Making babyfood and solids help (long)....

sliz · January 2011

I got a Magic Bullet Embarrassed and ventured into the land of making my own babyfood last night. I did apples (3 apples made about 16 oz), pears (3 pears made about 22 oz of food) and peaches.

The apples and pears turned out great - I used fresh fruit that I cooked. The peaches turned out really sour and runny - I got frozen organic peaches from Costco, cooked and pureed them.

Can I fix the peaches but adding a bit of cane sugar? they are borderline inedible.....I would add a splash of juice but they are already too liquidy.

Also - it took over 2 hours to make this much food. Is it worth the effort and savings (which I don't feel are much given the cost of fresh fruit in the winter) or should I just stick to jarred food (and get adult apple and pear sauce)?

She ate Florida (the big less fatty) avocados over Christmas when mixed with banana but totally refused the Haas Avocado I tried to feed her yesterday (even mixed with applesauce) - should I just give up on the avocado for now? It is the first food she has just refused.

Bananas constipate her a lot so I have limited them even though I think they are great alone and to mix with other food - her poops have been very hard since giving her more solids (she poops out little turds (sorry!) about 5-6 times a day and strains a lot) - anyone have any solutions?

She is going on 6 months so does that mean I can start table foods soon (i.e. a month or two) and be done with purees? Once starting table foods did you still feed them purees (or chunkier purees)?

She's done: apples, pears, bananas, avocados, sweet potatoes, peas, carrots and squash. I want to start her on baby yogurt (I have peach and blueberry so I guess I have to test out the fruit components individually first). What else do you all recommend after the yogurt?

Do you have non-meat protein suggestions for 6-7 months? The idea of pureed meat grosses me out.....

How do you know your kid is ready to start table foods/finger food and not choke on it? What did you start with?

xtencornfield · January 2011

I'm not going to answer all of your questions because Ethan is behind in the world of solids. However, I will say that making my own food has been a balancing act of what's actually worth making on my own (i.e. ease of preparation and cost) versus what I can get cheaply and easily already prepared. I've found that certain things like apples, pears, beans, peas, I prefer to just get the pre-made. I can buy a big jar of Meijer unsweetened organic applesauce that the only ingredient is organic apples for ~$2 on sale. I eat the same applesauce. There is zero reason for me to make this myself. Other items I just can't get the texture right or it's just too much effort for the amount of food I get.

As far as finger foods go, we kind of waited on those until Ethan was actually attempting to gum things instead of just swallowing them. We started with puffs and have moved up to mummums, cheese, toast, crackers w/cream cheese, organic cereal bars, banana slices, pieces of lunchmeat (low sodium, no fillers stuff), etc.

krissyh21 · January 2011

I tried the making my own food thing and for ME it just wasn't worth the time it took to do it all.

I started table food at about 9 months and DS was not ready, he gagged when ever something entered his mouth. So I held off longer, re-trying at about 10 months, starting with sweet potatoes and mushy type food gradually adding things to the meal. Honestly, even at a year he was still behind the solid thing, gagging and not interested in certain textures, then one day he just got it all. He was reaching for my food instead of wanting me to feed him his. So now he has whatever I am eating and he has never went back.

Soon2beMrs.Sivert · January 2011

I'll try to answer as much as I can.

Peaches: I wouldn't add the sugar personally. You could try mixing them into her cereal if you are concerned about the texture.

Cost Savings: I made almost all of our baby food. It was a ton of fun and totally worth the time. We'd bake, boil, steam, etc in large batches & freeze the food into ice cube trays. I loved making foods because my daughters were able to have food that you can't find in a jar generally (cauliflower, broccoli, asparagus, zucchini, etc). It does get better. We used a food processor, which you may want to consider as you are beginning to make chunky food.

We didn't do bananas a lot but I think everything in moderation. There are other foods, like blueberries that would balance that out.

Beans are a great source of protein. We didn't do pureed meat but I know gretchen did, she might have some suggestions for that.

We started our finger foods with those yogurt melts and puff things at about 7-8 months.

Good luck!

xtencornfield · January 2011

krissyh21:

I tried the making my own food thing and for ME it just wasn't worth the time it took to do it all.

