Pasta makes a wonderful food for babies, particularly for babies with few or no teeth who need something soft and gummable to eat!
This sweet potato cannelloni is a great dish because it brings together the goodness of these nutrient packed veggies with creamy ricotta to make an easy-to-eat meal that’s full of fantastic flavour!
You can offer this dish to your baby from 6 months of age, once all the ingredients have been introduced separately.
Please note that this recipe DOES contain tomato sauce – some parents find that the acidity of tomatoes gives their babies a rash… so if your little one is sensitive to tomatoes, then save this recipe until later in his first year (learn more about introducing tomatoes here).
Once cooked, the cannelloni can be chopped for your baby, or pureed in a food processor. You can freeze any leftovers (if you haven’t eaten them yourself!).
To Make Vegetarian Sweet Potato Cannelloni for Baby You Will Need…
6 oz (3/4 cups) cooked sweet potato, still warm
1/4 red onion, chopped
olive oil
pinch dried thyme
2 oz (1/4 cup) ricotta cheese
4 fl oz (1/2 cup) canned tomato sauce
1 tsp fresh basil, chopped
1 small garlic clove, crushed
2 sheets fresh lasagna or dried lasagna, cooked (you can also use dried cannelloni tubes if you prefer – we used lasagna in our photo)
1 to 2 oz grated Cheddar cheese
Preheat the oven to 400 deg F (200 deg C).
Heat a little olive oil in a small frying pan/skillet and saute the onion until soft. Remove from the heat.
Mix the warm sweet potato with the cooked onion, thyme and ricotta.
In a small bowl, mix the tomato puree with the basil and garlic.
Grease a small oven-proof dish and spread around 3 oz (approx 1/3 cup) of the tomato sauce over the base.
Cut the lasagna sheets in half, then divide the sweet potato mixture between them, spooning it into the middle of each sheet.
Roll the sheets up and place them, seam side down, into the baking dish (you will have 4 little ‘parcels’).
Pour the rest of the tomato mixture over the top, then top with a good handful of grated Cheddar cheese.
Bake for 30 mins until the mixture is bubbly.
Cool to a safe temperature and serve.
Tip: You can adjust this recipe by adding cooked meat (diced chicken works well) to the sweet potato mixture.
More sweet potato baby food recipes
More pasta baby food recipes