When my boy Fenix started weaning, we gave him a mix of home-cooked pureed vegetables, fruits and rice cereal mixed with a daily vegetable stock for added nutrients. I do give him jars of baby food for convenience's sake when we travel or go out - but like most moms, I believe home cooking is always the best!

As I was a first-time stay-at-home mom, I found my own routine and developed shortcuts along the way with the objective to allow more rest for me (tough when breastfeeding round the clock and the kid won't sleep through the night yet).

One of the lifesavers for me was to boil a small pot of stock daily, using 4 to 5 kinds of vegetables and 2 dried baby scallops or some ikan bilis to inject flavour. The cooking time only takes 15 minutes max - and it serves as a nutritional soup base for his lunch and dinner; whether it's pasta, noodles or porridge. Plus he gets his daily portion of vegetables which offer loads of vitamins and fibre!

For younger babies, you can start with 2 to 3 vegetables that taste sweeter such as pumpkin, carrot, sweet potato and peas so they will like (or get used to) the taste and puree the vegs finely.

Along the way as they get older (12 to 24 months), you can introduce an assortment of greens like broccoli, corn, spinach, cherry tomatoes, zucchini, eggplant, cauliflower, snowpeas, celery - the list goes on! - and cut them with a scissors so they are used to the texture. It really depends on the kid though - some would lap it all up like my son, and some might prefer certain vegs and how it's cooked (in pasta sauces or combined with meat/fish).

When Fenix was 18 month old, I even added lady fingers, bell peppers, yam, asparagus, beetroot, mushrooms, leeks, coriander, red onion and a garlic clove or ginger.

Another plus is that these vegetables keep well within a week in the fridge. And if you like, you can also make a big pot and freeze the stock in batches. You can find covered ice-cube trays in different sizes at Daiso stores.

Vegetable Stock For Toddlers

Ingredients:

Potato - 2 medium size

Broccoli florets - 4

Fresh corn - 1/2

Carrot - 1/4

Garlic - 1 small clove, halved

Dried scallop - 2 (or 6 ikan bilis)

Method:

1. Place everything in a small pot filled with enough water to cover the vegetables.

2. Simmer for 15 mins and set aside for use later.

*Tips:

- You can use half of the stock to cook baby pasta or noodles along with minced meat or fish. For pasta, you can also freeze tomato sauce and add an ice cube of it. See the Baby Pasta recipe here.

- Use half the stock to cook with rice, fish or meat to make porridge.

- Season with pinch of pink Himalayan salt at the end of cooking to ensure the minerals are not lost.

Recipe courtesy of Carlyn Law, Eattodraw.com