STARTING BABY ON SOLID FOODS

It has arrived again – another one of my children is beginning to eat solid foods. I have contemplated posting about how I do this “food thing” with my babies for a while, and now that I am facing that stage once again, I decided to post about it - to give myself a refresher!

You may be interested in reading this post as well, which includes some very helpful information. I actually do a very similar process as that mother, as far as theory goes, but I think I may be less methodical. So, here are my two cents, for what it’s worth!

WHEN TO BEGIN

First of all, I delay solids as long as possible. Well, let me re-phrase that. I wait until the child is showing all signs of being ready and interested in eating. I see no reason to force-feed a child that is mainly keen on ejecting everything you put in his or her mouth! I have enough messes to clean up without that, so I just skip it if the child is not interested. I should also qualify this by saying that my babies have all been very chubby and have all continued gaining weight at a sufficient rate, so there has been no question of adequate nutrition.

Okay, so once the child is between 7-9 months of age and is clearly interested in eating *food* --- there is a difference between wanting to eat and simply wanting to put all items within reach into the mouth--- then we begin the journey and adventure of solid food.

With one of my children, I could hardly hold her off until 7 months because she clearly wanted to eat, and once I started feeding her, she immediately wanted to eat us out of house and home! I had to constantly struggle against over-feeding her, which would often cause constipation in her still immature digestive system.

On the other end of the spectrum, I had one child who hardly wanted to eat anything at all until he was 14 months old! We would offer him different things, and he would “taste test” a bite or two, and then want nothing more to do with it. Incidentally, he was my fattest baby, so I didn’t worry about him too much. One day, at 14 months old, he all-of-a-sudden got hungry, and has eaten just fine ever since that day!

WHAT TO BEGIN WITH

Well, before they actually start *eating*, I do begin giving them cod liver oil and spirulina powder or barleygreen powder in small quantities around six months old. But that isn’t really eating….

But once I have established that my baby is old enough and interested enough to begin eating solid foods, I like to start with avocado as a first food. It needs no processing or mashing and is the perfect texture. It is very high in nutrients as well. I prefer that to starting with fruit, only because I like to train their taste buds to like vegetables before feeding them sweet foods like fruit. So, we start with avocado.

Just cut it open and spoon a few bites directly out of the shell.

We stick with that for a while, but I am super relaxed about the whole process. I always make sure they nurse before eating, so that they are not super-famished at feeding time. I’m not trying to encourage early weaning, but only trying to teach a new skill. If they are sleeping at convenient times to feed them, I just don’t feed them that day! They are not eating at this point for nutrition, really, as they are still getting all they need from breastmilk. It is more a matter of learning a new skill and “practicing” eating. At this point, I never bring food for the baby along with us when we go out either. If we are out, they just nurse and are perfectly happy to do so.

After a few weeks of avocado, I begin giving them an egg yolk a day, preferably from farm-raised, free range chickens. Never give egg white to a baby under a year old. The yolk, however, is full of nutrients that baby needs for healthy brain growth. I just cook it on my cast-iron griddle.

I gradually add other foods. Brown rice and oatmeal are good beginning foods. I never buy that nasty “baby food” flaky stuff that is supposed to be healthy for them. It is way too processed!

Instead, I just take some of the brown rice that I have already cooked for our family and cook it a bit longer in more water to make it a softer, mushier texture before feeding it to baby. And I don’t do this very long either. Soon, they can eat the same brown rice that we do.

As for oatmeal, I blend whole old fashioned rolled oats in the blender before cooking it, to make it into a powder. Then I cook a small amount on the stove with plain water and serve. Again, I only do this for a short while as well, as they very soon can begin eating the same oatmeal that the family eats.

Sometime about 10-11 months, I start giving them small amounts of plain yogurt, preferably homemade from fresh milk.

By this time, they also begin taste-testing some of the family vegetables when we eat them, eating some carrot bits as finger foods and things like that. And I probably am starting to give them some fruits by this time as well. Bananas always seem to be a big hit with babies. I just try to go easy on them, because they are quite high in fructose, and also because they tend to cause constipation in little ones. Sweet potatoes are also a hit.

By the time baby is about a year old, I try to plan the family meals with at least one thing that baby can eat along with us, like vegetable soup or a sweet potato or something like that. That way, I am not making something separate for baby and it is easier for me that way. Typically by this time, baby also becomes aware if he/she is eating something different from the rest of the family and is less inclined to cooperate about eating it. I prefer to keep fights about food to a minimum if possible!

FOODS TO AVOID

Long before I was married, I used to work for a medical doctor that dealt with all sorts of food allergies. He told me to be extremely careful with what I gave my baby, if I ever had one, because introducing certain foods to a baby before their immature digestive system is prepared to handle it often causes them to develop allergies to that food. These allergies are often subtle enough to go undetected, but are common culprits to all sorts of physical discomforts and maladies.

The top allergy causing foods are:

-Dairy

-Peanuts

-Corn

-Wheat

Other things to avoid:

-Egg whites

-Honey

I avoid giving these foods to my babies at all costs until well over a year. The wheat is especially hard to avoid having other people give to your baby, but it is worth the effort to avoid a food allergy!