Need Advice on Foods to Feed 13 Mo. Old

My son loves to eat sweet potato fries and french fries. I buy the frozen ones and heat them up in the toaster oven as opposed to actually frying them. When he just started eating table foods, he preferred them soft as instead of crunchy so I would just heat them up until they were soft. Oatmeal was also a big hit and helped him learn to use a spoon since it sticks to the spoon instead of sliding off. Peas are fun for them to pick up.

Try foods that you know he likes in the jar, but in the table food form. Peas, sweet potatoes, soft green beans, canned asparagus, cooked carrots, soft fruits, smashed avocados (they have the good fat that he needs for brain development), etc.

If you want to introduce something new, you can start by mixing some into a baby food he
already likes and then gradually increase the proportion of new food and decrease the old food. It can take up to 12 times of introducing a new food before some kids will get used to it. So, be persistent and keep trying new foods often, along with his usuals.

Many babies have a hard transition from baby food to table food but it usually just takes time. My niece is almost 15 months and is still working on that transition. She is just very picky and preferred dry table food to wet ones.

You mentioned chicken nuggets... they are pretty unhealthy and have lots of preservatives and additives usually. Once he has enough teeth, you could just boil some chicken and tear it into pieces. I would stay as far away as possible from highly processed foods. Your little guy's body is growing so quickly and really absorbs anything he eats, so adding all those chemicals and unhealthy additives really has an impact on his little body. There are usually good alternatives to nuggets and similar foods in the health food section at a grocery store. Remember, fresh, all natural food will be better for him, and what he gets used to eating now, is what he will be used to eating when he gets older. A great book to read is "If It's Not Food, Don't Eat It" by Kelly Hayford, C.N.C. It is easy to read and you could find it cheap on Amazon.com or at the library. Very entertaining and really helps with ideas for eating fresh, whole, and natural foods in a way that is actually do-able and not too complicated.

Also here are two good websites:
http://www.askdrsears.com/html/3/T030800.asp "Feeding Toddlers: 17 Tips for Pleasing the Picky Eater" It has good ideas for introducing new, healthy foods to toddlers.

and
http://www.askdrsears.com/html/4/T040200.asp "ABC's of Teaching Nutrition to Kids" I thought this one was especially good because it teaches parents how to make learning about healthy food fun for kids. It talks about how to educate kids so that they make healthy choices on their own later on and so they know which kinds of food are healthy and why. The only thing I didn't agree with was that he suggested rewards, but everything else was pretty good advice. The article talks about referring to "grow" foods for kids. You could start on some of the ideas like letting him hold some vegetables in the grocery cart and talking about the colors, letting him wash the produce at home, etc. Take some of the ideas and alter them so they are age-appropriate for your son.

Best wishes!

Some of my son's favorites were scrambled eggs (others prefer hard-boiled eggs), hash browns, bagels cut up very small, strawberries, blueberries, steamed/boiled carrots, sweet potato, cubed potato or other hard vegetable, quiche, pumpkin pancake, turkey lunchmeat, dry cereal, etc. Almost any pasta would work great, but I found that my son likes rotini the best.
Just try to give him what you are eating and see what happens. He may not like self-feeding because he gets food faster when you feed him. Maybe give him about half of what he normally eats at one sitting and then give him finger food so he can take his time to figure out how to eat without being too hungry to be patient.

My son (15 months) loves fried bologna (I get the turkey and pork bologna so its a bit lower in fat). Do you feed him while you eat? My son eats much better for us while we are eating and he very much prefers to eat what is on my plate instead of something special for him. How many teeth does your son have? Try small pieces of familiar fruit like peaches. They can mash peaches up very easily with few teeth. Try toast with just a bit of his fruit baby food on top to help him get use to different textures. The gerber puffs and freeze-dried fruits are great to teach self-feeding and so are the much cheaper generic brands. I would stick with somewhat bland foods until he gets use to the different textures, then start introducing the fun flavors. Good luck!

S., my son is a little older than yours but he still likes a lot of the same foods from when he was starting table foods. Peas are good and fun...they can be served cold or warm. Small cubes of good cheese ( not that processed garbage)I guess not a good idea for lactoce intolerance.
I know its not the healthiest of food choices but my little guy thinks stuffing is incredible. Any type of bean, my guy thinks butter beans and pinto beans are awesome.
Fresh fruits are so yummy! Blueberries, melon is soft if cubed small enough very easy to chew. I make a dish with sausage and wild rice that he feeds himself ( its not to bad if you stick to leaner sausage and still drain it before you mix it into the rice.

The trick is to remember he has no judgement against food yet so let him learn to try all sorts of new foods...also its been proven that kids need to try things like 12 or more times before they can be sure if they like them or not.

