So, my little man is now eating solid foods.  Remember, he is lactose intolerant and possibly wheat sensitive. 

And I thought finding food for myself was hard.

If you go to the grocery store and look at the labels on the baby food jars you will be shocked to find all the crazy ingredients on them.  If you're like me, you'll cringe at the idea of putting that junk into your baby.

At first it was easy to feed him; rice cereal (the organic box of course), mixed with breast milk and/or bottled water.  Organic carrots, peas, and green beans; squash and sweet potato.  But one can only eat so much of that.  This is where the " fresh feeder" comes in.

This thing is the greatest invention next to sliced bread and penicillin.  I learned about it from my cousin who gave me one after I saw her son going to town on a piece of grilled chicken once.  He only had six teeth then.

Buddy has less than six teeth yet he is eating meat!  And the best part is, he loves it!

The "fresh feeder" is a little mesh bag with a big handle.  You insert your food of choice in the mesh bag and snap it shut.  Then you hand it to baby.  Since baby already puts everything in his/her mouth, they figure out fairly quickly what to do with it.

Here's the latest thing I've been feeding my little eater.




(Remember, you don't want to salt the food.  Salt is very overpowering.  You want baby to develop a taste for the food itself, not for salt or other condiments.  You can start salting things as baby becomes a toddler.  The same goes for sugar.)

Allow the stew to cool completely.  Then, remove all excess fat from the food (when cold, it's a white, hard substance that usually forms around the edge of the container).  Warm up some meat in the juice to keep the meat tender.  Then, when the meat is warm (but not hot), place inside the clean fresh feeder.  Be careful when using the microwave to warm up food.  Hot spots may occur.
A great way to warm up baby food is to use a bottle warmer.  I save baby food jars.  They fit perfectly in the warmer.

Buddy will suck all the juice out of the meat, it's great!

Other feeding methods:

-Use the baby mill to grind up the meat (and carrots and peas).  Mix it up with some meat juice, rice cereal, and/or water.  You'll soon learn what consistency baby likes.

-Mash up the carrots, peas, and potatoes and give them to baby mashed.  Be sure to mash well.  If your baby is sensitive to chunky food, he/she could gag and then you've lost your chance at a feeding.

-Finally, if your baby is still not sure about this new food, you can mix up some of the meat juice in his/her rice cereal to give them a taste for it.

Storage:

A great way to store food for future use is to use ice cube trays.  You can prepare the food ahead of time and then freeze it or just store it whole.  (Be sure to freeze right away.)  Then, just pull out as many cubes as you need per feeding.  You can store for up to 4 months in the freezer.  Remember, you should never re-freeze food.


Feeding baby can be both challenging and fun.  Buddy loves to eat, but when he's had enough, he's not shy about telling me.  He usually starts chucking things across the room.

I am signing to him (this is for another blog entry), but he looks at me as if I've lost my mind and of course throwing is way more fun!