Baby Food

[Bee7]

Just wondering if you ladies could clear up a little debate me and my OH had the other day. He fancies himself as a bit of a chef and after baby has come off bottles he suggested mushing up the food we eat and giving him that instead of the baby food in jars. I'm a little dubious about this because surely jars are safer in the sense that they are designed for babies, what does my OH know about the salt content and suchlike in our food? But my mum said that jars are basically mushed up food anyway and there's nothing wrong with what he's suggesting providing he makes sure it doesn't have too much seasoning etc.

Anyone else done this? xxx

 

[lyndsey_28]

with my first son i only used jars and he such a picky eater now, 2nd son i started on jars but he went to day nursery at 6 months and they dont do jars just blend the food up all the other kids have, and he has done fine on it no problems and he i nearly 4 and would much rather eat a plateful of veg than chips etc coz of all the good food they fed him at nursery!!


if u are worried about the food your hubby wants to cook you can buy a baby cook book, which gives u recipes and advice on what foods to intoduce and when!! they also tell you bout the storage of food and how long to keep it for etc xx

 

[Rachel1509]

When I was at college doing health & social care, we did a bit on babies and feeding them etc, and I remember doing a section on pureed food. You can give them our food during weaning but as long as it's completely mushed with no lumps in it when they can't yet swallow them. There's lots of books about this and recommended food that works best when pureed and when weaning them, so it's completely fine as long as it's done properly.

Some shops also sell blenders specifically designed for this

 

[Lewa]

My husband is planning on doing the same, and just make sure we don't salt to it etc before pureeing or mushing it up. There should be a lot of information available about this online and other places, (pamphlets on health stations, or hospitals maybe? Books..) to get some basic guidelines to follow.

The jars need to contain additives to give them longer shelf lives, and a lot of nutrition might get lost in the needed processing of the food (for it to be safe for storage), and then they add extra vitamins etc to that instead, to make up for the loss of the processing. (for instance raw vegetables are healthier than boiled vegetables, in a jar it would be boiled to death, make it yourself and you can steam it, bake it, or at least if you boil it not boil it until it's too soft).
I would say freshly mushed food would probably be both tastier and healthier for the baby (just like microwave meals are not as healthy for us as the exact same meal made from scratch at home would be).

Honestly, when it comes to babyfood in jars I think it's used so much mostly because of money, (the people selling it) and convenience (the people buying it), not because it's better for the baby.

We'll probably do a bit of both, as I'm guessing we won't always have time to make his food, or maybe we want to eat something we can't just mush up, and then we can have some bought baby food, but I'm hoping we'll keep that to a minimum.

This is of course only my personal opinion!

 

[hugsy]

i would personaly think your own dinner mushed up is much better as you know exactly whats in it, just take the babys portion out before adding salt ect

jars will have extr preservativs and wht not in them i think

I will be giving our baby the same food as we eat muched up too

 

[TORino]

I will be giving baby the same food as we eat. Not mushed up either. I really want to go down the baby led weaning route as opposed to traditional weaning on pureed food. It makes a lot of sense to me.

The notion of using jars etc does not appeal to me at all. But then those are principles that I apply to my life now so it makes sense that I wouldn't do it for baby. I like to minimise the amount of heavily processed food I eat and I make a lot of things from scratch and don't eat packet/microwave meals myself because I like to know what is in the food I am eating. This is all when I am eating properly of course. Pregnancy has made it very difficult!

 

[mummy2b73]

Mine will be having our food (with a few exceptions) mashed up. I used to work in a nursery and the older babies ate the same as the older children. As long as you don't add salt and it's not spicy your LO will be fine. I'm not really into using jars except for convenience when out and about. Our neice ate nothing but jars and i know it sounds stupid but it made her nose go orange...it turned out it was the amount of carotene in the jars she was having my sister in law wouldn't have it and thought she knew best at the time even though I kept telling her and it only went when she started having normal food so in all her older baby photos she looks like Rudolph !

 

[hugsy]

I will be giving baby the same food as we eat. Not mushed up either. I really want to go down the baby led weaning route as opposed to traditional weaning on pureed food. It makes a lot of sense to me.

The notion of using jars etc does not appeal to me at all. But then those are principles that I apply to my life now so it makes sense that I wouldn't do it for baby. I like to minimise the amount of heavily processed food I eat and I make a lot of things from scratch and don't eat packet/microwave meals myself because I like to know what is in the food I am eating. This is all when I am eating properly of course. Pregnancy has made it very difficult!

sorry to side tarck but whats baby led feeding?

 

[beckyboo1]

I got given for Christmas a baby recipe book by Annabel KArmel that has recipes for the varying stages of baby/toddlers, as well as recipes for when you are breast feeding.

My best friend gave it me and said she'd found ita really good book.

I too would like to avoid jars as like the others have siad, at least you know what you've put in your own food xx

 

[beckyboo1]

Hugsy - don't know a huge amount about baby led weaning, but if you head over to baby and todler section there's lots about it on there.

 

[TORino]

http://www.babyledweaning.com/

Here you go hugsy.

I know it's not for everyone and it is probably a lot of hard work but it makes sense to me. Some of the videos on you tube are really cute.

 

[hugsy]

Thanks TOrino i check it out x

 

[lrb]

I work at a nursery and the food we give the babies is no different to the older children just blended. None of the children have any seasoning or salts added to any food. Trust me some stuff tastes bland but to a baby it wouldn't. They don't normally give a baby food that they haven't tried at home first Incase of any allergies or reactions but I know when it comes to feeding my baby I'm going to stick with buying the baby breakfasts but make certain foods for baby and blend. Just a couple of veg first like sweet pot and carrots! One baby at work brings in there own jars and won't let her eat our food yet as the parents don't have the time at home to test her out on there own food and they all seem the same flavours n food she has! Not a lot of variety! And wether it has anything to do with it or not but she's very small for her age and never puts on weight like all the other babies her age on our food! Maybe she's just a small baby but I plan to start my baby on our food!

What age are u all introducing foods? 6 months? And breakfast at 4?? Thanks

 

[l_maclean]

If your doing tw (traditional weaning i.e. Purees) home made stuff is fine - but a baby cookbook would prob give you some ideas, and you need to watch out for salt levels etc.

BLW - baby led weaning generally is the theory that food is fun, and you use things like finger foods for LO to try out, but as they still get nutrition from milk you don't stress about how much of things they eat - there are some good threads about it in baby/toddler and feeding.

The official advice (at the moment) is 6 months before weaning but that seems to be for ever changing - I'm aiming to go with the 'sign' like watching people eat, attempting to reach for food, sitting unaided. I kinda feel babies do EVERYTHING else at different times, like rolling over, walking, teeth, talking - why on earth would they all be ready to eat t the same time.
Xxx

 

[BevG]

im going with baby led weaning and if baby wants some of our tea i will mush it for her so she can eat it too. i dont like salt added to food anyway really and i cant stand spicy food so i can t see the point in spending a fortune for tins of funny smelling mush when what i cook is better for us.