Making baby food

[Graye]

My son and family will be arriving for a visit soon. Baby Ayvah will be five months old when they arrive. I've asked what they will feed her and they've told me she will have whatever we are having but liquidised etc. My son asked if I will just cook a little extra when I'm making our food, liquidise it and freeze it so they can defrost it when they need it. He says they freeze the food in ice-cube trays and store it in labelled and dated plastic bags in the freezer.

We don't eat meat so it will be fish or vegetables, fruit, etc. I don't cook with salt but I'm concerned there will be things in our meals which might not be 100% suitable for a baby. I was thinking of doing some mashed carrots, potatoes and cauliflower, etc, perhaps some rice with salmon.

The problem is that we often eat pretty spicy food and I suspect this wouldn't be a good idea. So I'll make stuff separately in preparation. I would really appreciate some recipes etc if anyone makes their own baby food. Also, any ideas for making fruit juices and breakfast type cereals?

[witchstorm]

5 months is early but I just do baby led weaning, baby eats what we eat, no liquidising or freezing anything. Like you said I don't add salt but maybe a little less spicy! bananas, carrots, cauli, broccoli, cucumber, tom's, all fruit and veg really :) they just pick up and eat things as they fancy all just an experiment at that age as all the nutrition they require comes from breastmilk.

[Urban Ayisha]

why dont you set a little bit of whatever your cooking aside before you add spice? the fact that you use little salt means pretty much anything you cook is baby safe, the things 'they' tend to suggest u avoid for baby are nuts (esp if there is allergy in the family) and honey, as well as salt and sugar. we do the freezing in portions thing too, but find that making special baby meals is time-consuming and pretty wearing so where possible i try and give baby what we're eating, not jsut for an easy life, but to try and involve her with family meal times too and for her to learn she eats the same as us! its very generous of you to consider freezing special meals up, as it is quite a lot of work, believe it or not!

however... how long are they staying for cos i do have some brilliant easy-to-make recipes from a book, tried and tested by yours truly that i could post up?

[red]

when my son was little i used to make baby food by blending adult food - as we also like spicey i used to make extra of the not spicy food meals and freeze spare. so no chili or curry for baby! - bt i would cook a casserole with meat and veg, no additives. blend that.

you can cook up a mixed lot of veg.. carrots, green beans spuds etc. blend.

also i would peel and cook in a little water a whole bag of coxes apples.

dont forget mashed advocado or banana are good foods.

I used to freeze portions in glass jars - if you dont fill to the top they dont break or anything. you can reuse baby jars or jam jars etc. advantage is you can sterilyse glass etc.

but that is justwhat i did.....

[Muscroj]

my boys both ate chilli/curry etc when they were weaning, but I suess they were a bit older, probably about 8 months. At 5 months I wouldn't have thought she would be eating fish or meat yet?? As normally you start out on veg & start adding meat after a month or 2?

Anyway, all veg used to go down well with ours, especially the sweater veg, sweet potato, butternut squash, carrot etc. You may want to find out if she will tollerate lumps yet as my 2nd boy was very fussy when it came to consistency and there's a hug difference between pureed and mashed!

As for recipes, anything that tastes good as a soup is great for purees, so if you make soup then you could puree it down & before you add too much stock, take some out for the baby. Butternut squash & died apricot is lovely. Mine also really liked tomato based food, so I'd wizz up a load of veg, anything you have to hand, onion, mushroom, peppers etc & add it to some chopped tomato & pasta.

As far as things to avoid, the only things I can think of is honey, sauces containing peanuts & shellfish (including prawns) which should all be a no no until 1 year old

[Graye]

Thanks for those ideas, and I would love some recipes Urban Ayisha, thank you.

I think she may only be having veggies, fruit and rice at the moment so perhaps I'lll leave out the salmon idea. I know they are buying Hipp brand in the UK when they don't have anything on hand to give her and I know we can buy that brand in France too so I might buy a few jars to have in reserve.

Their first daughter is a huge curry and garlic bread fan so I suspect they gave her those from quite an early age too. then again my son was a lover of sliced lemon way before he had any teeth to chew it with so perhaps we are a family with odd tastes.

I'm violently allergic to nuts and peanuts so fortunately she won't encounter any of those in our kitchen. But can anyone tell me the problem with honey please? I don't normally use it - just curiosity.

[Muscroj]

there's a risk of botchulism (sp??) for babies, if you look at a jar of honey or any product containing honey there's always a warning on the label. Although I did catch my mum feeding George honey on toast when he was about 8 months old, she thought she was doing the right thing because it was healthier than jam, but he didn't come to any harm! ;)

[witchstorm]

There was a report out saying that the no honey til 1 advice was a severe over reaction to originally flawed data, can't find the linky at the moment but will search for it if anyone is interested :)

[Annpan]

Advice in my area is no honey till 2.

