Michael + Kristen + Kellan + Alden: Coconut Custard

I mentioned in an earlier post that since Kellan is 10 months old now, there were some new foods that I wanted to add to his diet. In the Super Nutrition for Babies book that I'm reading, I found a recipe for Coconut Custard. For the recipe you need coconut milk that has no extra additives. We looked everywhere and could not find JUST coconut milk. The book also offered directions for making your own coconut milk from an actual coconut. I couldn't imagine that it would be too difficult so we bought a coconut to give it a try.

Saturday afternoon while Kellan was taking a nap I decided to break into this coconut. Wow. It. was. a. job!!! When Michael got home I had managed to break the coconut in half but didn't know what to do from there. Lucky for me, but unfortunately for you, I didn't take any pictures of my struggle with this coconut. Being the ~~ridiculous~~ resourceful person that I am, I used a kitchen mallet to ~~beat~~ tap a butterknife into the coconut shell. Once it was far enough into the center, I pulled the knife out and then drained the coconut water into glass jars to store it.

Coconut water is an excellent drink for babies due to its lauric acid content. It contains natural electrolytes and is great at preventing dehydration and helping to treat diarrhea.

Thankfully Michael got home and helped me separate the shell from the meat inside.

This is what the pieces look like separated from the outer shell. Once they are out I used a regular peeler to remove the brown inner shell from the white coconut meat.

Once the coconut meat is broken up into smaller pieces, we put them into the blender.

And blended them up. After they are well grinded we spooned some of the coconut into a cheese cloth.

Michael squeezed the coconut (wrapped in the cheesecloth) over the measuring cup to squeeze out all of the milk. This was also quite a job. I know...we're crazy. Or I'm crazy and I'm slowly making him crazy too :)

Now that I actually have the coconut milk...here is the recipe for Coconut Custard from Super Nutrition for Babies.

Ingredients
1/2 cup coconut milk
1/4 cup melted butter (cooled)
1/4 of a mashed well ripe banana
3 large egg yolks

Pre-heat oven to 325 degrees. Go ahead and melt the 1/4 cup of butter so that it will be cooled when you are ready to mix it in.

Mix together 1/2 cup coconut milk, 1/4 of a mashed banana, and 3 egg yolks

Make sure your melted butter has completely cooled. When cooled add it to your mixture and stir in until blended. *Note* If you add the butter while it is hot it will "scramble" the eggs...I may or may not know this from personal experience.

Use a stick of butter to lightly grease the insides of 4 cupcake wrappers (I did too many, 4 is just right)

Pour your mixture into each wrapper. The custard doesn't rise so you don't have to worry about saving room at the top. I filled each wrapper until just below the top.

Next, fill a large pan (big enough that your muffin pan can fit inside) about halfway full of water. Place the muffin pan inside the pan of water. This creates a water bath that will make sure the custard cooks evenly.