Season 2, Episode 7:
HOW WE COOK AND EAT NOW

Conner: (00:01)
Welcome to Kiddos in the Kitchen. A podcast hosted by my mom.

Theresa McCluskey: (00:12)
I just kind of let her go with it. She adds sprinkles and fruit and anything you can find to some of her recipes and they're not always great, but I love the creativity and little Wes helps her and they make a huge mess.

Stephanie Conner: (00:32)
That's Theresa McCluskey, a mother of four who's seen firsthand the upside of cooking at home and slowing down during the pandemic. I wanted to learn more about Theresa's experience because while I know there's been an awful lot of awful during this pandemic, I also think there's a lot to be learned from this moment in time.

Stephanie Conner: (00:54)
Welcome to Kiddos in the Kitchen, a podcast about helping busy adults find the inspiration and information they need to teach the kids in their lives how to cook. I'm your host, Stephanie Conner. And today we're going to talk about changing how we eat, from slowing down and cooking more to baby-led weaning later in the show.

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Stephanie Conner: (01:51)
Theresa, who lives in North Carolina, works full time for a large company. She has four active kids aged 13, 11, and then 6-year-old twins. The pandemic sent them home for school. We've talked a lot this season about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our cooking and eating and living habits. And though school has returned to in-person in Theresa's area since we spoke, the pandemic, understandably, changed things for this working mom. And I wanted to learn all about it.

Theresa McCluskey: (02:27)
In planning for meals, we eat dinner together every night. And then on the weekends, we eat three meals together. I would say pre-pandemic, our focus was on how can we prep, cook and eat within 30 to 45 minutes daily? And how can we just have enough time for fun? The workday ends around 5:00, 5:30, the kids' homework ends and playing outside at that time and everyone's just perfect. So how do we help each other to get that done so we can go outside and play? That often involved me prepping on Sunday is with primarily proteins, sometimes carbs as well, and just sticking them in the fridge to have them. And by Wednesday or Thursday, those were out and we ended up eating out, probably too much. Lots of pizza, maybe one time of fast food a week, and then maybe actual restaurant dining. That's actually a lot different now during COVID. And I feel energized to say that.

Theresa McCluskey: (03:31)
We haven't made any significant diet changes where I can label them, and we're living this alternate lifestyle, where we're all super healthy and I've lost 20 pounds. There's nowhere we're really rushing off to. The kids are slowly integrating back into safe activities, but it's one per child versus two or three. We're not really going to birthday parties. We don't really have weekend plans, and during the day they're home. So I don't feel as rushed to get that playtime after dinner or a bath or shower, they can do it anytime. So I really like that. I'm trying recipes, which I haven't pulled out the recipe books that my mom and grandma gave me in so long.

Stephanie Conner: (04:17)
For Theresa's family, everyone eats the same meal and she was appreciating dinnertimes more because things weren't so rushed, and she's found an approach to cooking that really works for her.

Theresa McCluskey: (04:29)
I try to focus on one-pot recipes for my sanity. I actually dislike cleaning up more than anything. We're also, as a family, trying to eat less meat to reduce our carbon footprint and to integrate more vegetables in and to save money.

Stephanie Conner: (04:46)
When we spoke, Theresa had made three new recipes the weekend before--three. How is this superwoman and supermom doing this, I wondered.

Theresa McCluskey: (04:58)
One of the ways that I have started getting back into it is using what we have in the pantry and the fridge versus going shopping. I was gifted by my mom with a four-ingredient cookbook. I pulled that back out and it just makes it so simple to say, "Okay, what matches to what I have in the fridge or the pantry? And then let's start from there." I'm trying to shy away from some of the big meat dishes and more into ones that I wouldn't normally try, and so that also forced them to get a little bit creative.

Theresa McCluskey: (05:27)
And then the internet, there are so many great recipes. Me and my friends have been talking more about cooking. It's been just more of a conversation because everyone's home trying new recipes. And that was definitely not a topic of conversation before.

Stephanie Conner: (05:42)
Yeah, that's a good point, because we all are cooking more for sure. You alluded to this a little bit, but for you, what is the benefit or the value of cooking at home?

