What are some good food ideas for a 14 month old

[1973Cougar]

My wife and I are running out of ideas.  For breakfast it is either waffles or eggs and some cheerios. 

For lunch its pastina, soup, eggs, or baby food.  We would rather give her real food over baby food.  We still do give her the gerber stage 3 fruit and veggies if we do not have strawberries, blueberries etc in the house.

For Dinner it would be chicken, turkey, hamburger, cheese, etc.  We try new foods as much as we can.  SOme she likes - some she doesnt.

Can you give some ideas as to what your kids liked at this age?

Thanks

[andromedajulie]

My 13-mo old pretty much eats whatever we are serving to the rest of the family. (exceptions are if i'm having a frozen dinner, deli meat, etc). She pretty much likes everything, with the exception of arugula, LOL. Of course she has preferences, but she eats meats and fish, rice, pastas, pretty much whatever veggies I cook (except salad, too hard), beans. Mexican dinner, with beans, cheese, veggies, meat, avocado, even refried beans, she'll scoop up with her hands or I smear it on a rice cake. I also give her almond butter or yogurt (on a rice cake). I pretty much just make our dinner, which is generally healthy enough for everyone, and then figure out if there's something I need to cut smaller or make easier for her to pick up. sometimes I give her individual items, but most often I just scoop the thing out onto her tray (thai curry, the chunks of stuff in the soup, rice and beans). I just don't want her to expect "kid meals" as I see so many do... my kids have to eat whatever meal is being served to the whole family (unless it's extremely spicy, or she has a food allergy). Your LO might be willing to eat many things that you don't think of as toddler foods. I agree, breakfast does get kind of repetitive though - but if i'm desperate i just serve leftover dinner to her!

[stephbrownthinks]

We do pretty much the same as the above poster. For breakfast I usually make DS a smoothie that has greek yogurt, almond butter, flax seeds, frozen blueberries or other berries, 1/2 apple, carrot, spinach, and some almond milk if it needs to be thinned down. Lots of vitamins, minerals, protein, and good fats! Sometime we just do the smoothie, or we'll also do 1/2 a piece of Ezekiel bread or brown rice bread with coconut oil and almond butter, some scrambled eggs and cheese, oatmeal with cottage cheese and a little cinnamon, something like that. He usually gets a smoothie every day. I change up the fruits and veggies in it so that it isn't the same flavor week after week. For lunch and dinner he'll eat anything we do except for lettuces (he doesn't have molars to chew it with yet). Fish is his favorite. I try to make sure he gets protein with every meal and snack.

[nstewart]

As with PPs, we also feed DS pretty much whatever we are having, minus lettuce, anything super spicy, any highly processed foods (which we rarely eat), or anything quite sweet (cake, etc. also rare) or salty such as ham, sausage, etc. 

You may be surprised by what DD enjoys!  DS LOVES curry flavours for example. We are pretty boring with breakfast.  Most days it is toast with some kind of nut butter.  Sometimes we'll have pancakes, scrambled eggs with cheese and tomato, shredded wheat cereal, oatmeal, a fruit smoothie, etc.

Favorites for snacks would be cheese, avocado, hummus, greek yogurt, banana, apple, crackers, guacamole, peas...I can't think of what else. 

DS eats whatever is on hand at home!  Recently DS is crazy for corn on the cob.   I made home made brocolii chedder soup and he couldn't get enough of it.  He also really enjoyed home made salmon burgers.  Anything with beans of any kind is always a hit (chili, soup, tamali pie, baked beans, just plain 'ol cooked black-eye peas).

[neonalee]

I don't usually make special food for DS who is 13 months. We usually have on hand banana, applesauce, plain yogurt, & string cheese, then we give him bits of what we are having. Today he had some diced tomato at dinner & curried sweet potato at lunch. Beans n rice is always good, small amounts of almond or peanut butter, eggs... We often will roast a sweet potato on the grill & portion it out for his daycare lunches. He is very fond of all red meat also.

sent from my phone using tapatalk, please excuse typos.

[lifeguard]

We never made anything special for meals. Ds ate what we were eating or a slight variation (ie. if we were eating something particularly spicy he'd get a less spicy version).

[mommytimes2]

Great thread! I have a 15 month old and was wondering the same thing lately...my DS also eats whatever we are eating, but no dairy for him. It is nice to know what others are doing. We are going shopping tomorrow for some smoothie ingredients! Yum!

[wishin'&hopin']

Our guy (16 months) loves hummus (a puree of chickpeas, olive oil, lemon juice, garlic, a little salt and possibly tahini).  He will eat it with a spoon; dip pita or veggies in it; and I can mix it in with other foods for a protein boost (marinara sauce + hummus; hummus in macaroni and cheese, I throw grated carrot in it as well; hummus tossed with pasta and veggies).  

He mostly eats what we eat--he loves curries and veggies sprinkled with nutritional yeast.

[andromedajulie]

those of you that serve smoothies - is this in a cup? my 13 mo old is not good with the cup. just wondering, because it's such a great meal idea.

[nstewart]

My DS uses a straw sippy cup or just a regular cup with a straw. 

[stephbrownthinks]

we use straw cups for smoothies. I think they're the take 'n toss brand you can get at Walmart or Target, its 5 cups/lids/straws for $2.99. I like those the best because there isn't a valve in the straw but they are harder than normal straws so they last awhile, plus they are pretty spill proof.

[katelove]

For meals our 15 mo eats what we're eating. For snacks, if she is eating but we aren't, then it's usually a PB sandwich, some cheese, rice crackers or fruit.

[mommy212]

Share your food! DS at that age loved sweet potatoes, cute into bite sized and roasted. You can try new fruits, like raspberries, pears, etc., and always new veggies while they are small is a great idea.

[P.J.]

DS is 15months, we did Baby-Led Weaning so he's always had solids (no purees or jarred baby food) and since about 10 months he eats what we eat more or less (before that we gave him mostly just pure fruit or veggies, sometimes steamed depending what it was).

For breakfast we sometimes do smoothies which I have been feeding him with a spoon....but the closed-top cup w/straw is a great idea I think we may try next time! He loves avocado (I also give w. a spoon as when we give it to him directly it gets sooooo messy and we are pressed for time most mornings) for brekkers, or yogurt, or banana or apple slices. I usually offer all these things and every morning it's different what he wants (although avocado seems to be a consistent favorite).

For snacks he is crazy about cheese. In fact I wonder how much is too much. So far he's not constipated from it so I think it's okay, but he goes up to the fridge and says "cheese cheese cheese" until I give him some, several times a day! He also snacks on plain spelt crackers or sesame spelt pretzels, or these really yummy sugar-free (sweetened w/raisins) cookies, or rice cakes. Also cuke slices, apples, or banana. He also loves soy hot dogs and sausages (we are vegetarian) and all that imitation meat stuff. It's not healthy so I try to not give it to him every single day, but he gobbles it up so it is definitely a regular food for us. I just pre-cook them and chop them up and keep handy for snacks.

He pretty much just snacks throughout the day, and I have found the idea of three big meals a day is just not natural for him. I make sure he gets something in him in the morning before we start our day, but the rest of the day including dinner time is just lots of little snacks and of course offering him whatever we are eating at meals. It's just that he rarely will eat much more than a little nibble at any one time, so there are no big "meals" for him, even if he's sitting with us at lunch or dinner.