Making Baby Food

So, who does it?

I know we have had a lot of babies born here in the past year, so how many of you are making your own baby food? We just started, pretty excited about the nutrition and economy of it all!

Made a weeks worth of food for baby last night in 15 minutes!

How do you do it? Just steam the food and toss in a food processor?

We did it. None of my kids are babies any more now though.

We had a little hand grinder, put the cooked and cooled food in, and grind away!

They dont recommed steaming persay as the nutrients end up in the water. They do however recommend cooking the foods in a container with a couple TBSP of water, then processing them. We then freeze them in special "ice cube" containers that divide it up into 1oz servings.

Once frozen, you pop them out, seal in a bag, mark with type and date. You then thaw them and serve later, one at a time

After reading about processed baby foods and what they do to it to make it last for YEARS, we decided it wasnt really for us, and the cost is rediculous.

Same as what we do. We peel a squash, sweet potato, etc. and cut it in half. Lay it on a plate with a little water around it and microwave for 5 to 10 minutes. We have a $10 food processor from Menards that turns it into mush in no time. Its then frozen into the ice cube trays. We've got a freezer full of trays of various squash, yams, carrots, peas, and more.

We haven't tried any meats, but I suppose the process is similar. They just have to be mixed with something mushy.

I think it's really only useful for that short "in between" phase where they're eating solids, but not eating regular table food yet. If you buy a lot of baby food when it's on sale, it's not THAT much more expensive than making your own. Especially here in Chicago where produce is usually rape anyway... not much difference between buying a $6 squash and spending a half hour prepping it, or buying 10 jars of food and calling it a day.

We would do some here and there, but we mostly fed commercial food at the puree stage.

Now that he's on to table food (16 mos), it's a lot more fun... I make him "sandwiches" where I put two think sliced of meat and a slice of cheese between two pieces of LIGHTLY buttered bread (just to get it to stick basically), and then smash it flat with a big knife or the bottom of a pot. Trim the crusts off, cut it into squares, and you have a fingerfood sandwiches.

Stuff like that... other than that, he eats what we eat.

We steam vegetables in our steamer like normal and we through it into a food processor we bought for this. After a few weeks we got lazy and used our tv commercial grade electric chopper to chop of the girls food. It saved a crap load of money and was worth it. Thankfully my girls are now at that age that they tell me they don't like food and can explain why and I'm left dumbfounded with their reasoning. Damn I'm getting old...

I saw the thread title and thought it was a euphemism for drinking too much!

Our babies weren't on baby food for long. Sometimes SWMBO would grind up whatever we were having and add that to commercial baby food but usually it was just a serving of whatever was on the table. Mashed to a thick goo of course.

GVH_Dan said:

Same as what we do. We peel a squash, sweet potato, etc. and cut it in half. Lay it on a plate with a little water around it and microwave for 5 to 10 minutes. We have a $10 food processor from Menards that turns it into mush in no time. Its then frozen into the ice cube trays. We've got a freezer full of trays of various squash, yams, carrots, peas, and more.

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Did this but moved on to more substantial stuff as quickly as we could. He was also really into feeding himself so we gave him all kinds of finger food (eggs, fruits, veggies, pita, etc.). Now the dude (10 mos) pretty much eats whatever we eat, unless it's too spicy.

Usually on Sunday we'll make a pot of brown rice with a ton of cut-up veggies and maybe some beans in it, and he eats it at least once a day for the next 3-4 days. Really easy, really healthy, and he digs it.

I agree with MrInternet, the "baby food" phase is so short that we just bought the baby food for a while. It seems like with the first kid we were more touchy about moving to "real food" but the younger boy basically went from the tit to whatever the rest of us are having for dinner. We might mash it or cut it into pieces but it's nothing I'd call "baby food."

The big thing for us was to look at the ingredient list on the baby food jar-- some jars that contain "squash" will say "squash, salt" and some will say "squash, sodiubichloromethalidamalathiaminoplasma, Tibetan yak sperm." So we just kept an eye on the ingredient list for the (very brief) baby food phase.

we used the "happy baby" hand grinder (30 yrs ago)

everything we ate went directly into it and into the kids (except for crusts of bread that they teethed on)

they wound up loving everything including turnip greens, broccoli, brussel sprouts, beans, squash, enchiladas, quiche, ...

baby food out of a jar is BS

Well, an acorn sqaush here is $1.48.