Theresa McCluskey: (05:54)
I definitely find comfort in cooking. I also find comfort in the kids saying that they enjoy it. Last night, we did our high/lows. We always do that at the dinner table. What's your favorite part of the day or the least favorite? And my little guy who is the pickiest who's 6 said, "My favorite part of the day was this dinner." And I was like, "Well, then you're totally getting this again." Maybe it's the Polish in my background, but just knowing that they like it and they want more is very satisfying for me. And then I definitely want to try more recipes.

Stephanie Conner: (06:28)
That is so sweet.

Theresa McCluskey: (06:30)
It was very sweet. Even my husband smiled at that one.

Stephanie Conner: (06:33)
That just makes you feel so good because so often it's like, "Yuck. What else do we have?"

Theresa McCluskey: (06:39)
Right. We have a saying in our family that some of the ugliest food tastes the best, so give it a try. And we say that a lot to each other, especially if it's something like refried beans or a casserole, and they have been pleasantly surprised by doing that. So I'm sticking to it.

Stephanie Conner: (06:57)
I love that. Yeah, I'm going to use that, especially with kids. Because they always want to keep things separate and not combine things. And you're like, "But when you put it together, it's really better that way."

Theresa McCluskey: (07:07)
Yeah. I mean, I just don't have time to use some really creative approaches to meal planning and prepping from a visual perspective. It's just not in my time. And so usually it's a one-pot dish or maybe it's two things on the plate, and it doesn't always turn out like Pinterest.

Stephanie Conner: (07:25)
What about bringing your kids into the kitchen? I'm curious because you have such an age range. Is it something you even focus on or does it just happen?

Theresa McCluskey: (07:35)
I would say just like any family, I have two that are very interested in cooking and two that aren't. My little guy, Wes, and my daughter Kate are really involved in the cooking and baking. My 10-year-old daughter, except for the oven, is allowed to do almost everything herself. So a funny conundrum with COVID is that she's baking almost every day, and we don't always need baked goods.

Stephanie Conner: (07:59)
We've been baking way too much here too.

Theresa McCluskey: (08:01)
Lots of cookies, cakes, muffins, whatever she can find. And I buy most of the ingredients, pretty low cost at a discount grocery store here in Charlotte. I just kind of let her go with it. She adds sprinkles and fruit and anything you can find to some of her recipes and they're not always great, but I love the creativity, and little Wes helps her and they make a huge mess. I love baked goods and that was a very fond memory for me growing up. My mom didn't allow us to eat too many sweets, except if we baked it. Probably around 10, I also had a lot of freedom in the kitchen to explore recipes and baking was just more fun, because I have a sweet tooth. I don't remember being told no much when it came to trying new recipes or cooking or baking, and I love giving them to others, so I found joy in, like, making that for my family.

Theresa McCluskey: (08:54)
I'm excited that they're getting into that. And then the other two just can't wait for the oven to ding, so they get to reap the rewards. Another thing that we're doing every day that we definitely didn't do before COVID is making smoothies. I have a Ninja and we kind of have our balance of ingredients down eyeballing really quickly. So between calls, I can totally make smoothies with them. And I just sneak in a little bit of protein powder, and now it's like their 10 a.m. or 2 p.m. snack. Because we've had more time with shopping, we're getting more fruits. So as they're kind of not even bad, but browning, we just throw them in. So we've come up with some really interesting recipes. So I would say I'm having smoothies every day now, which has maybe added calories, but it's been fun. As they transition back to the classroom, I'm going to miss that for sure.

Stephanie Conner: (09:44)
Is there anything else that we haven't covered that maybe you've been thinking about? Things that you do that really make cooking easier for you?

Theresa McCluskey: (09:52)
I actually have a very basic kitchen, so I do not have a ton of supplies. I would not consider myself a minimalist at all, but I've realized that the more I have, the more I get overwhelmed. I just have what I need and I actually use it all every week. And every couple of months I get rid of stuff that I haven't used. I know that's the alternate of most people cooking in the kitchen, but I found that just having what I need, that has really helped me having stuff that I really like to use as tools that are high quality, but less is more for me.

