Adventures in Baby Food
I have started the process of making baby food, So far so good. I researched everything before starting and again as with most things involving babies different people say different things, some of it contradicting. Everyone (except probably Gerber) agrees that making your own baby food is healthier then ready made. When canned baby foods are made, they are cooked at such a high temperature that it kills a lot of nutrients (they need to be able to store them on the shelf for 2 years).
It is also much less expensive then canned foods- I got one organic sweet potato for $1.50 and it made 7 full size portions of baby food (which in the store cost 89 cents each for organic).
For all you none-parents your eyes might glaze over the next part, feel free to stop reading whenever you like.
First step was to get baby food containers. I settled on Baby Cubes because they are BPA free, you can microwave, dish wash and freeze them. They also travel well because they are individual containers.
Then I researched what foods were the best:
- Things like Carrots, beets, broccoli have higher level of nitrates, it seems like for those it is better to buy ready made. Baby food companies make sure to get low nitrate produce and they test all the time (I don’t have this capability so I will leave it up to them).
- You also can’t add salt, spices, citrus, peanut butter, sugar, honey etc. Babies systems are too immature. Better to go straight up- I do puree and breast milk blend so it is easier for him to eat.
- When to introduce foods is important. Babies are continuously developing; you don’t want to give them something too early that their bodies won’t respond well too. From what I have read the best things to start with are: apples, sweet potatoes, pears, peas, bananas and avocados. The first solid to give them is rice cereal- I use organic brown rice cereal- but I can’t make that from scratcdh so I’m not talking about grains here.
It is also much less expensive then canned foods- I got one organic sweet potato for $1.50 and it made 7 full size portions of baby food (which in the store cost 89 cents each for organic).
For all you none-parents your eyes might glaze over the next part, feel free to stop reading whenever you like.
First step was to get baby food containers. I settled on Baby Cubes because they are BPA free, you can microwave, dish wash and freeze them. They also travel well because they are individual containers.
Then I researched what foods were the best:
- Things like Carrots, beets, broccoli have higher level of nitrates, it seems like for those it is better to buy ready made. Baby food companies make sure to get low nitrate produce and they test all the time (I don’t have this capability so I will leave it up to them).
- You also can’t add salt, spices, citrus, peanut butter, sugar, honey etc. Babies systems are too immature. Better to go straight up- I do puree and breast milk blend so it is easier for him to eat.
- When to introduce foods is important. Babies are continuously developing; you don’t want to give them something too early that their bodies won’t respond well too. From what I have read the best things to start with are: apples, sweet potatoes, pears, peas, bananas and avocados. The first solid to give them is rice cereal- I use organic brown rice cereal- but I can’t make that from scratcdh so I’m not talking about grains here.
- I have also read that babies develop most of their taste for food between 6-12 months, so you need to introduce them to lots of flavors during this time.
Then I got cooking: To keep the nutrients it is best to steam or bake the fruit or veggie. Boiling foods can take away some of the nutrients. (You don’t have to cook avocados or bananas- babies can handle these foods raw).
- I steam mine and put them in a food chopper, it got out all the lumps
- You can add water, formula, and breast milk to make it the right consistency.
Ryan eats 2 servings of solids a day followed by breast milk and the other feedings are just breast milk.
So far I have only made sweet potatoes, but they turned out very well. I am introducing one new food a week to make sure he doesn’t have any allergic reactions- and if he does it will be easily traceable. I think I will do bananas next.
I’ll keep you updated if I come up with any genius baby food purees.
Then I got cooking: To keep the nutrients it is best to steam or bake the fruit or veggie. Boiling foods can take away some of the nutrients. (You don’t have to cook avocados or bananas- babies can handle these foods raw).
- I steam mine and put them in a food chopper, it got out all the lumps
- You can add water, formula, and breast milk to make it the right consistency.
Ryan eats 2 servings of solids a day followed by breast milk and the other feedings are just breast milk.
So far I have only made sweet potatoes, but they turned out very well. I am introducing one new food a week to make sure he doesn’t have any allergic reactions- and if he does it will be easily traceable. I think I will do bananas next.
I’ll keep you updated if I come up with any genius baby food purees.
3 comments:
this is great,,, i willl order baby cuv=bes and go from here. where did you find brown rice cereal? i can not find it in TX by us?
see you tomorrow
I'm impressed! You are a woman with many skills.
We need to hook up! My schedule seems to be clearing up some...finally!
Hope you got your application done :)
Excellent choice! We made all our own baby food too. My best memory of this was when we took erin on her first plane ride i thought it would be easiest to buy a jar of baby food to travel with just in case. so we decided on carrots as that was her favorite home made baby food at the time. we tried giving it to her on the plane and she spit it right out. so yay for homemade vs. processed. unfortunately, as she is getting closer to being a pre teen she's a little more picky about her fresh veggies. carrots are no longer a favorite. :-(
We got a VitaMix to make our baby food. It's a high powered blender. Not cheap but does an excellent job in getting all the lumps out. we use it now for smoothies, homemade soups or your favorit adult frozen beverage. :-)
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