does anyone here make their infants baby food?

Question

I want to make my daughter foods, carrots ect.have you ever done this?any food advice, or products that would be helpful-if you havent done this pls dont answer.what were your experiences doing this also?

Answer 1

Back in the 80's when my kids were babies, I made my own baby food. It's SO easy to do!

For beef, just get the leanest chuck roast you can get, brown it on both sides, then simmer it over low heat for several hours in a bit of water.

For chicken, cook a whole chicken or just dark pieces in some water like you're stewing it. When you're done, let it cool some and pull the skin off the pieces and remove from the bone.

For both meats, remember not to add any salt... it's not necessary. Let the remaining liquid sit in the fridge long enough for the fat to rise to the top. Remove it. Babies don't need clogged arteries either :)

Break or cut your meat up, whiz it in a food processor, adding the liquid to get it to the right consistency, you can vary the texture as your baby gets older, Then plop it into old fashioned ice cube trays. Freeze it. Once frozen, remove cubes to zipper style freezer bags and just pull out a cube or two for each meal. These zap in the microwave really quick!

For sweet potatoes, cook them in a little water, cool, peel, whiz in food processor, make your cubes that way. Winter squash can be purchased already cooked, pureed and frozen so I never bothered with that. They add no salt or anything else. Carrots you can do the same thing, just scrape, cut up, cook in a little water until soft, puree and freeze.

I never did my own fruits, not because it would be difficult but because cooking removes the Vitamin C and baby food companies add it back. But using regular unsweetened applesauce that's got Vitamin C added but no sugar is fine and most babies can handle the texture very early on so no need for baby applesauce after about the first month or so...

The ice cube tray method was my favorite, then you can just label the bags and have several weeks worth of baby food so you're not messing with it all the time. I still got jars to travel with and stick in the diaper bag and now they have those neat little plastic containers that make it even easier because you don't have to worry about anything breaking if you drop your diaper bag :)

I don't think babies need corn (too hard to digest) and green beans lose most of their nutrients once you cook them, so I concentrated on those three Vitamin A veggies, two meats, regular applesauce and jarred baby pears and peaches. It was plenty of variety for them until they were ready for table food.

I used baby cereals when they were younger, then moved up to Cream of Rice and instant oatmeal in those packages that has vitamins added but no flavors or sugar. I wouldn't switch from baby cereals until after the first year simply because of the iron they add to them. After that they can usually absorb the iron from "grown-up" cereals just fine.

For the sake of minimizing allergy risk for the first year, avoid eggs, citrus fruits, peanuts, seafood, wheat and if food allergies run in your family, you'd be best to avoid all those items for the first two years. If no allergies, you can give egg yolks (not whites) after a year, same with wheat products and citrus. Seafood and peanut products are best left until age three when their immune system has developed enough that they're less likely to have an allergic response. Some pediatricians now say wait until they're even 4 or 5 years old for those two products, especially if there are food allergies in the family history.

Hope this helps!

Answer 2

I made baby food for both of my son's, and I loved it. When making a vegetable ie: green beans, carrots, sweet potatoes.. etc , something to remember is that when you puree it, add a little bit of the water that you used to cook it in. When you boil vegetables, they lose nutrients in the water, so use some of the water when you're pureeing it.

Also, another thing that I found helpful was to use Ice cube trays. When my sons' were just starting solid food, a serving the size of an ice cube was perfect.

Making their food can be cheaper, and more rewarding, but you really have to want to do it, because it does take a little more time than buying bottles of babyfood.

Congrats and good luck.

Answer 3

I don't anymore, just becuase my girls are 2 & 4. I used to though. It's very easy actually. In addition to the book mentioned above you can also google, how to make baby food or homemade baby food & get some good sites & recipes. Good luck. It's a wonderful thing to do because you know exactly what's in the food you give your child & you don't have preservatives in there. Oh & if you make too much you can freeze it in an ice cube tray then when it's frozen pop the food cubes into a ziplock bag & when you're in a hurry, just pop one into the microwave for a sec.

Answer 4

Yes, I made some things. I got most of my recipes and guidelines from a book called Super Baby Food by Ruth Yaron. Some things it just made more sense to buy in jars, but there were several things that I couldn't find in jars as a single ingredient or at all (like avocado). The book has recommendations on what ages to introduce what foods and if a food you made needs to be cooked or strained before serving it to your baby. I bought a lot of these tiny baby food jar sized gladware containers to portion out what I had made. Then saved a used baby food jar for measuring purposes, and froze my single serving gladware containers for later.

Answer 5

I made some of it. I used a food processor or sometimes a blender. I used store bought cereal though. I basically just pureed whatever we were eating, but not with spices. Also, avoid things like nuts, fish and seafood, shellfish, eggs, strawberries, and other common allergy triggers. A good book to buy is Blender Baby Food, it's about 13 dollars. It's full of great recipes.

Answer 6

My husband and I started doing this for our daughter! We borrowed a friend's Magic Bullet to see if it would really do all it says it does on tv and we've been whipping up gourmet baby food ever since!

The nice part is that you'll know exactly what's in your baby's food - you can ensure that everything's organic, preservative, and additive free! And since I've noticed that many 'toddler foods' are adding autolyzed yeast (another name for MSG) I've been more convinced than ever that we're doing the best thing for our daughter.

My daughter loves pureed bananas with organic milk in the morning - and cornish hens with rice and veggies for dinner!

There's even a neat book to help you along called Feed Me! I'm Yours by Vicki Lansky that has lots of neat ideas for combining different foods for your baby!

Oh, and the Magic Bullet is the BEST! Invest in one of these - you can buy them at Walgreen's for about 50 dollars... Money well spent - trust me!

Answer 7

Once your baby is at least 6 months, you can start giving quite a variety of foods. Commercial baby food tends to be very bland, whereas the food you make yourself can be so much tastier.

Try http://www.homemade-baby-food-recipes.com - there is lots of information there about making your own food and when to introduce different things - plus there are lots of recipes from simple purees to more exotic things like baby curries and casseroles.

Answer 8

I would make my own bananas, squash, potatoes, etc when mine were little. they have these little mini food processors that you can buy that work great. Just throw whatever you want into, and mix it up. It gets the chunks out and is a good consistency. Plus, it's healthier for the babies. Gets them used to some real food.

Answer 9

thats what i plan on doing for my baby when it comes, ive read up on it a lot what can do is boil the foods that need to be boiled and then stick them in a blender and to store it you can you ice cube trays to freeze them and then thaw and warm up the food when your ready for feeding time, just keep one thing in mind dont add salt or sugar, but if and when your ready to introduce meats your baby should be old enough to add broth to the mix anyway you might be able to find more info at pregnancy.org, i love that site its very helpful good luck