Stephanie Conner: (10:25)
Oh, I love that. I am the opposite.

Theresa McCluskey: (10:26)
Most people are.

Stephanie Conner: (10:28)
At least in terms of ... when I look around in my kitchen, I have a lot of things I don't use, but I think I might someday.

Theresa McCluskey: (10:37)
Right, oh yeah. That's like the story of my life everywhere else in the house.

Stephanie Conner: (10:41)
I might fit into that, and I might need that tool. I might spiralize again someday. You never know. Well, Theresa, thank you so much.

Theresa McCluskey: (10:53)
Yes. Thank you. This is great. I love connecting with you.

Stephanie Conner: (10:59)
My next guest is Malina Malkani, a registered dietician nutritionist who specializes in infant feeding, picky eating and pediatric and maternal nutrition. She's the author of the book "Simple and Safe Baby-Led Weaning." You may remember her from last season. She was on episode 2, talking about developing a healthier relationship with food.

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Stephanie Conner: (11:41)
Understanding how we introduce foods to babies is instructional, not just for parents of babies, but for all of us, as we better understand eating habits and our family's relationship with food. So first things first: What is baby-led weaning?

Malina Malkani: (11:58)
In essence, baby-led weaning is a method of infant feeding that involves offering baby appropriately sized finger foods from the family table for self-feeding starting at about 6 months of age. And it skips over that passive spoon-feeding of purees. It doesn't necessarily skip over purees. Purees are an important texture that babies should learn as well. But in terms of the spoon-feeding part, when you offer a baby purees, the baby-led weaning way, it's on a preloaded spoon that baby can self-feed.

Malina Malkani: (12:32)
It does not refer to transitioning away from breast milk and/or formula, which is where some of the misconceptions come in, I think.

Stephanie Conner: (12:39)
Yes.

Malina Malkani: (12:40)
Yeah, the word "weaning," that's where it gets a little bit confusing. Because breast milk and/or formula are going to be the number one source of nutrients for baby throughout that first year of life. But it does involve beginning to offer those complementary foods. And by doing that, as baby takes in more calories and more nutrients from food, they do start to reduce their intake slowly of breast milk and/or formula as that year goes by. Sometimes people refer to it as baby-led feeding. And I actually prefer that term. I actually think it's a more descriptive term and a helpful way to describe what baby-led weaning is.

Stephanie Conner: (13:23)
The other thing that jumped out to me was your statement about purees. Because when I was trying to introduce solid purees, whatever form it took to my son, around that 6-7-month mark, I remember all the baby-led weaning Instagram accounts and anything that I saw, it was always this picture of a baby with a pork chop in his hand. And I thought, "Oh my God, like, my kid can't do that." It just seemed like the focus was no purees, no purees, no purees, food, food, food. And I liked the idea. I think I went a little too into it where he got overwhelmed and we ended up kind of backtracking to purees. But it's interesting, you say that we're not talking about skipping purees.

Malina Malkani: (14:11)
Yeah, it's interesting because there are some Facebook groups and I do get a lot of questions about whether it's "okay" to offer purees during baby-led weaning. And if in fact, if you are doing pure baby-led weaning, doesn't it go against baby-led weaning to offer purees? And the answer is no. First of all, there's no evidence that a combined approach of both purees and finger foods is detrimental or increases choking risk or confuses the baby. No, there's no evidence of that.

Malina Malkani: (14:41)
In my community of dieticians, we're very focused on what the evidence says. And now we have what we didn't have five, 10 years ago, is a really good and robust and growing body of evidence that describes a lot of the benefits of baby-led weaning and how it works best. Offering purees, that's an important part of learning how to eat. So much so that some of the speech language pathologists that I work with tell me that as children enter into toddlerhood, one of the larger parts of their caseloads are baby-led weaning babies who were not offered purees and then get to toddlerhood and don't know how to manage that texture in the mouth. So, that is an important part. It's just a difference in the way that we offer it.

