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Homemade Baby Food For Busy People

Preparing homemade baby food assures that Baby will get better nutrition than that which comes from a jar.

Before my son was even born, I had already decided two things about his nutrition: one, I was going to breastfeed him as long as he wanted; and two, no mush from any jar would ever pass through his lips.

Nope, not even the organic brand. Although it's free from chemicals, it is still processed food, lacking in the nutrients and freshness found in food just prepared from scratch. Other reasons to choose homemade baby food over store-bought:

It's less expensive.
You probably won't mind finishing it if your baby doesn't (just looking at a jar of strained peas nauseates me). Which connects with the next point:
It tastes better.
Your baby deserves the best.
Preparing homemade baby food takes very little time.

"But I don't even have that much time!"

Yes, you do. It's time for some out-of-the-box thinking.

A new way to view feeding babies

What if I told you that you didn't have to start feeding your child solids at six months? What if I told you that you could keep your child exclusively at the breast (I deal with formula in this article) for eight, ten, even fourteen months?

What if your child didn't start eating solids until he or she could, well, eat solids? That is, the same kind of food you eat, only cut up into smaller bites? I think you can agree that in that case, preparing homemade baby food would take a lot less time than you thought. As in, several months less.

According to Lauren Feder, M.D, author of Natural Baby and Childcare, such a practice is perfectly acceptable, and regularly followed by more traditional societies. Being a particular age is no more a readiness sign to eat solid food than it is to begin learning the multiplication tables.

What are some more appropriate readiness signs than age, according to Dr. Feder? Your baby...

can sit upright, and nonverbally communicate wants (such as, "no more");
seriously stares at the food on your fork, then subsequently
grabs at your food; and
eagerly opens mouth when you offer food.

My son didn't show any serious signs of wanting anything other than my milk until he was nine months old. At that point, he started fussing whenever he saw us eating. He still had to begin with well-blended (homemade) baby foods, but he left that stage much more quickly than most younger babies do.

I have a friend whose son began tasting food around the age of nine months. He much preferred the breast, however, and didn't begin seriously eating solids until the age of fourteen months. By that time, he was mature enough that he didn't require any special food preparation. Not even homemade baby food.

Waiting to start our sons on solids saved us a lot of time and effort. Furthermore, the later a baby begins solid foods, the more mature their digestive and immune systems, and the less likely food allergies are to show their ugly heads.

Four ways to make homemade baby food a snap

Even if you do wait past six months to start your baby on solids, she may, like my son, still need the mush to start out. And when she gets past the mush stage, she will still not be able to dive into a plateful of hamburger and lettuce salad.

Here are four ways to cut down the food preparation time for Baby.

Include foods you want Baby to try with the regular family meal, and blend her portion in a hand-held blender or mini food processor.
Prepare more than one meal at a time: blend more than one Baby serving of several different foods, then freeze serving-size portions in ice cube trays or muffin tins.
When Baby is ready for more solid foods, give her what you are feeding the rest of the family, only cut up into bite-size pieces.
Provide Baby with several different kinds of soft foods to try at one meal; for example, a slice of cheese, a few small pieces of nectarine, and three or four small cubes of meatloaf.

Where to find homemade baby food recipes

This website is a great online resource of baby food recipes. The site author not only provides food suggestions and recipes for babies of different ages, but she also has articles on a variety of related topics, such as food allergies, traveling with Baby, and food safety.

Raw fruits and vegetables are an important part of anyone's diets, as all the enzymes and nutrients remain intact. However, because of the chew factor babies and toddlers have a hard time getting most types of produce down.

Enter the book Baby Greens: A Live-Food Approach for Children of All Ages by Michaela Lynn and Michael Chrisemer. Although I do not agree with the authors' premise that a raw vegan diet is the epitomy of healthy eating, I do appreciate the wonderful recipes they provide that combine a variety of fruits and vegetables in a tasty manner.

The recipes for babies are mostly various types of smoothies made from fruit, vegetables, and nut milk. Having tried a few, I can vouch for the fact that they are enjoyable for adults as well.

Of course, once your baby is past the stage of eating only one kind of food at a time, you can let your creativity soar. Combine millet with squash, for example, or almond butter blended with banana.

May I coach you? Your children deserve the best, and food from scratch is always the most excellent choice. No matter how busy you are, feeding your baby homemade food can be fun and easy with a little forethought.

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