This will make 16 ounces of baby food.

Baby food at the sore here runs about $.25 per ounce.

16 ounces of processes and preserved baby food is $4

16 ounces of fresh, 100% natural baby food made from ANY vegetalbe or fruit we choose, $1.48

One of the great benefits is the fact that your child is allowed to eat, really... anything. Not what the major baby food manufacturers happen to have on the shelves.

Sometimes it is not what is "added" to processed baby food, but what is "removed" to make it keep well on store shelves.

We made baby food for our daughter. it was insanely easy(and cheap), did the ice cube tray method.

We'll definitely do it again for our 2nd. We did use commercial food as well, but we used as much homemade as we could.

We make most of the baby food that our 7 month old eats. We also steam veggies, process, and freeze in ice cube trays...wicked easy.

He is a big boy and typically eats 4 "ice cubes" worth of food and 6 oz of formula for dinner. As I understand it, most babies his age are good with a single jar of baby food. This is our first so I don't have anything to compare his intake to. I can't imagine feeding him only the store-bought stuff!

MrInternet said:

... not much difference between buying a $6 squash and spending a half hour prepping it, or buying 10 jars of food and calling it a day.

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$6 dollar squash!! We get them for about 50 cents up here in Madison. So it is a cost savings plus we don't have to read the labels looking for Yak sperm and monosodiumsdfomaontokcouinslkengoi.

Yeah, off-season produce is a beyotch here in Chicagoland... he started eating solids right in the middle of winter... what ya gonna do.

we also use the frozen bags of veggies (peas, green-beans). Those are also pretty cheap...I'm sure you could also use the boxes of frozen squash if the fresh veg is super expensive.

We used store bought for the very short time he was on it. WE talked about making our own and I really expected swmbo to do it, just never did.

MrInternet said:

Yeah, off-season produce is a beyotch here in Chicagoland... he started eating solids right in the middle of winter... what ya gonna do.

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Get Winter squash? Just thinkin' out loud, here.


TL

We did for a little while. Got one of those "motor boat" processors.

Store bought was no hassle and not much more expensive plus it provides a **** load of nice small jars for keeping the odd bits in.

Youngest is already on finger foods at 10 months.

we want to give it a whirl for our little guy. I think between the nutritional aspect and the low cost its a win win.

pickles said:

we want to give it a whirl for our little guy. I think between the nutritional aspect and the low cost its a win win.

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It really is, nothing can compete with fresh. Also, like I said earlier, you can expose him to nearly anything, whereas at the store you are severely limited.

To those of you toting the nutriotional reasoning (it's good reasoning) how many of your children were breast fed?
My son is finally in the wheening process at 15 months old. I was not worried about lack of nutrients from store bought food one bit with the wife nursing him.
He finally got his first fever last week, but we are now thinking it was teething related because we noticed a new tooth two days ago that had broke through and he was generally in a good mood with the fever. So we're calling it, still never been sick.

The Pol said:

It really is, nothing can compete with fresh. Also, like I said earlier, you can expose him to nearly anything, whereas at the store you are severely limited.

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This is also a good point...the store-bought food is pretty limited.

We are feeding our kid beets...and he's eating them!

I'm with Pol on this. I wish I'd have thought of it when our kids were little. I am positive we would have saved money, but just the idea that you are feeding pure veggies, and not a bunch of salt and who knows what, and how long it's been in the jar.

But we fed them jars and it all turned out fine anyway.

IrregularPulse said:

To those of you toting the nutriotional reasoning (it's good reasoning) how many of your children were breast fed?
My son is finally in the wheening process at 15 months old. I was not worried about lack of nutrients from store bought food one bit with the wife nursing him.
He finally got his first fever last week, but we are now thinking it was teething related because we noticed a new tooth two days ago that had broke through and he was generally in a good mood with the fever. So we're calling it, still never been sick.

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My wife breastfed while she was on maternity leave and for a couple of months while she was back at work. She gave it the good-old college try, but it ultimately worked out (for multiple reasons) that formula would be easier for all of us. Once we switched him to formula, things got MUCH EASIER for all of us, and we began to enjoy life again!

