Why I Make My Own Baby Food: Guest Post from Kristi S.
March is a big month for your contributors at The Mom Crowd: Amanda, our founder, just had her second child, and McKenna is going to Eastern Europe for the first time to meet her new daughter (for the first time!) When Amanda asked for guest posters to step in and share their wisdom, the response was phenomenal. Keep coming back to The Mom Crowd every day for fabulous information, tips, stories, and inspiration!
Kristi has an admitted coffee addiction and lately has been indulging in an occasional spoonful of chocolate frosting straight out of the can. When she is not chasing her 1 year old around the house, trying to keep him from eating electrical cords or learning about the life cycle of frogs with her 3 year old, she enjoys teaching ladies’ Bible studies, talking about Biblical womanhood, and blogging at Run the Earth, Watch the Sky.
I am one of those crazy people who make their own baby food. Yes, one of those. You
know the kind: I pull out my baby food at restaurants and grind up steamed carrots (ordered with no seasoning, no butter, please!) while my friends look on with an incredulous look that says, “We knew you were weird, Kristi, but this…?”
Why did I do this (for two babies, so far)? Obviously, every new mom is a little fanatical when it comes to health and safety. We dutifully pick up every single thing that falls on the floor and sanitize it. We carefully boil or sterilize everything that will enter our child’s mouth. I was no different, and the thought of feeding my baby unrecognizable vegetable-based substances that are who-knows-how-old from a jar that has been who-knows-where did not sit well with me.
These thoughts were confirmed the first time that I tasted jarred baby food – wow! That stuff is bad! I was used to tasting my daughter’s homemade purees, and I was shocked when the jarred butternut squash tasted more like dirt than anything resembling a fresh vegetable. She obviously agreed, because she wanted nothing to do with that orange muck coming toward her mouth!
So, I chose to make my own baby food for health reasons and taste. That, and let’s face it: we are extremely cheap. Those little jars of baby food seem cheap when you’re standing in the grocery aisle, but when your baby starts eating 3 or 4+ jars a day, suddenly that adds up fast! For example, you could buy a five pound bag of carrots for $2.99 and end up with 36 servings of baby food. If you buy carrots in the cute little plastic containers, it would cost you $18.00 for that much! Yikes!
So, here’s what to do: (it’s very complicated, so take notes)
- Get some vegetables or fruit
- Cook them until they’re soft
- Puree them in a blender or food processor
- Freeze them in ice cube trays
- Pop them into labeled plastic freezer bags
Presto! Tricky, isn’t it?
Most people seem to feel more comfortable with the little jars and containers for some reason. I am frequently asked how you know what to feed the kids. My suggestion? Go to the grocery store and look at “level one” foods. What are they? Buy them. Cook them. Repeat the steps above. You can even buy one jar to check the consistency if it makes you feel more comfortable. Trust me, Gerber does not have some magical formula for carrots. They use: carrots!
Another great benefit to making your own baby food is the ease of transition to other foods – once they are ready for ‘chunkier’ foods, just do a quick, coarse puree and freeze them in ice cube trays. I have also found that silicone muffin cups work great once they start eating larger servings. Once they’re ready for finger foods, just chop the vegetable/fruit into chunks and freeze them. As your children get older, start grinding/mashing up whatever you’re eating for dinner, and they automatically learn to eat what the rest of the family eats. I will usually pull a portion out before I add salt, etc.
You can do this! Your baby will thank you (well, maybe not. But you’ll feel good about it!) and so will your wallet!
If you want a book that spells out what to do when, and gives you more specific ideas and pictures of the purees, I love First Meals by Annabel Karmel. I also like www.wholesomebabyfood.com. In addition, you can check out Amanda’s post on making baby food.
Do you make your own baby food? Do you have any qualms about taking the plunge?
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I made all of my daughters baby food for the same reasons. I tried about a dozen baby food books but found that it was bot complicated at all. I plan to make all of my other children’s baby food as well. I loved using a rice streamer for vegetables. It is make making large batches easy. And since it turned off on its own I could go about doing other things in my house and not worry about if its cooking too long.
Even at 2 we try very hard for her (and us) not to eat any processed foods. I try not to have any processed food in the house. We just brought a bread machine to start making our own bread. (It does many other things as well).
We made most of our baby food too. I did buy the jars of fruit but mainly because everything was so out of season here and I thought it would be way to expensive. I ground all the grains and cooked them too. It really isn’t hard and I love how you can vary up the veggies that you can’t get from the jars. I cooked broccoli, kale, spinach and it was super easy.
Trina-we make all of our own bread too–well, sandwich bread anyway–I haven’t made pita bread yet. I use the dough feature on the bread machine and then bake it in the oven because I like the long shape better than the big square shape the bread machines make. Homemade bread is sooooo yummy. And smells so good.
I like how cooking it fresh and freezing it tastes too. It just takes a little extra time–which is hard to imagine you have when time feels tight already. It is fun though and older kids like helping too!
Hi.
Just passing through via MBC.
Have a great day!
I used Super Baby Food for help the first time around — just to get a general idea of what foods are good at what age. there were also some good recipes in the back for your older (toddler age) kids.
I used Super Baby Food for help the first time around — just to get a general idea of what foods are good at what age. there were also some good recipes in the back for your older (toddler age) kids.
Sorry… forgot to say great post – can’t wait to read your next one!
Some great ideas in here! I was extremely inefficient and made my baby food every time instead of making one huge batch and storing it. I do agree though that it’s the best way to go. I rarely have trouble getting my kids to try new foods and they LOVE veggies. I’m pretty sure it’s because I fed them homemade baby food instead of that disgusting jarred stuff. Plus there’s the peace of mind knowing what exactly is going into their little tummies and no worrying about baby food recalls.
I love making my own baby food. Its actually pretty easy and does not cost that much. Thanks for the post.
I am going to do this for sure next time! Great post!
He he. I also will admit to it being more of a control thing than anything else. But so easy to justify from the taste and economy point of view too. Plus, then I don’t have to worry about forgetting to buy more jars.
I have two reservations though. I find it hard to feed him my food when we are out because of contradictory advice about the care of food once it has been defrosted. Of course, some sort of cooler puch would probably work here.
The other one is the issue of organic food vs ordinary food. I was reading an article a while ago which said that the irony of making your own food is that because of the very strict guidelines for baby food it often has far lower levels of pesticides and such than food made at home. But it annoys me that in the supermarkets a lot of the organic food I want to cook is from far flung places, whereas the local stuff is non-organic. And of course there’s the cost. I’m afraid I compromise and buy some things organic – meat, things I won’t be cooking or peeling and such – and other things not.