How should I feed my baby?

[Carin81]

Hi Everybody,

I am a new mother and my daughter is 4 months old. It’s my first child and I need some advice. Where can I decide on the best things to buy my baby? My question is, where can I gather reliable information about baby food and other things.

What should I look for when buying food for my baby? Do you just go in the store or should I inform myself at home about the products before?

Thank you very much for your help. I am  looking forward to rearing from you.

Carin

[LaughingHyena]

You little one is still quite young so you have plenty of time to research.

Have you come across baby led weaning? http://www.babyledweaning.com/  It's defiantly worth a read. I came across it shortly after we started solids with my first, because she just was not interested in me coming anywhere near her with a spoon. She was much happier picking up the food and feeding herself. Dispute all my worries about choking she was surprisingly good about spitting out things which turned out to be to chewy for her to handle.

In terms of what to feed we had quite a lot of allergies in our family so we went quite slowly introducing new foods so I could see if they were having any reactions and avoided things like dairy and eggs till they were a bit older.

Some easy options were sticks of steamed vegetables, chunks of avacardo, small pieces of fishcake/bean burgers.

[SundayCrepes]

Definitely go with baby led weaning. My son's first solid was the potato and pea insides of a samosa. Our daughter's first food was avocado.

[Carin81]

Thank you for your answers and help. So you would reccomend not to feed packaged baby food, right? What du you think is wrong with baby food? What do you miss? Because sometimes it is pretty handy and convenient.

[Youngfrankenstein]

It's not that anything is wrong with it, it's just completely unnecessary.  Babies who are ready for solids don't need purees.  Babies who are still nursing or taking a bottle will use milk as their primary source of nutrition for that first year at least so introducing solids is a supplement to that.  The old saying goes "Solids under 1 are just for fun."

Solids are to give your baby the experience of getting ready to convert, eventually.  We started with half bananas, mushy cooked veggies, shredded meats are great to start with. 

So many people are hung up with spooning rice cereal in their baby when it's nutritionally void and is taking up lots of room that milk should be taking up.  I've never read the Baby Led Weaning book but you might want to.  It may explain the whys better than I am.

Of course we spoon fed things like soup and yogurt but honestly I would hold up the spoon close to their mouths and let them grab it and put it in their mouths.  I think much of baby led weaning is not shoving food in their mouths for them.  Helping them get a grip on a squishy banana is great but not "feeding" them.

And most commercially prepared foods for babies and toddlers are either purees or junk food like "puffs" or fruit snacks.  I did buy rice rusks as a thing for them to work on as a longer-eating treat.

Just watch your baby and once he's at least 6 months, see what you think he's ready for development-wise.  Some babies don't get interested in food until 7, 8, 9 months.  Mine all went pretty gung ho at 7 months or so.

[LaughingHyena]

We did use a few jars, because yes it was handy to have something to take for a meal out or something when we didn't know what food would be available and I didn't want to mess with keeping food cold in my bag. On the whole the kids were never that keen on actually eating them so it didn't really work out. Also if I could give them say a chunk of something they could manage themselves then they would be occupied while I got to eat my meal while it was still hot.

I did find I spoon fed them more often when we were out, I wasn't t hat keen on putting their food on restaurant high chair trays (no idea how often they get cleaned or what they are cleaned with) so till they were more reliable about using a plate/napkin to put things on I spoon fed them.

Our food to go in that case was half an avacardo. Chopped in half it did start to brown a bit the the kids never cared and it was easy to transport in a little plastic tub and scoop out with a spoon.

[llwr]

http://wholesomebabyfood.momtastic.com/ is a pretty good site.  Talks both about BLW and purees, what foods are considered safe at what age, and how to make baby food at home. 

I bought jars mostly just for traveling.  It's nice to have something you know they can eat with you. 

[ashleyhaugh]

i think ds might have had a jar or two of applesauce or something, but mostly we did baby led weaning as well. big pieces (think french fry shaped, theyre easier for little hands to hold onto before they get their pincer grasp down) of soft foods, like super ripe bananas or avocados, steamed veggies like carrots or sweet potatoes (that was our first food) and bread is always a hit, lol. i think its easier to learn about eating when youre actually eating, instead of just having liquid spooned down your throat

[Megan73]

You've got some time to figure it out! Every child health authority in the world says babies should be exclusively breastfed for at least six months. And even then, baby should be sitting alone and showing interest in food - not just the spoon.