Baby Food 101

My friend PreggerTJ asked me to do a post about making LJ's food. So here it is. I decided to make LJ's food instead of buying the regular baby food because:

1. I can use organic foods and it's still cheaper.

2. I believe it's healthier because I'm not adding all the preservatives to it so it can last on a shelf for who knows how long.

3. There are sooo many more stage 1 foods that baby's can eat than the manufacturer's produce.

They say you can start solids between 4 months and 6 months. I waited till a week before LJ was 6 months. They say you should hold off till 6 months if baby is exclusively breast fed so that's what I tried to do. The only thing is breast milk is not very filling! It was great at the beginning because I knew he had to eat every 3 hrs but by the time he was 5 months old I could tell it just wasn't doing it for him. He was still waking up every 3-4 hrs at night to eat. Luckily I wouldn't go to bed till his 11pm-midnight feeding that way I only had to wake up once between 3am-4am to feed him. It didn't seem that bad at first to me because technically I was only waking up once, but in reality LJ was going to bed at 6pm so he would wake up 2 sometimes 3 times at night. My baby wasn't sleeping through the night yet! And he was almost 6 months old!

So I knew I needed to get him on solids to get his little tummy full at night so my boy can sleep!

So anyway, I did my research and I got this great book at my baby shower from Auntie Louie. It's called Baby 411. It has been my life line since the day LJ was born. It literally has everything to expect from your little one and advice on what to do. Great book, I totally recommend it!

So stage 1 foods are the least allergenic and that's why they are stage one foods. You can feed these to your baby in any order they say. I started out with vegetables, then fruits now we are at beans. I plan on doing stage 1 dairy and meats probably starting next week.

Once you introduce a food to your baby, you want to feed that same food to them for about 3-4 days to make sure they are not allergic. Makes it easy because you don't have to decide what to serve them.

Ok so here are the stage 1 foods:

Stage 1 Fruits and Vegetables: Applesauce, Apricots, Asparagus, Avocados, Bananas, Broccoli, Carrots, Green Beans, Guava, Mashed potatoes, Mango, Melons, Nectarines, Papaya, Peaches, Peas, Plums, Prunes, Pumpkin, Squash, Sweet Potatoes

Stage 1 Grains: Rice cereal, Barley cereal, Oatmeal cereal, Wheat cereal, Millet cereal, Quinoa cereal

Stage 1 Meats and Beans: Beans: red, kidney, white, black-eyed, navy, ect., Beef, Chicken, Garbanzo bean (hummus spread), lamb, lentils, pork, split peas, tofu, turkey

Here are stage 2 foods:

Stage 2 Fruits and Vegetables: Bell peppers, blueberries, grapefruit, kale and other greens, kiwi, oranges, pineapple, rhubarb-cooked, spinach-cooked, strawberries, tomatoes

Stage 2 Grains: Cherrios/Oatios or generic, cornmeal: polenta, cornbread, corn tortillas, oat bran cereal/muffins, pasta, puffed kashi, rice cakes, whole grain pancakes, whole grain waffles, whole wheat crackers

Stage 2 Meats and Beans: Edamame, egg yolks (no egg whites until after 1st bday), sunflower seed butter

That's a variety huh? Just for stage one foods! Baby food only comes in like 4-5 choices for stage 1 foods. I didn't go through all the stage one foods yet. We've had Sweet potatoes, yams (I know it's not listed but I figure it's the same as a potato), carrots, peas, green beans, butternut squash, apples, pears, bananas, we just started garbanzo beans, and I have tried whole grain pasta and whole grain pancakes just to see how he'd do and he did pretty well. I just had to make sure that it was really really small pieces.

So my method is easy:

1. Peel and cut up vegetable or fruit into equal size pieces. Pretty small so it cooks quickly.

2. Boil until fork tender

3. Drain but save a little of the water

4. Puree' in food processor with a little water. At first you want it kinda soupy, almost liquid when your introducing and then you can make the puree' thicker as baby adjusts and gets used to it.

Now to the storage. Here's where it gets interesting. I like to store it 2 different ways. Canning jars because they are glass and you can sanitize them and ice cube trays, you can't sanitize them but it does make for easy storage and transport at first.

You might want to do the ice cube trays at first because they don't eat very much at first. It's basically a treat and practice so you can work your way up on how many ice cubes to defrost and serve as baby gets used to.

1. Fill the ice cube trays with the puree'.

2. Cover it with foil or plastic wrap and freeze over night.

3. The next day I remove it from the ice cube tray then store it the small freezer bags and label them. It makes it easy if you have to go somewhere and bring the food with you. And you avoid freezer burn.

For the canning jars, here's where it gets tricky. I use the small jars, I believe they are the 4 oz jars. The timing is key if you want to make your jar seal and pop so you know it's canned correctly and sterile.

1. Wash all jars before you get started.

2. After you boil the food, put it in the food processor hot.

3. As you puree', fill the jar 3/4 full with water.

4. Place jars in microwave for at least 5 min. You want the water to boil.

5. As soon as the food is pureed to your consistency and the jars are done in the micro immediately empty the water out of the jar and fill the jar with the food.

6. Cover immediately. Lids will pop and seal as the food cools down.

Now you can either store it in the fridge or freezer. I like this way because you know it's sterilized. As your baby starts to eat more you could switch to just using the jars because he/she will eat a whole jar in one sitting.

How much to make? I try to make enough for 2 weeks. That way I avoid freezer burn and I'm not spending all day making baby food. It usually takes me about 2 hrs to do.

Well there it is...it's not hard at all. Just takes to time to get your routine down and get in the swing of things. (Tanya if you need help, I'll come over and show you when you're ready. Just let me know!) So that's my Baby Food 101. Happy Baby Food making!