We begin life with special food needs. Throughout life, special diet needs, whether due to health concerns or simply due to personal choice, demand we rethink our meals. This in turn demands we rethink the grocery list. Enjoyment is a third, and perhaps most significant consideration. When special diet needs arise, we are our best resource for a healthful and enjoyable transition.

Let’s consider soft foods or purées, for example. We feed baby puréed foods and puréed fruit  provide a great and satisfying alternative to sweets for adults who wish to adhere to healthy nutrition practices. Special foods do not have to be dull. In fact, many of our favorite foods can add pizzaz to a special “soft foods” diet.

Consider if you will Tomato and Orange Sauce, Tomato Sauce with Raisins & Pine Nuts, Applesauce Pudding, Apple Custard Pie, Applesauce Butter, Carrot Soup, Cantaloupe-Peach Marmalade and Soybean Spread, just a few of the tasty bites you can make with a sauce maker, food mill or Squeezo Strainer (recipes found in the All year Round Squeezo Book, incidentally). Indeed, the challenge of a special diet is an opportunity to rediscover the great taste of fresh fruits and vegetables in many new versions of themselves.

When preparing special foods, especially for adults, appearance is crucial. We feast with the eyes first. Making an attractive dish can make a special diet enjoyable, not boring. Applesauce on its own may sound “empty.” Applesauce mixed with ground veal and placed in the center of a colorful ring of steamed carrots evokes eating pleasure.

Making baby foods at home is not merely a trend anymore. Parents care deeply about nutrition and especially about the provenance of the foods they bring to the table. More and more, we live by these words: “We are what we eat.” If we are so concerned with the foods we cook and eat as adults, then we certainly should be just as interested in the foods we feed infants. If we make these foods ourselves, we need not worry about suspicious additives, too much sugar or any nutritional deficiencies. It is less expensive too.

The possibilities are endless. All that is required is a good food mill or sauce maker. Our favorite, of course, is the Squeezo Strainer. It is famous for making tomato sauce and apple sauce and this is precisely the point. With a sauce maker on hand, you can make the fruit or vegetable base to an infinite array of recipes, from sauces to jams, desserts to main courses, breads, special side dishes and special needs foods that will let you feel replenished, not bored and desperate, and even baby food.

By using any of the three different screens on a Squeezo Strainer, you have control over the texture of your baby’s or your own special needs food. Puréed vegetables can be mixed with other vegetables, cooked and ground meat or poultry. Puréed fruit with yogurt is a wonderfully nutritious first food for infants.

Often, all that separates us from wholesome nutrition choices we can embrace for a lifetime is the proper approach. Toiling over grocery choices can be disheartening. If you are fortunate enough to have access to an abundance of healthy choices, in your own garden or thanks to local producers, then the choices multiply exponentially, as does a sense of vigor and satisfaction with every, tasty, colorful bite; even on a special diet.

Making our own food is part of making life our own.

This article was inspired by the All Year Round Squeezo Book, included in every Squeezo box.