Fool Your 3 Year Old "Chicken" Nuggets

The Change

I want to be a vegetarian, but my three year old just won't let me. What...you say a 36 year old woman should stand up to her three year old daughter? Have you met my kid? She's smarter than me. She's more demanding than me, and to top that off she is cute and irresistable. And even though in my head, I am thinking this girl should just eat what I give her and like it; in my heart I am thinking, if I don't feed her what she wants, she will starve.

At the same time, she wants junk. Have you read the labels of the chicken nuggets you buy in the freezer section? I know in my heart a mostly vegetarian diet is healthier for both of us, but how do I convince her to try tofu?

"What's that, mommy"

"It's tofu." I try the direct and open approach.

Poke poke poke. She fingers a bit of the white mass laying on my counter. "That's ucky." She says with a crinkled nose and bewildered look on her face.

Great. No tofu tonight, I think. I pull out the frozen processed chicken pieces. We have dinner as usual. I do some research and learn some amazing things. Did you know if you freeze tofu, the water in it will expand and leave pockets of air, giving the tofu a meatier consistency? Uh huh...more "chicken-like." And since the stuff takes on the flavor of whatever you season it with.... Oh, my mind was rolling around with a little "wa ha ha" laugh inside it. I was getting ready to fool my three year old. She would eat tofu nuggets and like them.

The Recipe

Ingredients:

1 Block of Extra Firm tofu (freeze it when you get home, and take it out of the freezer to thaw the night before the day you will prepare it for dinner just like you would do with a chicken)

1 egg (or skip the egg if you are vegan)

Flour, Poultry Seasoning (or personal favorite herbs and seasonings)

Milk (or soy milk for Vegans)

Favorite Veggie Oil (Canola probably the best..more affordable in this quantity than Olive Oil) --enough for shallow pan frying

How-to:

Take tofu out of its little box home, and drain on towels--go ahead and put towels on top too, and a slightly heavy dish on top to squish out more water.

Pull out your favorite shallow frying pan. I personally love my cast iron-skillet, but tofu is so tender, a non-stick skillet really works better for this. Pour in enough oil to cover about half an inch thick. Don't turn it on yet...you've got some prepping to do.

Get out three bowls. In the first, pour in about 1/2 cup milk (or soymilk) or so. (You may need more...). In the second, pour in flour and herbs, and mix up. You will need enough flour to last the whole block of tofu....1/2 cup?? I'm just an eye-ball measurer...in the third bowl, whisk your egg. (Skip the egg if you are vegan.))

Now, cut your tofu into your favorite nugget shapes. I usually slice 1/2 inch pieces off the sides of the cake, and then cut those squares into thirds to make little chunky finger shapes. Now turn on your oil and heat to about medium high. You want the oil to crisp the outsides of your nuggets, but not burn and smoke.

Drain the nugget pieces on a dry towel. Take a few at a time and first dip into milk. Then take from milk to flour. Then coat in egg and back in flour again (or do a second soymilk dip if you are vegan). It's the double dipping that makes it resemble that chicken nugget of fast-food fame. And the poultry seasoning, even though is simply herbs, is so associated with chicken in our minds that we think it is chicken flavored.

After the double dippings, fry in the shallow oil, turning when they are golden brown. Drain on paper towels. Serve with ketchup (if your three year old is a ketchup fan too) or make your own mustard sauce (mix honey and mustard) or...you get it.

The Night of 1,000 Hoorahs

It was sometime after her first bite...when that beautfiul little face lit up into a big smile that stretched from ear to ear that I knew I could finally start living my dream of being a vegetarian...and my beautiful little life-runner would not stand in my way.

"That's good, mommy! Me like it!" Ketchup dotted the corners of her little mouth. She was happily munching on one of my secret "chicken" nuggets.

Dip. Munch. Smile. Five minutes later she was up running around the kitchen. Never sitting still. Is that how she maintains that svelte 30 pounds....my mind is always trying to figure things out, you know.

"Mommy. Mommy." She jumped up and down hangning on my arm.

"What?"

"Tomorrow, let's have hot dogs!!" And she ran off to work a puzzle with her favorite bear, Kuku.