Stephanie Conner: (15:25)
And so you're talking about the preloaded spoon, and I know that parents everywhere are going to say, "Okay, but what about pouches?" If I hand my kid a pouch they're self-feeding that way; how does that factor in?

Malina Malkani: (15:40)
That's a really good question. Well, there's a few different ways to offer pouches. You can use the puree that's in a pouch distributing it onto a preloaded spoon and hand the spoon to baby. The focus of baby-led weaning is that baby-led part. So helping baby make the connection between feeling hunger and then satisfying that hunger by self-feeding. Pouches can do that. They are one way to do that. Purees aren't necessarily going to be strengthening those self-feeding skills and that hand-eye coordination, those fine motor skills that are built by using a preloaded spoon. There are certainly as parents and we're all getting by and trying to manage and there is a place for pouches, I think. And the convenience factor can't really be beat. But in terms of building those self-feeding skills, as much as you can offer baby opportunities to self-feed on a preloaded spoon and/or self-feed with those finger foods and explore those different textures. That's a good thing.

Stephanie Conner: (16:46)
The convenience of pouches, I was like, don't tell parents they can't use pouches.

Malina Malkani: (16:53)
They're convenient for sure. I think one of the benefits of baby-led weaning is also, it saves parents and caregivers a lot of money. Because when you look at pouches, pouches are expensive.

Stephanie Conner: (17:05)
Yes, they are.

Malina Malkani: (17:06)
They really are. Yeah. And if you are focusing on pouches as a main source of nutrients and offering multiple pouches throughout the day, that can really add up. Whereas with baby-led weaning, you're making one meal for everybody. There's one meal that everyone is able to share, and yes, there does need to be some minor adjustments for baby, but they're minor. And so in terms of cost and the convenience factor of preparing only one meal for everybody, baby-led weaning has a lot of benefits. So, there's pros and cons to everything. But I do like to point that one out because cost is important, especially these days.

Stephanie Conner: (17:43)
Absolutely. I remember trying to make my own pouches to save money and then he wouldn't eat any of it. So, it was a double whammy. I spent all that time and money on real food and pureeing and it didn't make a difference. So you mentioned the cost savings and really stress savings making only one meal idea. But what are some of the other benefits? What do you like about this approach to feeding?

Malina Malkani: (18:06)
Great question. Like I said, there's a lot of growing evidence about the different benefits of a baby-led approach to starting solids. My favorite is that it does strengthen a baby's ability to self-regulate food intake. So to recognize cues for hunger, cues for fullness and what to do in the event of each. I started my career in dietetics, working at the Bronx VA Hospital in weight management and bariatrics. And I think that ability to self-regulate intake is something that a lot of us struggle with into adulthood. And if we can strengthen that in the next generation of babies who are eaters that we're raising, I think we may be able to avoid a lot of issues that we come up against down the road. So that's one. This one, and I know you'll love this one, Stephanie, it helps babies integrate earlier into family meals.

Stephanie Conner: (19:03)
I do love that one.

Malina Malkani: (19:05)
I knew you would. But yeah, instead of feeding baby purees first, and then everyone's sitting down as a family to eat the family meal, baby gets pulled right up to the table and participates in the family meal, learns from the role modeling that is a part of that family meal. Eats the same flavors and different textures and gets exposed to different foods and then benefits from that family communal aspect of eating, which is so important and has so many benefits in and of itself. Baby-led weaning also increases the likelihood that children and babies will eat more minimally processed, fresh, nutrient-dense, whole foods and fresh foods, which is a good thing. And this one as a dietician in private practice, this comes up so often for the parents that I speak with. But baby-led weaning promotes less picky eating in early childhood.

Stephanie Conner: (20:05)
I was going to ask about that.

Malina Malkani: (20:06)
Yeah.

Stephanie Conner: (20:08)
You know that's a really important issue for a lot of parents.

