Tips for Making Baby Food

Making baby food is easy. I bought jarred food for my first son, and I have made it for my second and third sons. It has saved us SO much money! There are a few books out there, and you can find a lot of info online also. My favorite website is http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com/
Most first foods are as simple as just steaming and pureeing. You can make your own baby cereal also.
Good Luck!

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My daughter never once ate a gar of baby food and still only eats everything all natural/organic and from scratch (She is 15 months). The best book is called Super Baby Food and is an excellent resource. I would also go to Yahoo and go to the groups section and search for 'homade baby food' and things like that. I was on one and it was an excellent source for ideas and tips. The process is super easy, do everything in batchs, freeze in ice cube trays and double ziplock in the freezer. Sharpie marker the date and what it is on the outside. Even now my daughter eats anything, lentils, salmon, chicken, tofu, avocados, whole wheat pasta with any sauce (including puree broccoli & spinich with parm cheese or carrot/squash with parm cheese). I spend about 40 min. every 4 days making fresh stuff and then container it in the fridge and then meal time is 2 min or less.
If you have any specific questions feel free to email me off-line.
Shelly
____@____.com

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Hi, T..
I have not actually made any baby food, but I have a beautiful book written by Annabelle Karmel. It contains many pictures, recipes and advice on equipment and food storage.
Have fun.
Amy

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oops i got cut off the name of the book is WHOLE FOODS FOR BABIES & TODDLERS it has a whole bunch of cool info about feeding

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Hi T.,
I made pretty much all the fruits and veggies for my now 21/2 year old. It's really very easy. For veggies I would steam them then put it in the blender or a food processor and use the water from steaming to blend to the correct consistency. There are lots of nutrients in that water. Also, for some things I would use frozen veggies and just steam them. It doesn't have to be fresh. Also, Trader Joes has great prices on fresh organic produce. Once it was all blended up I'd pour it into ice trays and freeze. Pop them out and into a freezer bag and then you just have to get one or two out for your feedings. It doesn't really take that long to do it and my daughter always perferred my home made food over store bought. Mine always tasted so much better. Oh...no need to add any salt or anything. ..and if you want you can always add some rice cereal to your fruits or veggies.

For fruits I would just blend them up and freeze. i made apples a few times then realized that natural (no sugar added) applesauce works great and is so much easier. I did use canned peaches and pears because it was easy and they weren't in season. I got the no or low sugar ones. Bananas can be frozen too. they look a little yucky but they are fine.

Once we got to adding meats I gave up and just bought that stuff. She was able to move to table food soon after anyway so I didn't have to buy that stuff for very long.

Great resource: http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com

Congrats on your son. I've got a 4 month old daughter too, born in Nov. I'm planning on making her food again.

J.

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Hi! I would love to help you with this! Its quite easy and so much fun! First, you need some sort of food mill, grinder or processor is fine. Then you can make the texture you desire. Any veggie you can steam for keeping the best nutrients and things like squash, I cut in half and put face down in a baking dish with about and inch of water in the bottom and bake until soft. After the food is cooked, just put a little at a time into the processor with some of the water or juices left from cooking it. The more water the thinner the consistency, so just use a little at a time. Get a few extra ice trays and scoop the food into that, cover with plastic wrap and freeze for 12-24 hours. Put into individual labelled freezer bags and take out what you need for each meal. You can thaw these in the microwave pretty quickly. That's it! Please let me know if you have any more questions!

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I used ice cube trays to store it - each cube is a good serving size so you just pop out what you need to thaw. On babycenter.com they sell special ice cube trays with lids just for this purpose. And I used the blender to puree the food - makes it easy to pour into the trays also. good luck!

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We read a book called Super Baby Food and basically we pureed different vegetables and then put them in ice cube trays. the night before, we'd put a cub or two depending on how much they were eating into the fridg to thaw. Then we just heated it slightly to warm it for them. Worked out great.

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I made my own baby food and it was soooo simple. There are some good books (I've heard the book "Super Baby Food" is awesome, but I don't have it) and web sites out there with good tips. Basically I started out with avacado, as they're supposed to be so good for babies. I would put about 4-6 of them in the Cuisinart, add a little formula (liquid to thin and smooth) and let it mix until it's really smooth. Then I poured it into ice cube trays (I have the Tupperware ones with covers on them). Once frozen, you can just pop them out and put them into a ziploc bag. Then just defrost them a couple at a time, depending on how much your baby is eating. I did the same with carrots, apples, beans - tons of stuff (you obviously need to cook them first). I found the process so simple and I knew exactly what she was getting. I would make a batch of 3 or 4 items every weekend, then it was done for the week. I would just take out as many cubes as I needed for the following day the night before. It's a ton easier than people think. Oh, then to acclimate her to more textures, you can just increase the chunkiness as you go (by not pureeing so long), until your baby is on regular table food. Seriously, it's so simple. Have fun!