There was alot of hang-wringing when deciding to switch him to formula, and both of us being scientists, we did our due-diligence in looking at the scientific studies investigating breast vs. formula. As it turns out, those studies really didn't show any clear advantage of breast milk over formula, as everyone would have you believe. I won't go on my full tirade about breastfeeding , but I have concluded that their is a little bit of hot-air in the "breast is best" argument.

That being said, our kid does get sick (maybe 3-4 times so far) but we've been ascribing this to daycare and not so much because he is now on formula. Germs get passed around that place like nobody's business and it can't be helped. Oh well, he'll have a strong immune system when he gets to school and he is getting his H1N1 shot today!

IrregularPulse said:

To those of you toting the nutriotional reasoning (it's good reasoning) how many of your children were breast fed?
My son is finally in the wheening process at 15 months old. I was not worried about lack of nutrients from store bought food one bit with the wife nursing him.
He finally got his first fever last week, but we are now thinking it was teething related because we noticed a new tooth two days ago that had broke through and he was generally in a good mood with the fever. So we're calling it, still never been sick.

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Wow, 15 months, that is really great. You guys should be proud for what you were able to do for your son. My wife was able to go 6-8 months which both of our daughters before nature took its course.

Our first daughter got sick all the time, but she was in a day care center early. Ever since we pulled her out and was going to a private nanny (that had 2 or 3 other kids) the colds, pink eye, etc stopped. Our second daughter doesn't get sick at all and has only been with the private nanny, rather than a big day care center.
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As for the food, I would love to do it. I'm the one who goes food shopping, so I know a jar of baby food is about a buck a piece and I buy like 20-30 of them a week, plus the $25 (powdered formula) (which, btw, thankfully we switched to that. We used to use the premade liquid cans and we were going through a case of that **** a week at $38 a pop).

Not to derail the topic but my wife's due in Feb and she plans to breast feed. Money definitely weighed into that decision too, not just nutrition. The homemade baby food will follow which should save mucho dinero too. We have a garden and are in a local co-op so our vegetables are really cheap.

We make all of our baby food. I am the cook of the house so I usually whip up a bunch of food for the week.

I puree a lot fo different types of food and then use about four regular ice cube trays to freeze little cubes. It is great and we can grab it on the go.

Our oldest (15 months) now eats everything we eat, but I will be pureeing (sp?) again for our 3 month old by the end of november.

The one thing we struggled with was meat so I started to get creative. There are some awesome website with great recipes all about this. Check this out if you have a chance:

http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com/

If you have the time, it is a great way to introduce a large variety of food to your kids. To this day, I roast up Sweet Potatoes for my oldest and he loves it.

My wife tried to breast feed for about 5 weeks but it just wasn't taking and she was constantly getting mastitus (sp?).

johnnyc: if this is your first baby be sure to have your wife see the lactation consultant (usually free while she and baby are in hospital). They can give great info for breast feeding. Believe it or not it can be difficult and a real PIA!

I'm a step-dad so missed out on that phase of my kids' development (and not sorry about it a bit ), but I can heartily recommend Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater. It's a fun read and a real eye-opener for parents uncertain about what their babies can and cannot eat. Disclosure: the author, Matthew Amster-Burton is an acquaintance and colleague. I like him and think he's a good guy. I don't think that colors my judgment of the book, however.

Another interesting resource is the DVD Chef and Father, made by a veteran chef who realized he could do better than commercial food for his kids.

Then, when my daughter turned six months old, something new came into the picture. Solid food. Uh oh, here we go again. Get out the books, start making phone calls…wait…hold on. Cooking. I know cooking! I browsed a few books to get the basics and then I got to work. I have been a chef for sixteen years and cooked all over the world. But nothing has matched the joy and satisfaction I received when my daughter took that first bite of mashed yams I prepared and actually seemed to enjoy it. I was hooked. Over the next year and a half, I came up with all sorts of fun and healthy ways to cook for kids and, more importantly, new techniques to make it easy on the parents.

