Shopped .. now to chop Junes food.

[Talaya]

All washed and ready to chop. I also have a pot of red lentils, split peas and barley boiling. (I add fruit on the day)

Does anyone have any suggestions on how the keep the collard greens and spinach from wilting once they’ve defrosted ?

 

[chris-md]

Hello! You have a great base there, but I fear you don't' have nearly enough ingredients. Just 6 ingredients won't provide nearly the well-rounded nutrition your birdie needs. Where are the grains? Where are the pulses? Where's the color diversity? You're awash in green there. You have to feed the rainbow, and more of it, because color diversity=nutrient diversity.

If you are making frozen chop, and this is to be the primary food source, you really need at least 15 ingredients, if not more.

Some of those ingredients can help absorb moisture from the mix so that the defrosted product isn't quite as watery. Things like flax seed, chia see, and rolled oats can help.

Regarding the wilting, you can't exactly prevent that. However, what will help is if you blanch the entire mix for 90-120 seconds. Anything that has never been frozen before should be blanched first. That will help a bit with the consistency for the leafy greens when they defrost.

 

[Talaya]

Thanks Chris
yes, there were 8 veg ingredients, plus I had chickpeas, red lentils, Pearl barley, split peas & quinoa boiling. This is only my chop base. Thank you for the blanching tip.
i did want to buy some radicchio, as they didn’t have any rainbow chard yet, but it’s not on my Eclectus safe list.. maybe you know ?
He gets chop am & pm. AM he has a sprinkle of a Johnson & Jeff lean and fit on it. But both times with additional veg from our own dinners such as, beetroot, squash, sweetcorn, beans, peas, parsnip, swede (loves this mashed) Etc to give a different texture.
Then the fruit. Jury’s is still out on strawberry, raspberry, blackberry, blueberry and kiwi. But he will eat most others. He likes banana skin but not the banana. If the thawed mix looks a little wet, I do add oats, or coconut flour, or a flax seed and goji berry mix we have here, sometimes pea or chickpea pasta helps too.
lunch is often sprouted seeds or things I can hang on a kabob.
nuts are his ‘treat’ At Halloween I ask for the innards of peoples squashes, I then sort, wash & roast for the year ahead.
I make birdie bread, and freeze that too. He then gets a piece a Few times a week (seasame/poppy/almond/egg/apple/coconut/pellet)
I hope this is a bit better detailed. X
he eats a lot of food. I do weigh him, last week he was 412g

 

[chris-md]

love it! Doing great!

Chard is fine. I grow some in my garden for Parker.

I wouldn’t do radicchio. It’s too celery like and wouldn’t really work great.

You’re gonna regret the barley! When cooked it becomes slimy in texture. It’s going to add an unpleasant texture to your chop (<—- voice of experience a few times over, I’m afraid. I’ll never do that again).

 

[chris-md]

Sorry, radicchio is too LETTUCE like, not celery. It’s too soft and not something I’d trust for chop.

 

[Talaya]

Another chop made, for August.. I’m pleased to say the Pearl barley didn’t go slimey, maybe it’s a bit different from normal barley ?
we made another batch yesterday, this time also in the shops I managed to get some bean sprouts, broad beans and soya beans. As well as the collard greens, pak ChoI, red cabbage, mixed chard, swede, sweet peppers, chillis, and corn cobs.
I cooked, Pearl barley, quinoa, giant couscous, red lentils, yellow split peas, chickpeas, half the carrots and half sweet potato plus a yellow squash. I showed hubby how to do it, as it’s important that he knows too. Though I think he did chop some a little small. Solo still eats it.
Ive tried several ways of freezing it, but found that smallish tubs work best for us. Papaya & melon is now in the shops here, so currently gets some of that, plus one black grape,, a strawberry and the melon seeds on top.. plus a little of my homemade sprinkler (15 ingredients in that)
The little seeds you can see are mixed millet from a cockatiel food - which he was on before we got him and he also gets Johnson and Jeff lean parrot mix a couple of times a week with various nuts as rewards.
Yesterday I made lemon curd, so he got all the pips in dinner.
PHEW I think I covered it all this month and haven’t missed anything !
The last picture is him eyeing me up , because my chair is next to his tree and then him trying to urge me on to feed him a bit early lol. Today he just went to his tree next to me and fell asleep and waited ..Awwww.

 

[wrench13]

I crush up 2-3 Nutraberries into the chop to absorb moisture. Seems to work well. Ekkies are sooo hard to get the right nutrition into them !!

 

[Talaya]

I crush up 2-3 Nutraberries into the chop to absorb moisture. Seems to work well. Ekkies are sooo hard to get the right nutrition into them !!

Thank you wrench.
I’ve just come back from my friends house with some Hibiscus flowers, so he has them as an extra item today. I think it’s the first flower he hasn’t attacked