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Caldo de pollo (basically chicken soup). However, this chicken soup is very rustic and very healthy. All my life, I have seen this caldo (soup) be prepared for all the children (and adults) in the family. It is a very big hit. Basically, you throw large pieces of carrots and potatoes into a pot with large pieces of chicken (legs, thighs, breasts, etc) w/the skin on, add some salt for taste of course. I recommend this because the vegetables get very soft due to the soft simmering and the large pieces of chicken make an amazing chicken stock you can also spoon feed to your baby. The vegetables are easy to store because they are still whole yet very tender but mushing them isn't a problem since they sit in chickenstock anyway. When your son is old enough, you can also shred bits of chicken and I know he will love it. Another favorite is lightly scraping a sweet potato w/a spoon as you would a banana after boiling or baking it. I don't think my family (extended included) has ever seen a jarred baby food in their home ever. I hope this helps.

I found the easiest for me was to mash a banana in a cup. I never did the major quantities and freeze but I hear its a great idea. I simply would mash up whatever I was eating in a small cup. This way I didn't prepare several different things. It is better to make you own and I found having frozen vegetables is the best theing ever!! I micro for 2-3 minutes and they easily mash with a fork. If you have a blender that woudl work too!

All the advice below is great, the only things I would add is to find a friend or two and swap trays, so that way you can make maybe two things at once (a green veggie and an fruit) and then swap so you have four things.
I rebag in the snack back then I can just pull the corner off and squeeze it onto the container I'm feeding him from.
Then you can throw away the bag (if you can square it with your green side)
Have fun with the food, don't add sugar or honey but if its really tart (ie plums are not quite ripe), add a wee bit of maple syrup.r

I did the same as Kelly but I bought a baby Food Mill by KidCo. on ebay for about 10 bucks and they also have the food storage with the tops that are a little more sanitary than the ice cube trays. I did some research on the ice cube trays and they collect more bacteria than anything in your fridge or freezer, but I used ice cube trays for months and my little one is as healthy as an OX. Just a little information that might help you make your choice on trays or covered food trays.
I steamed all of her veggies and fruits to keep the nutrients but boiling is good too. Good luck.

Hi T.,

I too am a full-time working mom and made most of our baby food as well. After I got the hang of it, it was real easy!

I took a lot from Super Baby Food as well, cooked in larger batches once we found out our son wasn't allergic to anything and then froze the food in ice cube trays. Once frozen, I would place in big freezer bags and use the trays again. Each cube is about a serving. Avocados, bananas, homemade apple sauce, peach sauce, broccoli, asparagus, sweet potatoes....almost anything! Again, it took some time to get the hang of it and every now and them I would use jar food for traveling with but making your own food saves sooooooo much money!

I hear that avocados is a great starter. An avocado will only last a couple of days once cut, so buy the tiny ones.

Good Luck & Good for you on making your own baby food.

Hi T.,

Check out an awesome site called wholesomebabyfood.com . It covers everything from making and storing, amounts, how to introduce etc. Love it. Have just made a batch of apples for my 5 month old today. Making your own saves sooooo much money, and is sooooo easy.

Good luck and enjoy!!!
L.

I used the book Super Baby Food and it was very helpful. I started with sweet potatoes, avocadoes, and bananas. All mixed with breast milk or formula until the right consistency for his age. It was so easy. I also work full-time and was able to make my son plenty of food in big batches about every other week. I made several batches and froze the food in ice cube trays. It made it so easy to pull out just what he needed. And, as he got older, you can just pull out more cubes. My son is in a daycare that allowed me to bring in his food, so I would just get a few cubes for each meal out in the morning so they could serve it to him during the day. There is also a very good, fast, and easy recipe for homemade cereal in that book. It smells (and tastes) much better than the boxed cereals and it is so healthy for the baby. My son never really had diarrhea or constipation during those months and I am convinced that it is because I was giving him homemade food. Plus, it made me feel like I was able to do something really good for him despite being away from him so much for work. Good luck!

