Early fruits

As I have mentioned in previous posts, I am a fan of ice cube freezing. Lessons I have learned as it relates to fruits...
In the winter, apples and pears are easy to do in large batches and a dash of cinnamon gives them a kick. Just chop, boil (add a bit of water if doing apples alone) and puree. Frozen blueberries are also easy and I found that Costco started selling 5 lb bags of organic blueberries. For on the go, bananas have been a life saver, I just cut off the top and dig a spoon in like an ice cream scoop. I did experiment with mixing bananas with blueberries and other fruits but found when I pureed bananas, they had an odd texture and of course didn't keep for more then a few hours.

For the summer, peaches and mangos were in high demand. I like them because if they are ripe enough, they don't even need to be pureed (unless freezing) and made for good early finger foods. Fresh blueberries and grapes are also great initial finger foods. We peel the grapes and quarter them. We just half the blueberries, little man didn't seem have any issues with the skins.

Make any veggie yummy

While I have been trying to introduce as many vegetables to the little man as possible, he has, at an early age, established a distinct palate. Anything orange - sweet potato, butternut squash and carrots are a fav. I found when other vegetables are not up to his taste (cauliflower, broccoli, peas) if I had one of the former, it makes everything delicious and packs extra nutrients into his purees. I always do a large batch of sweet potatoes and carrots to freeze into cubes to throw into something at a moments notice. I add butter for extra fat and low sodium chicken broth to flavor the purees and give them a smoother consistency.

Feed yourself breakfast

Looking for more finger food options, I recently grabbed some frozen waffles. Vans is a great brand of organic waffles. After toasting them, I nuke em for a few seconds to soften them up. Little guy likes them plain but sometimes I add a bit of yogurt to dip.

While waffles are great and easy, they can still be a bit crunchy when you only have two bottom teeth. Next experiment..... pancakes. They are more time consuming but also make a great finger food and we have been having fun adding new ingredients.

I like Bob's Red Mill organic whole wheat mix. Mixed with water and olive oil, we add bananas and cinnamon or blueberries and mashed apple for breakfast. I have even added sweet potatoes and carrots in a pinch for a last minute dinner.

Mini Meat Balls

This was our intro to beef, it was really easy to pull together and tasty (Dad kept sneaking them for himself). Because we suspect some dairy sensitivity, we left out the egg and instead replaced it with olive oil. Next time, I am going to add in some carrots or zucchini for extra veggies.

If you are in for a mess, it makes a great finger food. Tonight I mashed a few up with some rice and he gobbled it up.

Ground beef
Bread crumbs
Olive oil
Onion
Mushrooms
Basil
Tomato sauce

Finely chop onion, mushroom and basil. Mix with ground beef, bread crumbs and olive oil. Roll into tiny meat balls. Add olive oil to pan and brown meat balls transfer to an oven save dish and cover with tomato sauce. Bake at 350 for 45 mins.

My favorite meal

Because we skipped rice cereal (which is fortified with iron), it was important to introduce meat early. The little man's first meat was chicken thigh, which I introduced at about 7 months. I found a great recipe in the book "Top 100 Baby Purees" by Annabel Karmel - it includes sweet potato and apple to increase the flavor and he ate it up. A lot of the mom's in my "mom's group" had trouble getting their little ones to eat meat but this recipe seemed to win a lot of them over. The below recipe has become a staple and I have done several variations, adding rice, substituting carrots for sweet potato, pears for apple, etc. When they are older, it is still a hit but with no puree-ing required.

Note - b/c I often cook once a week and freeze the majority of the food, I don't often list amounts for ingredients. It all depends on how much you want to make and often it is easy to eyeball the correct amount.

Butter
Onion
Chicken thighs - chopped
Sweet potato - peeled and chopped
Apple - peeled and chopped
Chicken stock - low sodium or half/half CS and water

Saute onion in butter, add chicken to saute for a few additional minutes until it looks opaque. Add sweet potato and apple and cover with chicken stock. Bring to a boil then cover and simmer until chicken is cooked through and sweet potato and apple are soft. Puree.

Carrots and nitrates?

I was at a party recently and another mom told me that you shouldn't make carrots as part of homemade baby food because of the high nitrate content. I naturally freaked because carrots have been a staple in little guy's diet since the early days of solids (see "make any veggie yummy"). I promptly did some research when I got home and found this statement to be overblown. According to an article from Wholesomebabyfood.com the AAP, homemade carrots and other foods high in nitrates (spinach, beets, broccoli) should be avoided before 3 months of age. Pretty rare that anyone would be feeding solids that early and my fears were put to rest. Bring on the carrots.

First bites

Being a mom of a preemie, I am constantly worried that the little guy is getting enough milk, food, calories. Our Dr. wasn't a fan of rice cereal so we decided to jump right into the fruits and veggies for baby's first food. For its creamy texture and high fat content, we chose avocado for his first taste. He couldn't get enough of it - I blended it with some BM and he took right to it. The next week, we moved on to sweet potatoes, steamed and mixed with BM. I read that steamed was he best way to prepare baby foods as it maintains the nutrients.