# high-calorie finger food ideas



## fiddlefern (Nov 9, 2003)

My 10 mo ds is a picky eater. He utterly rejects purees and anything he can't self-feed.

Also, he hovers around about the 4th percentile in weight, except when interruptions like a busy schedule/travel/illness make him dip even lower in the charts.

so.....

I'm hoping for some ideas on high-calorie finger foods.

Here's what I've done so far:

1. diced avacado (too bad he hates it :LOL )
2. hard-boiled egg yolk (also rejected)
3. beans (hooray, a winner)
4. peas (also a favorite)

I plan to try:
1. veggie cubes or finger cereals dipped in hummous
2. olives (if I can find some that aren't super-salty)

any other ideas?


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## HerthElde (Sep 18, 2003)

Cheese cubes (real unpasteurized organic cheese - has probiotic benefit)
Parsnip or carrot sticks or cubes sauteed or roasted with butter or olive oil
(in fact, I add butter to all of dd's cooked veggies)
Banana bread with no sugar and lots of fat (unless avoiding grains-I only let dd have soaked grains)

That's all I can think of off the top of my head - am sure Cathe will have some great suggestions for you

ETA be careful with the olives - I have a friend who has a friend who is a surgeon who could not save his 3 year old when she choked on an olive pit


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## fiddlefern (Nov 9, 2003)

Thank you, HerthElde

Those are great. It didn't occur to me to cook veggies with butter instead of steaming them- duh.









I need to try yogurt again (as if I could get him to eat something on a spoon- ha ha) before I try cheese, 'cause the first time we tried yogurt, he had diarhea for three weeks. It was probably a cooincidence and he just had a virus, 'cause since then he's had toast with butter, and also twieback my mom baked with milk in it (oops!), and he's been fine. But cheese will be GREAT if he can have it. Thanks for the suggestion on which kind to get.

Yipes on the olive story. I bought a tiny can of organic sliced olives. Those should be safe.

Here's what else I thought of today at the food coop:

- almond butter spread thin on twieback (almond butter's OK for 10 mo, isn't it?)


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## VikingKvinna (Dec 31, 2003)

I have similar problems with my 20-month old, whom I've been trying to fatten up for a while now. Some of the things he eats a lot of:

***Oven-baked fries (both sweet and white potatoes)
***pb&j "sandwiches" -- either on whole-grain bread cut into postage-stamp size pieces or organic crackers -- I use the all-fruit style jam and natural pb, of course, but you could sub almond butter or soynut butter or whatever.
***scrambled egg (he likes this, but also rejects the hard-boiled egg -- or scramble just the yolk, if you prefer)
***small bites of pancake/waffles/french toast, with your choice of topping (butter, jam, pb, fruit puree, applesauce -- you could also sneak a lot of stuff in here, like banana)
***I also second the suggestion of quick breads -- banana, zucchini, pumpkin, etc. And I make "cookies" -- that are packed full of healthful stuff.

Do you have "Super Baby Food"? There's a lot in there I take with a grain of salt, but she's got some great ideas, too -- one of which is to make little balls or patties out of various foods, and fry them lightly. A good way to sneak in lots of nutrition and calories and yet still let your DC self-feed. Great way to use up leftovers, too! I've made them out of sweet potatoes, black beans, and brown rice -- puree it all, add enough wheat germ/soy flour/ground flax seed/egg to hold it all together, shape into patties, and pan-fry. Or substitute any kind of beans, or tofu, or shredded vegetables. -- you just have to get it to the point where it'll stick together into patties long enough to cook it.

HTH! I know how hard it is to come up with new ideas for good, healthful food.

~Nick


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## fiddlefern (Nov 9, 2003)

thank-you for the ideas, Nick!

I especially like the cooked patty idea- a good way to get just about anything I want to feed him into finger-food form.

I tried scrambled yolk today and no dice (sigh), but I'm SURE to find something he likes with all of those suggestions you gals have given.








Beth


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## cathe (Nov 17, 2002)

My daughter only wanted to feed herself too - what I did with yogurt was mix in some rolled oats that way she could pick it up with her hands. Here are some other things that you could try:

diced tofu or tempeh
cooked veggies or pasta tossed in olive oil - can add parmesan cheese too
cooked egg yolks
cheese
diced pancakes or french toast (use just egg yolks if you haven't introduced whole eggs yet) you can spread some butter on them too
diced veggie or bean burgers
diced salmon is great (if you're not vegetarian) he can also have minced poultry

Oh - gotta go - my daughter is about to debut her magic show. More later . ..


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## VikingKvinna (Dec 31, 2003)

Pasta!

Funny how your brain works overtime even when you're not trying! :LOL I woke up this morning thinking, "Pasta! That's what her picky eater can eat!"

My DS likes whole-wheat rotini with marinara, or sometimes w.w. elbows with sauce, or just with butter. You could try homemade macaroni and cheese, too, or a faux-alfredo sauce with tofu. Or even a real alfredo -- goodness knows that's got loads of calories! I actually need to make up a batch of pasta this afternoon.

If my brain comes up with anything else I'll post again!

~nick


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## fiddlefern (Nov 9, 2003)

Thanks, Cathe.









I know there are several other mamas struggling with this, in my May mamas thread over in Life with a Babe. I've given them the heads up to check this thread.

So you're helping a number of us at once.

I feel like we have a good list of things to try now (once ds recovers from croup and is ready to try solids again- argh.)

Thanks again


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## cathe (Nov 17, 2002)

I made a lot of chunky stews around that age - with beans or tofu, carrots, squash, potatoes, green beans, zucchini, broccoli, pasta - stuff like that - and they'd get some of the sauce as they ate the chunks with their hands. Another idea when you make soup is let your child eat out the chunks, then pour the broth into a cup and let him drink it.

My girls even ate grains like brown rice with their fingers. Mix in a little olive or flax oil for those good fats.


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