Colored Pasta

I've never made homemade pasta, but I used to buy the varicolored pastas (before I switched to whole wheat).

I couldn't tell the difference in the flavor at all - spinach, tomato, beet. I even had black squid pasta once. It all tasted the same to me, but it looks prettier than white pasta, imho.

I've never done it myself, but I have bought some that was made from spinach, tomato or other veggies. It didn't taste much different.

I've bought it before too but I didn't know if it was made differently or something.

You won't notice the flavor, but like Mac mentioned, it does make it look pretty.
I've done very thin lasagna sheets with whole herbs like basil leaves or parsley leaves pressed into the dough. I use a pasta machine and run the leaves through with the dough until the sheets are thin, but the leaves are imbedded. You do taste the herbs and it looks lovely. Homemade pasta always tastes the best- with or without the puree.

I was also thinking - you probably wouldn't be adding that much to the pasta so I can't imagine there is a lot of vitamins added, but it does add color and fun. I do like herb idea - I bet that would add some good flavor.

I think the recipe said 2/3 of the egg should be replaced with the puree.

Maybe it's not worth it. *shrug* it was more so that I could get Ade some veggies in her meals without her shaking her head no at me.

Try this book:
The Sneaky Chef: Simple Strategies for Hiding Healthy Foods in Kids' Favorite Meals by Missy Chase Lapine

The pasta addition would be trivial in terms of veggies. Try not to give the Ade commercially processed baby foods it addicts them to sugar and salt flavors.

Actually there was a food show on tv that focussed on getting kids to eat their veggies. They cut them up with cookie cutters to make it look fun. They also made faces and clowns and whatnot with bits of veggies. The kids actually ate them. It wasn't Jamie Oliver but someone like that. Then they did it with fruit, and everything was gone.

Sounds like a great book! Too bad my kids are grown. Maybe I'll get it for my guy, who doesn't like most veggies

I know some people don't like to be sneaky, but I think it's worse to force kids to eat veggies. It makes vegetables into a punishment. I think children then rebel later on by rejecting them as adults. Maybe your beau has bad childhood memories of peas and carrots.

When my daughter was little, she loved mashed potatoes (still does), so I pureed cauliflower, peas, carrots, and told her those were mashed potatoes with food coloring and she bought it - and ate it!

Bella, try shredded carrots with honey, Ade will like it!

I think mashed potatoes with veggies are delicious, as a whip or as a soup.

On tricolor pasta, etc., I just roll my eyes.

I do make my own pasta, not all the time but sometimes. I never fool with the recipe, happy as I am with the original. If I want spinach and pasta I'll cook a dish like that.

My primitive experience in Rome, when hub and I were beyond sleepy - something like 40 hours awake - and eating at a local pizzeria, looking sullenly at the table, was to stare at the food ordered by a couple next to us.

They got a quite large bowl of very hot pasta, steam wafting, a bowl of butter, and a bowl of parmigiano. One of the world's best meals.

Tell your daughter she is NOT allowed to eat (whatever it is you want her to eat).

Whenever we kids didn't like something, Mom's reply was, Well, I guess you're not big enough yet. When you're big, I'm sure you'll like it." Then she would refuse to give us any the next couple of times it was served, only to finally "give in" to our please that we were, too, big enough now!

How'd the pasta-making go?

One really easy way to get kids to eat greens is pesto. Basil and parsley have as much nutritional value as spinach. Of course, you could add spinach to the pesto if you wanted.

I am reading a book that has a recipe for zucchini chocolate-chip cookies in it. sweet vegies like that and carrot/pumkin/or zucchini bread work well too.

Yep, really agree with this. I'm for interesting shapes and presentation (I'll put in a plug for dips again here -- kids love dipping things, fruit or veggies), but not outright camouflage. That's a dangerous precedent for down the line I think.

Sozlet was a picky picky toddler (they all are) but I just kept giving her veggie and fruit choices along with other stuff and now she doesn't turn her nose up at anything. (Well, she has phases where she can't stand lettuce, but she does OK usually if I put her preferred salad dressing on it. She'll eat anything else, from brussels sprouts to spinach.)