Malina Malkani: (20:11)
It's a big struggle. It's a big struggle. And if we can really kind of set children up to have less of a risk for food fussiness, to really be more inclined toward adventurous eating, then we can avoid a lot of issues in early childhood. I mean, of course, picky-eating behaviors, they're very developmentally normal and phases come and go. And a baby-led weaning baby is not guaranteed not to have any picky-eating behaviors, but the risk is less. And the strength with which that picky-eating behavior sort of takes hold is less likely to become a longer problem.

Stephanie Conner: (20:48)
Talk to me a little bit about what to expect, especially in that first, let's say 6 to maybe 12 months. You've got your 6-month-old that you've been nursing or feeding formula and she's sitting upright, so she's able to be at the table safely. I remember my son just playing with the food, not actually eating. And you said this, especially in that first year, the breast milk or formula is still the main source of nutrition. So how much are we really expecting baby to eat early on versus play? Just to sort of set those expectations.

Malina Malkani: (21:23)
That's such a good question. And I think probably you've heard the little rhyme that just won't go away, which is food before one is just for fun. And it's funny because the answer to that sort of is that true, is a little bit nuanced. It should be for fun. There should be a lot of fun and play and exploration for baby starting out with solids. Because exploration and food play, messy food play, is part of the way that they do learn how to eat. And it is very normal that in the first, especially few weeks, even months of baby-led weaning, most of it's just going to end up on the floor as opposed to in baby's tummy. Self-feeding skills take time to learn and time to develop. And it's a little bit tricky, when you think about it, for babies to learn how to bring the food up to the mouth, chew, swallow and breathe all at the same time. It's a new set of skills that takes a lot of coordination. Especially those early stages, not a lot of food is going to get swallowed.

Stephanie Conner: (22:32)
One thing that comes up often with baby-led weaning is concerns over safety and choking. Malina set the record straight. First, she pointed to the growing body of evidence about infant feeding and recent studies showing that baby-led weaning is not associated with an increased risk of choking. It's important to make sure foods are prepared appropriately for the baby to match where the baby is developmentally. I'll link to a Kiddos Cook blog post in the show notes where Malina goes into detail about what this means. But it's also important for us to understand the difference between gagging and choking.

Malina Malkani: (23:11)
I hear from so many parents who are just so unnerved by the gagging that happens during baby-led weaning, and especially in those early days when the gag reflex is much stronger. It just is. It just is in babies. And it does shift back further into the mouth during that first year of life. By about 8 or 9 months, it's usually pretty much similar to that of an adult. But in those early days of baby-led weaning, a lot of babies gag a lot. And it's a normal part of the process of learning how to eat, but it can be very unnerving because a lot of parents don't know the difference between gagging and choking and that gagging is just part of the way that babies bring food forward that they're not quite ready yet to swallow. And it's actually a built-in safety mechanism, something that allows baby not to choke on food.

Malina Malkani: (24:07)
So if you're hearing air passing through, if it's noisy, if it's sputtery, if there's coughing, then that's a gag. And the best thing to do in the event of a gag is to stay calm and positive. And as best you can sort of coach baby through the process by saying, "No, chew, chew, chew. And you're doing great." Most babies are not upset by it and they just kind of gag up the food and then just keep on going with wherever they were in the meal. It's when we get upset and get stressed, visibly as caregivers, that it can become problematic for the baby. Because they're like little sponges and they absorb our stress and can sort of mimic however it is that we're feeling about it, which can then become problematic and lead to some negative associations with the process of eating and gagging. We don't want that. We want to keep the mealtime very positive.

Stephanie Conner: (25:08)
I really want to talk about bringing kids into the kitchen now. And I love that one of the benefits of this is really making sure that baby's at the dinner table with us from that young age. For our family, that was something that was important was to eat together and sort of the moment that he could sit upright and be there, he was there. But I also think about involving them in the cooking process from as early an age as possible, and I feel like this sort of lends itself to that mission as well. And so I'm curious, kind of your thoughts on how can we think about our approach to feeding as also a segue into an approach to family cooking maybe too.