Also as baby is very young, advice I was given was to avoid gluten (don't know if it is being followed here, my E was munching on toast by 5 months)

I did ice cube trays of mashed carrot, parsnip, apple, apple and apricot, potato and then you just pick a couple of ice cubes out to heat up (I would mix and match the flavours)

[Muscroj]

not heard that about honey, I'd heard the same about peanuts & I know they're now doing research as to whether it's actually better for a child to be introduced to peanuts as early as possible to avoid allergies

[kiwirach]

My son and family will be arriving for a visit soon. Baby Ayvah will be five months old when they arrive. I've asked what they will feed her and they've told me she will have whatever we are having but liquidised etc. My son asked if I will just cook a little extra when I'm making our food, liquidise it and freeze it so they can defrost it when they need it. He says they freeze the food in ice-cube trays and store it in labelled and dated plastic bags in the freezer.

We don't eat meat so it will be fish or vegetables, fruit, etc. I don't cook with salt but I'm concerned there will be things in our meals which might not be 100% suitable for a baby. I was thinking of doing some mashed carrots, potatoes and cauliflower, etc, perhaps some rice with salmon.

The problem is that we often eat pretty spicy food and I suspect this wouldn't be a good idea. So I'll make stuff separately in preparation. I would really appreciate some recipes etc if anyone makes their own baby food. Also, any ideas for making fruit juices and breakfast type cereals?

i used to teach feeding guidelines to parents in NZ.

a 5mth old is only just being introduced to solid food, and its an 'extra' to their main diet of milk, be it breast or formula.

make up some veges.....mostly root veges, as the brassicas can be difficult to digest in an infant under 6mths, and also are very windy. so i'd suggest, spuds, carrots, parnips, pumpkins, squash, then some fruits....apple, pear, banana. any of these foods can be given on its own, mixed with another, or mixed with baby rice....not our rice. as mentioned, they dont need their food to be seasoned.....they have lovely fresh, unabused taste buds!!.
the baby should only be eating 1-2 ice cubes 1-2 times a day....milk is and should be the main part of their diet.
i'd leave the fish out for a few more months, as well as spicier things til around 9mths.
i'd be aiming to have the baby on the family diet by 9-12mths.
but for now its bland and small doses as the babys digestive system learns to cope with processing of solid food.

i'm just going to go check what the current WHO guidelines are and edit as needed. * ETA WHO would recommend a baby doesnt start solids prior to 6mths (however i believe some babys are ready before then!)
hth, pm me if you want to talk further,
rachel.

[Graye]

OK, I'm taking all this onboard, thanks. It will be a three week visit so any recipes would be gratefully received, although perhaps she won't be too fussy about lots of variety. I've checked the local supermarket and we have Nestlé and Blédina, although I know I can find Hipp locally too if all else fails.

I can't believe I managed to bring up my son, I've either forgotten everything or else he survived despite my efforts! All I can remember is feeding him mashed banana and mashed hard boiled eggs.

I've made some apple puree and frozen that as a starter. I'll do some carrots and cauliflower over the weekend, also potatoes. I'll keep it bland, no additions. I did put the tiniest spot of lemon juice in with the apples but that was to keep their colour really.

I know she is having SMA Gold, this being through neccesity rather than choice. This is not available here so they will have to bring their own supplies. I think they started to supplement this early as she is such a large baby and physically very strong, she has been desperate to sit up for weeks and already has two teeth.

Thanks for that Rachel, I will be pming you! My next job is to locate various second hand stuff they have asked me to look out for - they just have no room in the car for a lot of things. We tend not to have charity shops here so I'm off to the "vide-greniers" (literally empty attics) to see if I find a cot, high chair and play chair. Otherwise it will be serious improvisation!

[Annpan]

Hipp do milk formula too, that might be available?

Don't fret too much about it, her Mum and Dad will know better than us lot anyway And, as they said Milk is still the nutritional source, you are more getting them used to the texture and new flavours of solid than anything else.


Good Luck

[citizentwiglet]

No honey until 2 up here Annpan? Honestly? I've never heard of that one - mind you, I've only taken Fin to baby clinic once where I got a stern look and a roll of the eyes for doing Baby Led Weaning, I've not been back since.

You've got some great ideas there mate, we do BLW with Fin but we only started it a few weeks back, not from the word go (I didn't have the confidence at the time, tbh, it was Fin that dictated 'another way' as he started tantruming about being spoonfed); but I did 'traditional' weaning with Ellis and made all my own food.

Any combination of vegetables, or even veg and fruit (apple and parsnip is lovely) work well; but I always tried to make sure there was a protein and carb element to it as well (I do the same with BLW), so I'd make a vegetable soup that contained potato (for carbs) and a small amount of beans (I hate buying tins, but the beans you get in water are fantastic, no need to worry about soaking them and boiling them, and that niggling feeling you've just done it wrong and you've poisoned your child) for the protein. You need to go easy on the beans, some can be quite hard for small babies to digest, and she is really young - it would be worth checking with mummy and daddy if beans are OK (there are certainly beany recipes for purees for 4-6 months in my books so it might be a matter of building up resistance to wind, IYSWIM!).

You'll be fine - I think in a lot of ways we are FAR too over-cautious these days. When we were kids, we were all on mince and tatties at 3 months (according to my mother in law, LOL!).

[Milims]

Regarding the honey thing, experience tells me to stick to the advice. My friends baby niece contracted botulism and it's really not nice - she was still suffering it's effects years later. As it transpires it wasn't from honey, but it's not worth the risk.
One of the great favourites when my too were very wee was marrow. I simply cut the flesh into chunks and popped it into the microwave. It went mushy of it's own accord! They loved it!