Special Thanks To

Paramita Mukherjee, Sayani Sarkar & Tannistha Mukherjee for their contributions. This post could not have been possible without the recipes they have shared.        

Healthy, quick tiffin box recipes

Flattened rice (Poha) Tikki

Packed with iron, fibre, carbohydrates, antioxidants and vitamins, Poha (chire) provides a wholesome meal. And it’s also gluten-free.

A quick look at the ingredients to prepare poha Tikki for tiffin

Poha – a handful for two medium size tikkis, a small potato, seasonal vegetables (most preferably carrot, beans and capsicum), 2-3 tablespoons refined oil, ½ cube cheese or one teaspoon butter, half onion, pepper & salt according to taste

The ratio of poha to potato should be 1:1/2

Poha Tikki recipe

Wash the poha to soften it but ensure it does not become soggy. Mash the hardboiled (not very tender, yet mashable) potato in a bowl and add finely chopped onion, grated vegetables and cheese or butter. Mix well. Add the softened poha. Sprinkle in some salt and pepper. Mix well with your hand. Take small portions from the mixture. Give the portions flat shapes like Tikki or patty. Keep aside. Heat the oil and shallow fry the Tikki or patties till golden.

Preparation time: 10 to 15 mins. You can prepare the veggies the previous night and refrigerate them in a bowl of water or in an air-tight pouch.

Pick it and place it in your child’s tiffin box. As a dip, you can give tomato sauce or mayonnaise. (Try out Hellmann’s Eggless Mayonnaise.)

Pancake/Gola Ruti

This is one of those quick tiffin box recipes which has the widest variance. Different moms make this all-time favourite tiffin food in different ways. The process is the same, it’s only one of the ingredients that differ from mom to mom. 

Ingredients which has a wide options to choose from

An egg, all-purpose flour/semolina/Rava/wheat flour, chopped onion, grated veggies (if available), turmeric (optional), salt, pepper/chillies, oil for greasing the pan so that the batter doesn’t get stuck, a pinch of julienned ginger (optional). You can also add a bit of milk to the batter. It helps to maintain the consistency of the mixture and is healthy but adding is not a must.

Preparation

Preparation time: 10 to 15 mins. You can prepare the veggies the previous night and refrigerate them in a bowl of water or in an air-tight pouch.

Whisk the egg and mix in every ingredient to make a batter. The batter should be neither thick nor watery.

Grease the pan and start putting a ladle full of batter for browning. When one side browns, flip it and let the other side cook in the same way.

If in a dire hurry, you can also make this preparation without veggies and onion. In that case, add half a teaspoon of honey.

You can also add mayonnaise to it. But, in that case, whisk the mayo and then add the egg.

Quick fix Rava/semolina upma

Along with various other benefits, upma helps in digestion and boosts energy (something that all our kids need).

Ingredients

• Half cup Rava/fine blended suji (Semolina)
• Mustard seeds and curry leaves for tempering
• 1/4^th potato
• 1/4^th onion
• A small portion of carrot
• A handful of groundnuts
• 2-3 tablespoons oil or ghee
• Salt according to taste
• A teaspoon of coriander for garnishing (optional)

Preparation

• Finely chop all the vegetables
• Add oil/ghee to a deep-bottomed pan
• Once the oil is hot, add the mustard seeds and curry leaves to splutter. Then, add the veggies to it.
• Stir fir them until mildly cooked.
• Add the Rava and keep frying. Sprinkle some water on and off.
• Add the salt.
• Once the rava turns golden brown, take it off the pan, and garnish it with coriander.

Preparation time: 10 mins. You can prepare the veggies the previous night and refrigerate them in a bowl of water or in an air-tight pouch.

Lemon Rice

Like pancakes, lemon rice is also a prevalent tiffin food which our friends from Southern India swear by. Lemon rice is straightforward to make and lengthens the shelf life of rice. During humid days, when our kids cannot digest fried food easily, you can prepare lemon rice to cool the gut.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of pre-cooked rice (tastes better with short-grained gobindobhog atop chaal/rice)
• A handful of groundnuts
• A sprig of curry leaves
• A pinch of mustard seeds, chana daal (Bengal gram), urad daal for tempering
• ½ tsp of turmeric powder
• Salt and Sugar according to taste
• ½ slice of lemon
• 2 tbsp refined oil

Preparation:

• Heat the oil in the pan
• Fry the groundnuts and keep them aside.
• Now, put the mustard seeds, urad and chana dal in the same oil.
• As they start spluttering, add the curry leaves and immediately add the pre-cooked rice
• Stir in. Add the fried groundnuts, turmeric powder, salt and sugar. Mix well.
• Meanwhile, take the juice from the lemon slice and mix it with 1 ½ tbsp of water.
• Turn off the flame after mixing the rice well with the other ingredients.
• Add the lemon juice and water mix. Mix well. Once you see the colour of the mixed rice changing to faded yellow, you know it’s done.
• Preparation time: If you use a cooker, the rice hardly takes 15mins to cook. And once that’s ready, the rest is a matter of just 10 mins more. To quicken the process, you can use last night’s pre-cooked rice.
• Serve in the tiffin box after a standing time of 5 minutes.

Kabuli Chana Chaat (Chick Pea Salad)

The Chick Pea or Kabuli Chana has high protein content, which is required for nourishment in children.

Preparation that’ll make your Mondays happier

1. Boil overnight soaked Kabuli chana (Chick Pea), or use pre-boiled chana. The quantity depends on the kid’s appetite.

2. Mix chopped onion, cucumber, tomato, chilli and Kabuli chana in a bowl. Add a dash of lemon juice and black salt before packing the tiffin.

Preparation time: This is one of the best quick tiffin box recipes. It hardly takes 8 mins to prepare this delicious recipe. And can be used as a great evening snack too.

So, here are a few handpicked quick tiffin recipes, and we have a storehouse full of more tiffin ideas. So, please write to us in the comment section if you want more quick tiffin ideas from us. And if you have some other ideas, which will make the tiffing times more joyful for the kids without burning us, the moms, please share with us.

Related Articles: Hugely Popular Bengali Breakfast Dishes

The post Quick Tiffin Box Recipes appeared first on KolkataFusion.

When COVID-19 stuck, along with the multiple uncertainties, another concern that cropped up in front of us was keeping kids busy at home. Regardless of their age, being locked up indoors for days wasn’t an easy task for them – seeing them in such a situation wasn’t easy for parents either!

That is when we started discussing and searching for an indoor activity for kids, but most websites suggested games. With mounting work-pressure, no househelps and the constant stress caused by the spread of the novel virus, none of us could manage sufficient time and energy for games. As days turned into months, our kids’ demands kept increasing, and even the small activities for kids like reading books, colouring, making craft items started burning up our energies. That is when we decided to include them in household activities. Initially, we thought we would be jailed for child labour and people will mock our parenting skills. But, nearly a year now, and we can vouch for the small household activities that our kids know have helped them in multiple ways.

We don’t know when schools will re-open and letting kids go out to play with friends isn’t still safe, particularly for the younger ones, who see the criticality of COVID-19 but aren’t matured enough to take the desired precautions by themselves.

Let’s start…. with Household Activities for Kids and how they benefit your child

Peeling peas

A simple yet safe activity for kids stuck at home is peeling peas. During those hectic office hours, make your kids sit near you and give them a small bowl of peas. You can also add some fun elements to it by keeping small rewards.

And, if you have some free time, play peas peeling competition – you will kill two birds with one stone.

Viraaj’s an ADHD kid with a mild Autism spectrum, and this activity is something he enjoys and does patiently.

Read Our Lovely Story By Diptanu, another child with autism and extreme creativity – a sweet guest blogger of KolkataFusion.

How it helps?

Kids have many distractions, primarily caused by the screen – the mobiles that we constantly fidget with or the laptop that has become our necessity. So, encouraging your child to peel peas can be a perfect concentration building and cognitive development activity. The hand and eye coordination that they develop may seem petty, but eventually, it helps them a lot.

Grocery Shopping

The next time you plan to do grocery shopping from your local stores, or from Amazon Fresh or Big Basket, take your child’s help. Ask the kid to choose what groceries ze wants to have and let zir browse through the range of fruits and vegetables. While you make a grocery list for buying, you can also ask your preschooler to help while you write it down.  

How it helps?

During this process, you can introduce new vegetables, fruits and pulses to your child. Simultaneously you can explain to them the difference between healthy food and snacks.

Sorting the vegetables and fruits before they go inside the refrigerator

After you buy and bring home your weekly fill of fruits and vegetables, you can take your kids’ help to wash and sort them. They will enjoy playing around with the water and might wash one fruit at a time so that they can play more.

How it helps?