Malina Malkani: (25:47)
I love that you brought that up. And I think one of the biggest benefits of baby-led weaning is that piece where baby is integrated earlier into family meals. But one of the things that I think kind of prevents people from thinking that that's a possibility is assuming that there are so many adjustments that need to be made to the food before it could be offered to infants, which isn't really the case. Absolutely, there are safety precautions that we need to take, especially with regard to things like choking hazards. Like hard, round food, coin-shaped, popcorn, marshmallows, thickly spread nut butters, overly crusty bread or raw fruits and vegetables with tough skins. Yes, we need to be very cognizant of those. But there's so much that infants can eat that people assume they can't. For example, flavor.

Malina Malkani: (26:45)
The more flavors we offer to infants during this very amazing time in their lives when their palates are arguably the most open that they'll ever be, the better, because the more likely then down the road, they will be to be accepting of a wide variety of flavors, as opposed to experiencing them as toddlers for the first time and rejecting them.

Malina Malkani: (27:07)
Parents can take a lot of comfort in the thought that there aren't really a lot of rules when it comes to preparing foods and cooking for the entire family. Yes, we do need to limit sodium because infant kidneys are not equipped to handle a lot of sodium. A little bit is okay, but you can separate out a portion of the food or the recipe for baby before adding the salt. And added sugars, they're nutrient poor. They're not recommended for babies under 2. So as much as we can limit those, that's important. But with the exception of choking hazards, honey, because of the risk of infant botulism associated with honey, and excess sodium and added sugars, the sky's kind of the limit in terms of what we can prepare. And then what's fun, too, is that these foods then become a part of baby's sort of repertoire in terms of accepting different foods.

Malina Malkani: (28:08)
And so as they move into toddlerhood, they're already used to a whole wide variety of flavors and textures that were offered during family meals. And then we can start to integrate them into the preparation process as well. It just stands to reason the things that we're more familiar with, the more normal they are for us later on. It makes a lot of sense when you think about sort of the trajectory of childhood and as kids move in and out of different stages, if they'd been offered these minimally processed fresh whole foods from the get-go, they become part of their comfort foods.

Stephanie Conner: (28:44)
Thank you again to my guests today, Malina Malkani and Theresa McCluskey. I'll link to more about them in the show notes at kiddosinthekitchen.com. When my son was born, it seemed like baby-led weaning was everywhere. It was this new and exciting way to feed your baby. But the truth is there's nothing new about it. It's actually a rather natural way to feed babies. But we've complicated infant feeding with pouches and puffs and products, which in some ways distract from our natural instincts. We've complicated food in other ways, too, and those impacts are noticeable. We've trained ourselves to seek out hyper-palatable foods.

Stephanie Conner: (29:42)
We look for easy meals we can heat up or assemble rather than cooking. We've focused so much on convenience and rushing through the day that we don't take the time to pause for dinner. But when we remove the complications, food isn't hard. Letting kids learn their cues is important. When are they hungry? What do they crave? When are they full? How we start them on food is one piece of this. Teaching them how to navigate the kitchen is another. Part of what has complicated this process for children and us as parents is life. We take on too many activities. We're too rushed. Our offices are understaffed.

Stephanie Conner: (30:43)
We constantly yearn for balance. As Theresa pointed out, one of the upsides to this pandemic nightmare we've experienced over the past year is we've been forced to slow down. We've been forced to think differently about eating and cooking and how we spend our time. And while I complain a lot about what I'm missing out on in this pandemic, I also see some things I've gained. So my challenge to you this month is to stop and think about what you've gained in the kitchen over the past year. How has the pandemic changed your family's food habits for the better? What do you hope stays even after "normal" life resumes? And how will you make sure that that endures post-pandemic? Because yes, the past year has, well, sucked, let's be frank. But that doesn't mean we can't walk away with some good. In fact, let's savor that good.

Stephanie Conner: (32:23)
Thanks for joining me for Kiddos in the Kitchen. I'm your host, Stephanie Conner, with a reminder from my son.

Conner: (32:29)
If you like my mom's podcast as much as I do, you can subscribe on Apple podcasts, Google podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts.

Stephanie Conner: (32:49)
That's right, Conner. You can also view the show notes.