Orange Puree

As a stand-alone, this is about like baby food. As an ingredient, this stuff rocks! You can add it to breads, macaroni and cheese, spaghetti sauce, meatloaf, pancake batter, baked beans, etc. It is a fabulous way to "sneak" some vegetables into the diet of a picky eater or enhance the nutritional content of comfort foods. This is from "the sneaky chef" cookbook. Awesome ideas for feeding kids!

• Ready In: 25 mins
• Yields: 2 cups

Ingredients

• 1  medium sweet potato, peeled and cubed
• 3  carrots, peeled and sliced into chunks
•  water

Directions

1. Place the sliced veggies into a medium pot and cover with water. Boil for about 20 minutes or until the carrots are tender. Do not rush this! If the carrots aren't tender, the puree texture will not be smooth enough to go undetected.
2. Drain the carrots and sweet potatoes, saving the cooking liquid.
3. Use your food processor or blender and puree the vegetables into a smooth puree. Use some of the cooking water (3-4 tablespoons) to help get things moving in your food processor.
4. I used the remaining cooking water as part of the pasta water to make macaroni and cheese from the blue box. I added 4 tablespoons of the orange puree to the finished dish. I also added some extra cheese. The dish was creamier than normal, but my kids didn't notice the vegetable.
5. Freeze the orange puree in 1-2 tablespoon size portions (ice cube tray works well). The add 2 to 4 tablespoons into your cooking.
6. Another idea is to add 2 to 4 tablespoons to spaghettios or other canned pasta. Or add up to 1/2 a cup to canned baked beans (the sweet kind). Or add up to 1/4 cup to canned tomato soup made with milk. The author suggests adding some to chile con queso (not tried). Another use is 2 to 4 tablespoons into any storebought tomato based pasta sauce.