I started table food at about 9 months and DS was not ready, he gagged when ever something entered his mouth. So I held off longer, re-trying at about 10 months, starting with sweet potatoes and mushy type food gradually adding things to the meal. Honestly, even at a year he was still behind the solid thing, gagging and not interested in certain textures, then one day he just got it all. He was reaching for my food instead of wanting me to feed him his. So now he has whatever I am eating and he has never went back.

Thank you for posting this, you give me hope that DS will get this some day, LOL!

CandT · January 2011

Personally, I don't add juice to anything, just water. I also don't add water to everything, especially if it's runny. What makes the peaches unedible? I would just not feed them to her instead of adding sugars to make it taste better. She needs the nurtition and get get that from other fruits/veggies.

You made a lot of food at once. I don't make that much at one time and it doesn't take near that long. So you could spend less time, make less, and do it more often, or more time more food, less often. You have to weigh the pros and cons to you and how much time you have to devote to her food.

DD's poop was hard and some constipation when first starting food, it gets better with time and I do have to cut out bananas every once in a while.

I started some chunks around 7 months but I still do the purees. I was going to start yogurt and cheese around 8 months for the protein but haven't done that yet. I could tell she was ready for chunks when she really started chomping on food, she even does it with purees now, like she is really eating it. I could also tell when I gave her a small piece of banana and she didn't just swallow it, but chewed on it and took it in and out of her mouth some.

I started with banana, then sweet potato, squash, pasta, and occassionally the puffs the sell in the baby food aisle. The only hard thing I have come across so far with the chunks is heating or reheating. I dont' use the microwave for DD's food so it is a pain to heat up the chunks.

Good luck!

roaringrock · January 2011

Soon2beMrs.Sivert:
I'll try to answer as much as I can.
Peaches: I wouldn't add the sugar personally. You could try mixing them into her cereal if you are concerned about the texture.
Cost Savings: I made almost all of our baby food. It was a ton of fun and totally worth the time. We'd bake, boil, steam, etc in large batches & freeze the food into ice cube trays. I loved making foods because my daughters were able to have food that you can't find in a jar generally (cauliflower, broccoli, asparagus, zucchini, etc). It does get better. We used a food processor, which you may want to consider as you are beginning to make chunky food.
We didn't do bananas a lot but I think everything in moderation. There are other foods, like blueberries that would balance that out.
Beans are a great source of protein. We didn't do pureed meat but I know gretchen did, she might have some suggestions for that.
We started our finger foods with those yogurt melts and puff things at about 7-8 months.

Good luck!

all of this!

and I agree, don't add the sugar. I really enjoyed making ginny's food. the process was very satisfying and therapeutic for me (maybe because I was unable to BF.) someone had given us the $$ beaba baby cook and I loved it. it's really one step. you steam the fruits and veggies and then blend, all in one simple appliance. each batch lasted a week in the freezer. so every sunday I would buy my organic goods and spend an hour making all of ginny's meals.

ladychicago · January 2011

I can't make paragraphs, so this will look like a rambling mess. Sorry! I think making our own baby food is totally worth it. And I enjoy it. We just use a blender, though. I only do it about once a week, and it takes less than a half hour. Frozen organic fruits and veggies that can be steamed or thawed/sauteed are super easy. Stuff you have to peel and cut, less easy. I can often find peeled, cut squash or sweet potatoes at Trader Joe's. That is a huge time saver on those. Bananas totally constipated DD. I got rid of them. She is going on a week of high fiber foods (pears, prunes, and pumpkin, the prunes were store bought and the pumpkin was organic canned), and her poop is just now starting to return to normal. Prunes were a big help. Pedi also said we could do 50/50 prune juice and water. I am planning on experimenting with finger foods next week - unsalted rice cakes and small squares of whole grain toast with purees on top. Phasing out purees will depend on how she takes to table food. I plan to talk to my pedi at her 9m appointment about this. For yogurt, I bought a big tub of organic full fat plain yogurt, and will add my own homemade fruit purees to avoid too much sugar. And no, do not add sugar to the peaches! She may like them. If not, just toss them and try again later. Black beans and tofu are other good protein sources. Check out wholesomebabyfood.com if you haven't already for food ideas and good timelines for introducing different foods!

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