The kids will develop cognitive skills like comparing and sorting. Moreover, it will boost up their confidence and their familiarity with different types of fruits and veggies.

Cooking Activity for Kids

Pre-schoolers can help you with simple cooking activities, such as preparing cake batter, putting butter on bread toast, beating eggs for an omelette, etc.

Neha’s son enjoys doing is, watching recipes and then guiding her wherever she forgets. He conveniently forgets ingredients like baking powder and replaces them with his terms, such as “magic powder.” Still, he’s a constant companion and Neha doesn’t have to bother wondering what nuisance he’s into while she’s in the kitchen!

RELATED: Petuk Puri – Kolkata Restaurant Reviews & Recipes

How it helps?

It generates confidence in the children and makes them feel happy knowing that their parents are taking their help. Furthermore, these are the life skills bound to help the little one as ze grows up and moves out into the big world.

Arrange the play area

This is something that children should learn even when regular schedule like schools and day cares are open and your nanny is visiting without any scare of contracting Covid-19. Please help them to organize their toys and keep their play area clean. It might be a herculean task initially, but once the child is in the groove, this activity will keep your little one busy for quite some time – after all, the first thing kids do in the morning is pulling out all their toys on the floor!

 How it helps?

“Cleanliness is next to godliness.”

Before you teach your kid larger aspects like “do not throw trash on the roads,” “reduce wastage,” etc., let them start with their room. 

Dusting Activity For Kids

Parents, don’t take us wrong – We aren’t asking you to make the kid run around the house dusting all the pieces of furniture. It’s just that the days you plan to do some dusting, take the kid’s assistance. Hand over a neat cloth to the child and assign one table or some toys or some specific corner in the house. Trust us! You will be awed with the tot’s enthusiasm.

As a fun element, sing songs and rhymes while doing this tedious job.

How it helps?

It keeps your child busy while helping to build self-confidence and trust in you.

Tending plants

As kids, we got a lot of scope to play in the mud, dig soil and make ourselves murky. Unfortunately, many of our kids do not have that scope. So, the bare minimum activity that we can encourage them to do is watering and tending plants.

How it helps?

It gets them closer to nature, and they also start understanding the law of nature – plants’ life cycle, different types of plants, etc. The process of seeing plants grow and flowers bloom makes kids happy. You can also take this opportunity to introduce kids to the basic science of plants.

The post Household Activities for Kids to Keep them Engaged appeared first on KolkataFusion.

Brainyquote – Frank A Clark

Among the other challenges of parenthood, one major one is Parenting style.

The tussle between the new parenting style and the orthodox parenting style is an inevitable concern of the new generation parents. Both the grandparents and parents want the best for the baby of the house, but the approach often varies for every minuscule decision.

Please note: These are some general comments based on personal experience. We never intent to mean it holds true for all parents and grandparents! Feel free to share your experiences.

The New Age Mom, “The baby needs to be disciplined”

The Old Age Grandma, “Discipline is for the mom, not the baby”

The New Age Mom, “The baby needs a lot of sleep”

The Old Age Grandma, “It is you, the mom, who wants to sleep! She will sleep when she is sleepy”

The New Age Mom, “Do not force feed the baby”

The Old Age Grandma, “Feed the baby until she pukes. A prominent & protruding belly is the only symbol of a satisfied stomach”

The New Age Mom, “I will go out on our first trip as soon as the baby starts eating beyond milk”

The Old Age Grandma, “Forget about any holidays till the baby turns into a cute toddler”

The New Age Mom, “Let the kiddo know what’s ‘H’ of hunger at least”

The Old Age Grandma, “You should keep feeding the baby between meals”

The New Age Mom, “It’s ok to cry even if you are a boy”

The Old Age Grandma, “Boys do not cry!” 

This perpetual wrangle between two moms; one trusting her instincts and her extensive research while the other relying on her experience and age-old techniques; is futile.

So, ladies! Take a deep breath! There is no correct parenting style. There is no absolute perfect mother (or father). Each one of us is sailing on a different boat and the sailor of that boat is the most naive life on the earth, the baby.

Why fight over or be sad about something when there is no fixed route? For a change let us go out on a journey with no itinerary in place; for a change let’s live this moment without thinking about the next; for a moment let’s be a baby with the baby. When our agenda is same why follow different paths and why hold any complaints and most importantly why take any stress?

The post Parenting style – The New Parents And The Grands appeared first on KolkataFusion.