Baby oat cookies

These healthy snacks for babies are perfect for on their own or dipped in fruit and vegetable purees.

Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 10-12 minutes
Difficulty rating: Easy
Age recommendation: 9 months and over (or 8 months plus if you cook for a long time on a low temperature so it is less crumbly)
Number of servings: 15

Ingredients:

• 1 cup wholemeal flour (plain)
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• ½ cup quick oats
• 2 large egg yolks
• 80mL (4 tablespoons) vegetable oil- rice bran oil is a good choice as it has no flavour
• 1/2 tsp imitation vanilla essence (if you have a concentrated natural vanilla essence you’ll only need half that amount and versions – this gives a much better flavour)
• 5 tablespoons apple and pear juice (make it fresh in a juicer or store bought 100% fruit juice)

Method:

1. Pre-heat oven to 180C
2. Line a baking tray with greaseproof paper- you won’t need oil to grease the tray if you do this and cleaning the cookie tray after baking will also be easier.
3. Mix all dry ingredients in a bowl.
4. Mix all wet ingredients in a bowl.
5. Combine the wet and dry ingredients.
6. Roll the mixture into balls and flatten into small round biscuit shapes.
7. Bake for 10-12 mins depending on size, when they are slightly browning and your home smells like cookies, they’re ready.
8. Allow to cool completely before giving to baby.

Tips:

• These cookies are not sweet, and that’s great for babies- they don’t need added sugars or sweet snacks, which will only help them develop a sweet tooth later in life. The juice provides enough sweetness for babies and serves to lighten the strong wholemeal flavour. If you want a sweet biscuit for older children, take 2 or 3 times the quantity of pear and apple juice (the more you add the sweeter it will be) and boil it down to the 5 tablespoons you need for this recipe.
• These are a healthy wholegrain biscuit which make a great snack. They are good with fruit/veg puree or cream cheese or just on their own for a snack on the go. Simple ingredients make them a good food to take along to share with other babies at mother’s group instead of the highly processed and expensive biscuits available at supermarkets.
• The texture is soft and easy to roll. You may want to let baby poke their fingers in the dough as an initiation to a completely non-toxic play dough. But don’t leave baby unsupervised or you might just find they try and eat the dough. Although it may seem like a tasty snack for your baby the raw dough is a choking hazard and the raw egg it contains is not safe for babies to eat. Babies should not eat raw eggs and they should not eat egg whites (cooked or raw) until their first birthday.

Nutritional content:

References

1. AusNut. Nutrient Database. 2007. [cited 27 April 2012]. Available from: URL link
2. Queensland Health. Introduction to Solids. 2008. [cited 8 December]. Available from: URL link