Having a teenage daughter is a lot like having a two year old. Both are prone to mood swings and demanding moments, both are likely to be ready for sleep after you are and both need to watch their iron intake. As an infant, most babies are born with iron stores to get them through to the time when they are ready to take in solid foods. As a teenage girl, puberty means that the body needs external sources like never before. Both ages can also exhaust parental patience but that requires a whole different kind of advice! Complicating matters, many teens decide that they want to become “vegetarian” often as a (n erroneous!) way to control weight but it can throw the chief household cook for a loop. A cast iron skillet is your best weapon. (Not to use to clonk them, but to cook in!) It turns out that whatever you cook in a cast iron skillet does pick up some iron and transfer it to the food. Especially if there is any kind of acid (tomatoes, vinegar, lemons) in the food being cooked. So that stir fry of tofu and veggies prepared in cast iron skillet and finished with a splash of rice vinegar could contain decent amounts of iron. Some teens will agree to keep chicken in their “vegetarian” diets because they love it and know it is good for them as well as being a lean protein. It is good to note, too, that chicken legs contain higher amounts of iron over chicken breasts, but both are good sources. 100 grams of chicken breast meat contains 7% of the daily requirement, while the same amount of dark meat contains 10%. So, putting these two techniques together means that stir frying chopped chicken thigh meat in a cast iron skillet is the best of both worlds. If only getting my 2, ah, I mean, 13 year old into bed before 10 pm was as easy…