Good luck!
B.

Try putting the food in his jars. Maybe you can involve him in the preparing of his food. He might like it better if he helps to cook it. Like push buttons, stirring, or even cracking an egg. If they are interested in their food, it is easier to feed it to them. And save messes, you can put a trash bag under his high chair to let him do the stirring and all. Good luck.

S., I do daycare and the 1 year olds eat pretty much the same thing the other kids do. Chicken Nuggets cut into small pieces, grilled cheese and grilled cheese and turkey, mac and cheese, scrambled eggs. I feed them almost anything cut into small pieces. Just about the only thing I don't feed them is hot dogs.

M.

Dairy-free easy foods:
avocado chunks
egg cooked any way, in small pieces
small amount of 100% fruit juice, diluted
soy yogurt
smoothie with any fruit, soy milk or yogurt, a tsp of sunflower butter for some good fat
any pasta (whole grain)
any bread, toasted if he prefers, in small bites (whole grain)
cereal (whole grain, eg cheerios)
small chunks of cooked veggies: beet, carrot, green beans, potato, broccoli
whole fruit: apple, pear, peach, kiwi, etc.

Children are very different from one another! My older daughter tended to choke, so she ate soft and milled foods probably till almost 2. (We have a Happy Baby food mill, highly recommended!) My younger daughter never really liked baby food, she went straight to finger foods. I don't think there's a problem with your son eating smooth foods as long as he wants to. He'll explore when he's ready. One thing you could do to help him get more independent is give him the spoon. My older daughter used a spoon very young and it helped her feel more like the grown-ups when she couldn't eat the stuff we had on our plates.
hth

At 13 months, you should start trying almost anything you eat...lunch meats cut up into small piece, soy cheese, soy yogurt, graham crackers, bananas, kiwi, pears, peaches, canned veggies, toast, etc. You typically don't have to "teach" a child to self feed. Most babies will pick anything up with their fingers and put it in their mouth. Most of the pediatricians say to stay away from peanut butter at this stage, but almost (with the obvious exception of hard crunchy things and other choke hazards) anything else is a go. You might need to cold turkey stop the baby food and just offer the table foods. Typically, once babies start eating table foods, they don't want to go back to baby food. Good luck!

Both of my children loved (and my 3 year old still loves) firm or extra firm tofu cubed, right out of the container. And it's great b/c it has protein, iron, calcium, as well as fiber. It's smooth too, so it poses almost no choking hazard. I'd be careful with sticky things and keep pieces tiny, but let him try pretty much whatever you eat. If you keep things too bland, you'll regret it when he's 6 and will only eat 3 things (I've learned from watching my sisters' children). Oh, and not to scare you, but don't put too much on his tray at once b/c if he likes something, he might eat it really fast (and our pediatrician told us one of his 2 year old patients choked to death on mac and cheese b/c he stuffed in too much and his babysitter had left the room for something like 2 minutes). So aside from that caution, have fun. Oh- and my son LOVES hard boiled egg yolks in small chunks!

They have gerber puffs snack like food. You can try giving him cheerios just put some in front of him and teach him how to pick them up they basically dissolve in the mouth and easy to chew. I agree with the previous post, try mac n cheese just cut things up real small. My son was eating PB&J's I would make a piece of bread with pnut butter and jelly just enough to give the bread some flavor and broke it in tiny pieces he loved it. If your worried about the allergic thing then just give him the plain bread. I would buy the frozen pancakes pop one in the toaster and then cut it up in real small pieces.

I have a 15 mo. old and since he was a year old I have been giving him any (just about) to eat. If you are giving him stage 3 baby food then he needs to eat reg. food. Stop worring about choking and stuff. Just be there next to him for the finger sweep. I have to do it like 3 times since he feeds himself. They really do a good job by themselves. Try pasta like mac n cheese. try lots of things just cut them up into smaller pieces. corn, bread, waffles, bananas, cheeto puffs, wafers, fries, and yes i gave mine chicken nuggets then....just because they might not have teeth yet don't mean anything...good luck

My son really loved dried fruit at that age. It's messy but I'd give him a big chunk of dried mango and he'd gnaw on it for a long time. I don't remember him liking the little stuff, just the ones he could hold onto like papaya and mango.

Also, if your grocery store carries organic foods, I can't remember the brand name but there is a pop tart pizza in the frozen section that was our mainstay for a long time. I always had to defrost it before i toasted it to get the whole thing warm without burning though. I don't know the salt level, but it was whole wheat flour in the pizza crust and other good organic stuff. You'll want to check though I'm not 100% sure it was dairy free.