Baby Food Basics

I have a serious love of making homemade baby food. It's simple and it's kind of fun (shhhh..don't repeat that!) and it's nice to know what we're feeding the tiniest member of our family is healthy and unprocessed.

There are a ton of baby food recipe books. You may laugh at the thought of that (I did at first) because really baby food is just stuff thrown in a blender, right? Well yes. But the book I have is a good tool on age appropriate food. The "recipes" also give a good guideline on how to prepare and cook each fruit and veggie. It also gives good suggestions on stuff I wouldn't have thought of trying. As your child gets older, the recipes become more complex. Admittedly I stopped referring to the book as much when Ally started eating the same meals we did but it's a nice reference if I'm looking for a unique snack or a healthy fruit/veggie combo.

A quick over view of my baby food practices. I make big batches of food at one time. I freeze the food in ice cube trays and then store the frozen cubes in ziploc bags which are labeled with type and date made. Most food can be frozen for months (veggie freezing) and you're likely to use it all up long before quality becomes a concern. I did buy a heavy duty blender when I started making Ally's food because I used it a lot and it was worth the investment. It's still going strong now. A coffee grinder designated for grains only is also helpful (see below.) Aside from the range, that's really all you need.

Something I have learned about recently is making your own rice cereal as opposed to the iron fortified processed flakes from a box. I never really thought about the rice cereal until I started reading the ingredients and did some research. Many babies are started on rice cereal first because it is so basic and easy to digest. Very few people have rice allergies (more common is an allergy to the pollen that may be on the rice) and it is typically well received by immature digestive systems. For babies with GERD or similar issues, rice cereal can help "thicken" the food and reduce spitting up and easy tummy pain. However, the boxed cereal is a bit deceiving. There is a long ingredient list of additives because the rice has to be "stripped down" before it can be dehydrated. All the basic good stuff has to then be added back in. The bottom line to this topic is that this 1st food has been cooked and dehydrated and enriched and made into a complicated product.

So I decided to try making my own rice cereal. It couldn't be that hard right? Well it took a little experimenting but I figured it out.

1) Follow package instructions to make 1-2 cups of short grain brown rice. Let cool slightly.
2) Puree rice in blender with 1/4 cup water until smooth, adding water as necessary to thin down mixture to desired thickness.
3) Freeze in ice cube trays.
4) When frozen, put cubes in plastic bag and label.

That's all there is too it. I also used a coffee grinder (one that is just for grains) to grind up some rice into a fine powder. This can be taken to Grandma's house and kept in the fridge for meals over there. For the powder you use 1/4 cup powder to 1 C water and boil together for 10 min.

As we all know, many kids move past enjoying rice cereal once they try fruits and veggies because there's not a lot of taste. However, mixing one cube of cereal with a fruit or veggie makes a great meal and adds in good nutrition such as bran, iron and magnesium. You can also use the above method for oatmeal cereal.