Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Making Baby Food

This is my current research topic. Lil Hoot will be 4 months next week and just around the bend will be starting 'solid' foods. She won't be ready next week but I'm prepping for her to be ready sometime between 5-6 months. We will be discussing it with her doctor just in case she is ready to start before her 6 month appointment. So...my main source of information has been Super Baby Food but I have also read The Baby Food Bible and several baby food "cook books".

In all honesty, I'm pretty overwhelmed by the amount of information and guidelines. I understand why people decide it's too complex to feed their baby homemade food. But then I think, I manage to feed myself everyday and I will manage to feed her table food as a child, shouldn't I be able to figure out how to feed her as an infant too?

So here are my questions - did you make food yourself? If so, what did you make? How did you start out and when? Please share with me any tips or tricks that I need to know!

ETA: Do you have recommendations for utensils, sippy cups, dishes, storage containers, etc.? Please share!

Thanks in advance!

4 comments:

  1. I totally want to leave a comment since you worked so hard for this, but I used jar food and I worked, so feeding took on a different deminsion in our household. We started at four months with rice cereal made with expressed milk. We fed them at supper, because i wanted to do it, and because they were usually pretty alert and in good moods around that time of day. After they learned the ropes, I introduced a new food item each week. Saturday was the day for making the changes to both the food and the schedule. Once they got used to three or four foods that proved not to cause allergies, we introduced a new meal. (again on Saturday) We had an excellent sitter would followed my routines and did everything my way, so it was easier to relinquish a little control and allow her to take over from there, as long as I got to introduce the foods and the routine on the weekend.

    Sorry if that is totally irrelevant, but I really wanted to post something... :)

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  2. I REALLY wanted to make my own baby food, but Luke did not take to "solids" well at all, and I was wasting a lot of stuff. We, like most people just started with rice cereal, but he wouldn't eat anything, fresh or jarred until I discovered sweet potatoes with corn (a jarred food). After about a month of only that he started branching out. I am absolutely a firm believer in making your own food, though I never did. Well, I can't say never, but not on the whole. For every kid once they were ready to eat what we were eating, like meals, not just single foods, I would use a food mill or grinder. I wasn't big on the "meals" in a jar. So I never did the preparing ahead and freezing months worth of food, but I will tell you it will save you a LOT of money in the long run!!

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  3. I did not make my own baby food for the girls. I always recommend going as natural as possible but I don't know if I would have had the wherewithal to do such a thing. I hope you are able to find some things that will make it easier for you if you go that route. I do know they have jarred foods that are organic or all natural, but I am sure you already knew that and I am sure you have looked at the pros and cons of using that kind of jarred foods. If in your research you have found that those foods are "ok" then maybe if you find it to be too overwhelming you can use a combination of jarred natural and organic and fresh. Or maybe you can look into a local person that may make fresh jarred baby food, although that may be an expensive option. Just trying to throw some things out there, although I am sure you have thought of these already. Sorry I couldn't be more help.

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  4. Hey Charity!
    Sorry it took me so long to respond to this - in all honesty, I forgot. Unless it's right there in front of me all the time... :)
    I made all of Forest's baby food and plan to do the same for Willow. I took basically all of my advice from the "Super Baby Food" book - it's awesome! We started at six months (I waited because Fo was obviously thriving and once you start, there is no going back! Breastfeeding is so easy!). We started with rice, millet, sweet potatoes, avocadoes - those were his first favorites. He didn't like fruits to begin with - too sweet! We added a new food every four days. I would introduce items from the monthly breakdown she had in the book. After a couple months I made up creations and named them (b/c I'm a dork) like, Harvest: rice, applesauce & squash; Tropical: millet, avocado & mango; The B's: barley, banana, brocolli & beans. "Snack" foods, as he started handling figure food, were tofu, black beans, wheat puffs, etc. I didn't give him anything with sugar the first year to develop good eating habits and cravings. I also didn't add breast milk to his cereal b/c I knew of friend's kids who didn't want cereal later on with just water or regular milk, so start with what you want to do regularly; I used good ol' water. I batch froze everything in ice cube trays; then you can just pop them out and each cube helps you distinguish a serving. Used a blender. Water with each meal, even if it's just a tablespoon here and there, helps them digest. "Nuby" cups in general aren't cool b/c they leak easily, but they are great for when they are trying to learn to suck out of that kind of cup b/c they leak easily! I say the less colorful of a spoon when starting to feed the better b/c they aren't as tempted to grab it. Later on, Gerber sippy cups are great. I like them better then Playtex. Any bowls are fine. There are bibs at Wal-Mart that are washable and thick with pockets and are awesome. Hmmmmmm.... sure I'm leaving a lot out! Hope this helps a little. It's hard work but very worth it to know they are getting such nutritious food! Makes me excited to start this all again for Willow!
    Love
    Missy

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