Our vegan kid 25' up!
If you are currently raising or have raised a vegan child, you’ve probably fielded all the uninformed questions people ask about their health and nutrition. If you are getting ready to raise a vegan child, uneducated, often snide questions are what are in store for you and your child. The folks at The Downstream Vegan wrote this very fun post about answers to some of the questions we often get asked as vegans. I have been thinking that as my daughter gets older it would be awesome if she had these memorized!
On a more serious note, while we lived in Los Angeles we were fortunate enough to have Dr Paul Fleiss as our pediatrician, who felt that children should be vegan because their bodies are unable to digest animal products. He understands the idea of raising a healthy, vegan child. After moving to Seattle we weren’t as fortunate. We went through a series of doctors trying to find one that understood our lifestyle. By far the worst was the one who asked how our daughter could possibly get calcium if she wasn’t drinking milk. It took three and a half years of searching but we finally found a group of doctors that are better informed than the rest, though we were still subjected to series of questions about her vitamin and nutritional intake. Are parents of an omnivore(s) subjected to the same line of questioning? I know kids who are seven, overweight and eating fast food several nights a week. What does a doctor say to a parent who tells them that their child eats McDonald’s three times a week? The best defense is that we have researched our child’s diet and we have the information that proves she is being raised healthy. Amazingly enough the fact that she has never needed antibiotics, is working two grades above her grade level, and is a super jock isn’t enough to convince skeptics that she is a super healthy kid.
Though we have raised her with an understanding of nutrition and make her try everything that is vegan (unless it is spicy since she’s not old enough to appreciate the burn of wasabi) she is still finicky. Like any other kid she will eat just about anything for dessert. She loves peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and french toast, so I decided to put the two together. When I was a kid my mom made grilled PB & J’s which I loved, and that’s where this idea came from. It came out delicious, if I do say so myself, and my hubby and kid agree. It’s definitely on the sweet side and could be easily made as a dessert.
Ingredients:
10 slices of bread
3/4 cup heavy cashew cream
2/3 cup water
1 tbsp maple syrup
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
a pinch of tumeric
a pinch of Himalayan salt
Peanut butter
jelly
vegan butter or oil
powder sugar (optional)
syrup
When I cook breakfast I like everyone to be able to eat together so I preheat my oven to 200 degrees and let the finish slices sit in the oven to keep warm until everything else is done.
Mix ingredients together from cashew cream to salt in a bowl (big enough to dip sandwiches in) with a whisk. Make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (I cut them in half to make them easier to handle. Dip sandwiches in mix. Cook in a nonstick skillet with butter or oil until brown on both sides. Serve. We used a sprinkle of powdered sugar and syrup.
Enjoy!
Steffi DeRobertis writes the food blog Don’t Fear The Vegan with the help of her husband and daughter. On their blog they share recipes, give out information about vegan places and products, and put some topics out there about the vegan movement too. This is her second post as a guest contributor to Vegan Mainstream’s Vegan MOFO posts.
