cooking for three

We started Malakai on table foods almost as soon as he turned one. We're definitely easing him into things to make sure he doesn't have an allergic reaction as well as holding off on too much sugar or spice. Cooking essentially the same thing for all three of us has made life just a tad bit simpler. It's especially nice in the hot month of August to not cook two meals or spend a day in the kitchen making baby food to freeze. I'm using what we have in the freezer and come fall I'll make some steamed veggies + other things that I don't want to have to cook new every evening.

Recently I baked some carrots + potatoes I bought at the local Farmer's Market. For the carrots I just went with a recipe I had for sweet potato fries. They were so easy, all I did was wash them, roll them in some olive oil and put them in a little tin foil pouch! Baked at 350 degrees for about 30-45 minutes.

They turned out pretty good, but the skin was a little...stringy. So I would surely peel them next time. Maybe that's a no-brainer but I wanted to see if I could skip that step. Luckily they turned out so soft and yummy that the it could easily be peeled off by hand.

I tried something out with the potatoes too. I put all but one in the pouch to see if they would cook differently. The one outside the tinfoil cooked better.

I didn't peel these either, just stabbed them through with a fork a few times. I cooked them all together. I'm obviously not a very seasoned cook. Once again, I tried to skip some steps since the carrots obviously cooked faster than the potato. The carrots turned out perfect but the potato was a bit undercooked.

This actually worked out really well for me though, as I planned to use some potato that night and then freeze the rest. I just cut up one potato, added some water and nuked it for about a minute to mash it to the desired softness for Malakai. Since then I've used the frozen ones too and they cook through just fine when thawing. Again, the skin peeled off easily, but I'll probably peel before baking next time around.

Ben, Malakai + I all had baked potato for dinner that evening. I'm now continually on the look out for easy dinners that will satisfy all three of us. Any recommendations?