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I didn't read the whole thread so this may have been brought up already but when we had our three we would just cook a little more of what we were having and made the leftovers into baby food. We eat a lot of veggies and pretty healthy anyways. SWMBO would make stews and then use a blender on it and freeze it in small containers they all loved spaghetti .

but then again you could just toss them a rib .



or a let them suck on a piece of steak

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000067Q6J/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20



We bought a couple jars of baby food for Sibella (the best organic stuff we could find), tasted it and thought it was gross. Sibella seemed to think the same. She has been eating dinner with us ever since.

We just take what ever we are eating, and grind it up. She loves it and gets exposed to a ton of different foods with no extra work. We LOVE it! Try it for yourself, it only cost $10.

:EDIT: I noticed some folk already mentioned this. Mostly older generations know about it and felt they didn't need to tell us young whipper snappers about it. Why?! I hate it when that happens. Anyway, it is easy to use and gets baby food costs to zero.

Boerderij_Kabouter said:

:EDIT: I noticed some folk already mentioned this. Mostly older generations know about it and felt they didn't need to tell us young whipper snappers about it. Why?! I hate it when that happens. Anyway, it is easy to use and gets baby food costs to zero.

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just remember as I always tell my son "I taught you everything you know.... But I didn't teach you everything that I know."

from an old German Dr when I called him about my son teething . He asked me what I like to drink told him Jack Daniels . He then Told me " Pour out two shots take the one and dip a qtip in it and rub your sons gum's the other shot you drink"

Chad said:

I'm a step-dad so missed out on that phase of my kids' development (and not sorry about it a bit ), but I can heartily recommend Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater. It's a fun read and a real eye-opener for parents uncertain about what their babies can and cannot eat. Disclosure: the author, Matthew Amster-Burton is an acquaintance and colleague. I like him and think he's a good guy. I don't think that colors my judgment of the book, however.

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Bought. Bought it used, though, so no royalties for your buddy!

One area that I do feel I have failed thus far as a father is in Bean's desire to eat new foods. Of course, I grew up an uber-picky eater, but I have absolutely NOT done a good enough job getting her interested in trying new things. We try, but it's a battle.

pickles said:

My wife tried to breast feed for about 5 weeks but it just wasn't taking and she was constantly getting mastitus (sp?).

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I've heard and read a little about this and don't wish it on anyone!

pickles said:

johnnyc: if this is your first baby be sure to have your wife see the lactation consultant (usually free while she and baby are in hospital). They can give great info for breast feeding. Believe it or not it can be difficult and a real PIA!

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+1 on the lactation consultant and when he/she is first born, be assertive up front and at the time that you want the baby on the breast immediately. The less time between birth and feeding, the easier it is. Make sure you get at least one good feeding in before they bath the kid. It's nearly impossible after that.

the_bird said:

Bought. Bought it used, though, so no royalties for your buddy!

One area that I do feel I have failed thus far as a father is in Bean's desire to eat new foods. Of course, I grew up an uber-picky eater, but I have absolutely NOT done a good enough job getting her interested in trying new things. We try, but it's a battle.

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Luckily my kid has not found anything he doesn't like yet. It took a few days for whole milk, but that's was it and he eventually came around to it.

I'm not going to be the person that says you're a bad parent for not breast feeding, but it gives your baby exactly what it needs at the different stages in life, provides bonding with mother, Saves a ton of cash in formula and well....it's how the body has evolved to function.

IrregularPulse said:

I've heard and read a little about this and don't wish it on anyone!


+1 on the lactation consultant and when he/she is first born, be assertive up front and at the time that you want the baby on the breast immediately. The less time between birth and feeding, the easier it is. Make sure you get at least one good feeding in before they bath the kid. It's nearly impossible after that.


Luckily my kid has not found anything he doesn't like yet. It took a few days for whole milk, but that's was it and he eventually came around to it.

I'm not going to be the person that says you're a bad parent for not breast feeding, but it gives your baby exactly what it needs at the different stages in life, provides bonding with mother, Saves a ton of cash in formula and well....it's how the body was created by GOD to function.

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Fixed that for you

Cripes, let's not get into THAT discussion here...

The Pol said:

Fixed that for you

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the_bird said:

Cripes, let's not get into THAT discussion here...

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Don't think there is any discussion. I think we both agree that a God had nothing to do with it.

But to dismiss the nature of breast feeding is ridiculous whether you believe in god or not. Look at any other mammal on the planet and tell me it's not how we are designed/evolved, whatever you want to believe, to feed our children.