Hi T.,
I made the foods (usually whatever we were eating) and just threw it in a blender. In the begining I boiled the foods individually and gave them only 1 new thing per week, to make sure they had no food alergy. I used little container or had my friends save thier baby food jars and stored them in that, in the freezer. I've also put in the ice trays and once they were frozen put them in a zip lock bag.

Once your baby is older and you know the foods they can tolerate you can just blend whatever you guys eat, and they will be eating the same thing as you guys....

I started making baby food for my daughter when she was about the same age. We started with banana - we mashed it up and mixed it with rice cereal. We then moved on to sweet potatoes, carrots, apples, pears, and butternut squash. We simply steam them and them puree them in a food processor (you can also mash them or blend them). Sometimes she prefers them mixed - apple and sweet potato together for example. We have since moved on to fish, meat, pasta - We get a lot of ideas from baby recipe books. I usually make a large amount at once and then freeze several portions in small plastic bowls. You can make enough food on the weekend for the whole week (or longer). It is so easy to make it ourselves and we know exactly what is going in to her body! Good luck and be creative!

I breastfed my daughter until she was one but supplemented homemade food in between feedings. You can do one of two things.

1) buy a food mill (you crank it by hand) which you can probably find at a health food store. This process took a little too long for me.

2) Buy a mini food processor (holds about 2 cups). All you have to do is de-seed some of the fruits, toss them in, add some breast milk to make it soft, push the button a couple of times and voile baby food on flambe minus the flambe part.

******STORAGE IS EASY******
Just take a day & do multiple fruits and veggies & freeze it. They sell small glad containers, but I would use any small tupperware that you can't find the lids for anymore (you know, the ones we all hold on to) & Press 'N' Seal. You just have to stay away from carrots; it has something to do with the nitrate level in them. You could buy the carrots and use those jars for storage, just leave room for expansion.

Good Luck Mama.

I had great luck just steaming veggies and using a stick blender to puree them (save the cooking water, use it to dilute to the right consistency while you're pureeing). I mostly used ice cube trays to freeze it, then stored them in zipper bags. Since I brought my kids to day care and carried their food, I'd just create whatever blend they were having that day (a few cubes of veg, a few of meat, the fruit in a sep bag) and take it with. It would thaw in the fridge at the center. It's not a ton more work, especially if you make a bunch at a time. I'd often just cook a bunch of broccoli or something with dinner, then puree the babies' food after we ate. It's way cheaper than the jars, less salt and additives and you know exactly what you're getting.

Good luck!

This is for a little later on, after all the foods have been introduced, but if you have "What to Expect the First Year" it has some good simple recipes for early finger foods (it does also have recipes to do pureed baby food as well, I believe). There is a stew recipe in that book in the back that includes like carrots and potatoes and lentils and some other veggies. My daughter LOVED that when she was about 8 months or so.

If you do end up buying any baby food, the Gerber Stage 1 fruits and veggies in the plastic containers are are really good b/c a) they have no additives and b) the containers are great for storing food you then make yourself (good size, washable, plastic, etc).

If I were you I would give your little one small bits of real food. I know he doesn't have teeth yet, but babies do not really need food before one year of age, they just practice eating for the experience (physically and socially). I never pureed a single thing for my kids. Just give small bits of soft banana, pasta, cheerios, etc. You can start slowly adding different foods, but it's not about nutrition, it's about exposure.

Good luck!

Hi T.,

I have made all of our baby food. There is a Great book called Super Baby Food by Ruth Yaron. There are many Great things about this book ie: it takes each food, fruit, veggie and tells you at what age to start and how to make freezer cubes. It also shows you by stage. There are some fun homemade recipes in there like as they get older making shaving cream paint for the bath tub. The first foods it recommends is bananna & avocado. The key is to only introduce one new food every 3 to 4 days. You want to make sure that your son does not have allergies to anything. The bananna making is just mashing it or pureeing it. Hope this helps :) K.

You can google some recipes on the internet- they are usually pretty simple. I would start around 6 months of age. You should give only one new food every few days to check for an allergic reaction. My babies have always liked squash a lot for a first food.

Hi T.,

My lil guy is just turning 6 months and we waited on solids, we start Thursday, because Dr. Sears talked about new reaserach on delaying solids http://www.askdrsears.com/html/3/T032000.asp

I am using the books Mommy and Daddy Made and Baby Super foods

Hi T.,
First Meals, By Annabel Karmel
I have two daughters, and I used this book for both of them . This book is so helpfull,and full of great recepies that my kids love. It starts with four months and goes up until five years. I love this book!!!