Yum Watermelon!

Bug loves watermelon, or as she called it all last summer, waterlemon. It was with great joy and excitement that the first watermelon of the season was spotted at the farmer's market. They were the cute little personal sized ones and Bug wanted to get two of them. Since neither my husband nor I are really crazy about watermelon, I only got one. BIG mistake!

I cut a thick slice for Bug and decided to send another slice through the food mill to see what would happen. I chose the food mill because most of the seeds would get trapped in the grate, which would save me from having to pick every last one out. I did cut it off the rind - I'm not *that* lazy!

When you send a watermelon through the food mill an interesting thing happens. There is only juice coming out on the other side. Well, there was a little bit of pulp and a few ground seeds, but mostly it was water. (Go figure!) While it's hard to spoon liquid into your kid's mouth - at least my kid - it is great to mix with cereal.

Sprout really loves watermelon cereal. It's one of the few things she'll eat cold with minimal fussing, which is good because I just can't bring myself to heat up watermelon. It defeats the whole purpose of eating it. The little bit of ground up seed I figure are just some extra roughage and easily masked by the texture of the cereal.

Since watermelon cereal was so popular, I cut tiny pieces off of my leftover rind to give to Sprout while I finished my lunch. It pretty much dissolved in her hand, so I popped a bit in her mouth. Actual pieces of watermelon are not one of Sprout's favorite things. In fact, I think she spit out every piece I fed her. I know she's a bit sensitive to texture and I guess watermelon is one of those textures she just doesn't care for. I can understand that because I think it's one of my problems with the fruit, too.

So I'll keep buying personal sized watermelons as long as they're in season and keep some cut up for Bug. The rest I'll juice up for cereal to enjoy during the winter. (It's easy to get into the ice cube tray!) I am going to try the same thing with cantaloupe and cucumbers to see how those go down.