eventually, all on his own, he would start favoring solid food over milk.)

(Embarrassingly, my solution to the dilemma posed by ignoring the pediatrician's advice was to quit telling the pediatrician how much milk Eli was drinking.)

Anyway, lately Eli's been more interested in chewing his food and joining the rest of the family for meals. And, as I suspected would happen, he's taking in less whole milk. So now on a regular basis he's accepting waffles for breakfast, for example. Chicken noodle soup. Peanut butter sandwiches. Not a really challenging repetoire, but such an improvement.

And then tonight! Noodles coated in orange-soy stir fry sauce! And most astoundingly, stir-fried tofu! And he said as he chewed it: "Mom! This tofu is gooooood."