Beech Nut Tummy Trays...a review

Since my daughter Isabella started on table food I haven't bought or been tempted to buy anything prepackaged but I admit I got sucked into the Beech Nut No Junk Promise! marketing shtick and last week I picked up a Tomato Risotto Let's Grow! Tummy Trays to try out on my daughter Isabella. I was curious what can I say? And the cover made the meal look so yummy. [another reason never to go food shopping while hungry]

I mean they make it sound so exciting...

"Stylish trays make is easy to serve your little ones - even the picky eaters! These meals have lots of vegetables in them and have less than 50% of the sodium most other toddler meals. Let’s Grow! Tummy Trays come in 6 delicious flavours."

Note: Yeah sometimes this mommy is super lazy and if a 30sec zap in the microwave will sustain a little 14 month old girl for one meal from time to time...I'm all up for it....

Yeah about that.

I'm no expert Foodie/food critic/food snob by any stretch of the imagination [celery and peanut butter has been my go-to meal staple for years] BUT...

Perhaps the fine folks at Beech Nut should have consulted a chef with some culinary experience or even a short order cook at some random local dive diner down the street from their headquarters to see if what they were marketing as 'risotto' was actually in fact risotto. [just saying]

1. No Italian I know would ever put that much sauce in a risotto...it was like drinking a can of thick tomato juice...seriously there was way too much for the pasta to sauce ratio...it was like a soup tomato disaster.

2. Risotto uses Arborio rice. Not sure what fake rice shaped pasta they are trying to pass off as Arborio rice but because it is so evidently not Arborio rice, then your end product is therefore in fact not risotto...

3. And given comment # 1 & # 2...one can only imagine how it tasted...yeah that bad. After two bites Isabella spit it all out and threw the stylish tray on the floor. So I was left with a dirty red floor and a still hungry Isabella.

So today I ended making my own homemade, would make my Mamma proud, vegetable risotto...and both my kids loved it and devoured it. So well deserved **high five** to me.

Now I'm the first one to admit that there are days where I am all for convenience because sometimes thinking about what to cook for a can-be-fussy-all-I-want-is-Cheerios-and-fish crackers 14 month old is the last thing you want to do but this toddler food line is one I'll be passing on.

But totally serves me right. My mom always told me to stick to making it from scratch. I hate it when she's right. That and I could never stomach the Nonna styled guilt trip she would lay on me if she ever found out I was feeding her precious Isabella, risotto from a green tray that you pluck in the microwave. Let the hand waving and loud Italian talking begin.

So I had my 'life with kids' lesson for the week...sometimes easy isn't always good when it comes to the convenience of kiddie food.

***now to be fair to the people at Beech Nut, I haven't purchased the other Tummy Trays in this toddler food line but I'm a one shot deal kind of girl but send me some free samples and I'd be happy to try the rest.***