Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - X. Additional Tips

X. Additional Tips

There is no sure-fire way of making your baby appreciate healthy food, no matter how you present it and when but a little know-how does help. When introducing new food to your baby, it’s better to do it when he’s bright eyed and bushy tailed; not when he’s feeling sulky and difficult. Sometimes, when you try to give him a carrot stick, he’ll throw it right back at you. The best thing to do is to try again a few days later; he might love the carrot then. Studies show that it may take up to 15 tries before your baby will accept new food so don’t throw in the towel just yet.

One of the best things about feeding your baby is that it’s always a bonding moment. You can use every meal as an opportunity to build trust and security for your little one by using a gentle and soothing voice and by making eye contact. He may not remember his earliest meals as a grown up but having the comfort and security of your presence and your attention at such an early age will certainly help with his emotional and mental development. You could even let your feeding sessions take on an educational turn by naming the fruits and vegetables he eats. “Say banana!”

As a final reminder – and I can’t stress this enough – breastfeeding is very important for your child’s development and is ideally continued until he is two years old, although at age one and above, he can start drinking his milk and other liquids from a bottle. If you’re having trouble breastfeeding, don’t be afraid to ask for help from your physician, especially if feeding causes pain or if you think your baby isn’t gaining weight despite regular feeding.

If you aren’t producing bottles and bottles of milk, don’t worry. Remember that your child’s stomach is tiny at the beginning of his life; it doesn’t take a lot of milk to fill it. Chances are you are lactating just enough for your baby’s dietary and nutritional needs.

At the end of the day, you need to trust your instincts. As a parent, you’ll find that you will be able to tell when your baby is hungry, when he is content, and when he loves a particular kind of food. By paying attention to his nutritional intake and to his eating habits, you will have a much healthier child who will hopefully have the healthy diet that you want for him or her in the future. 

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - IX. The Basics of a Baby Schedule

 IX. The Basics of a Baby Schedule

Babies – and children, for that matter – appreciate boundaries. They may push against them and test how firm your rules are but at the end of the day, they sleep better, eat better, and feel safer for it. They like to know when to expect food, when to expect sleep, and because their needs aren’t that complicated, getting into a regular schedule will make both your lives easier.

An added bonus to having a feeding schedule (and a sleeping schedule) is it makes the transition of having to leave your baby to a sitter or a caregiver much easier. While your presence is an added comfort to your baby, having the same routine that he had with you will give him some of that comfort even when you leave him with someone else. But how exactly do you go about setting a schedule for your baby?

For the first month or so, you need to keep an eye on when he’s sleepy, when he’s hungry, and when he’s particularly painful. The first few months are the real challenge. Your baby will be waking up at all hours hungry; he may end up sleeping during the day and wide awake at night. Don’t fret; this stage will pass faster than you think and pretty soon your baby will be slightly more grown up and a lot more manageable.

In time, you will notice that your baby gets hungry during a particular hour and gets sleepy during certain times of the day too. Take note of these instances. 

Usually, your baby will be hungry first thing in the morning. Because breast milk is most abundant during that time, it is a good opportunity for your little one to get his fill of this precious milk. Your baby may want to sleep after this feeding or he may want to play.

Babies get tired and get hungry fast so another feeding may be in order just a few hours later. It is during later in the day that it is best to feed your baby solid food because mother’s usually have less milk as the day progresses.

Tracking your baby’s natural rhythms – including eating, sleeping, and playing habits – can give you a good idea of what kind of schedule to set for him. Pretty soon, you will have established a routine that works for both you and your baby that could even include when he poops, when he pees, and when he wants to eat more or eat less. Log your baby’s daily routine in a notebook so that you can base your schedule on your baby’s own rhythms.

What you don’t want to do is impose a schedule on your baby that has nothing to do with his natural, built-in routine. It will throw his innate biological schedule off track and you will have an unhappy and cranky baby in your hands. Take your cue from your baby and go from there. You would be surprised at how easy it is to establish a routine based on your little one’s biological clock.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Cheese-crusted White Bread

Cheese-crusted White Bread

Ingredients:

Pullman loaf bread

Parmesan or mozzarella or any cheese with a light flavor

Parsley or basil, chopped

Preparation:

This is one of the simplest but best ways to introduce texture to your baby’s diet. Take a piece of Pullman loaf bread, cut of the crusts, and top with grated cheese and chopped herbs. Place the bread in an oven toaster and let the cheese melt to form a crust. Take the bread out and cut into sticks, letting them cool in the process so that your baby can eat them safely.

Make sure that the cheese is neutral in flavor and soft enough for your baby to handle. Even processed cheese like Kraft will do. It would be a terrible idea to introduce something as strong flavoured as blue cheese to your baby so young; it will probably turn him off of cheese for life. 

Also, make sure that the bread is fresh and not stale. The longer your bread has been sitting on your cupboard, the harder it gets and the tougher it will be for your baby to eat. 

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Flaked Fish in White Rice

Flaked Fish in White Rice

Ingredients:

Fish fillet, white-fleshed

Fish or chicken stock

Rice, white

Lemon

Dill, chopped

Salt and pepper for seasoning

Preparation:

In case you’re wondering why it’s okay to use chicken stock for just about anything, it is because it is considered a neutral-flavored stock. It is okay to use it for fish but it is just about the only kind of stock that’s flexible that way. Fish stock is too strong in flavor for use in chicken and will change how it tastes; the same goes for beef stock or any other stock for that matter.

First, get started on cooking the rice because it can take a while. Wash the rice and place in a pot along with the chopped dill. Add enough water to cover the rice plus another centimetre to a centimetre and a half. Place the pot on low heat and let the rice cook until the water is gone or until the rice is fluffy and tender.

To cook the fish, season the fish fillet with salt, pepper, and a little lemon juice. Place it in a medium-sized pan and add chicken or fish stock until the fish is half covered. Bring the liquid to the point where it is steaming hot but not bubbling and let the fish cook like this for ten to fifteen minutes.

When the rice is cooked, mash it a little to make it softer and easier for your baby to eat. Flake the fish gently with a fork and mix with the dill-flavored rice. Make sure it is just the right temperature before feeding your baby.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Chicken Flakes in Sweet Potato Mash

Chicken Flakes in Sweet Potato Mash

Ingredients:

Sweet potato, peeled

Chicken breast

Chicken stock

Salt and pepper for seasoning

Preparation:

Once you’ve washed and peeled the sweet potato, cut it into thick slices, slather it with olive oil, season with salt and pepper and let it bake in the oven until completely tender at 180°C for about fifteen to twenty minutes. Alternatively, you can just drop it in a pot of boiling water until it is very tender.

Bring a pot of chicken stock to the point where it is steaming hot but there are no bubbles. Place the chicken breast in the hot stock and let it cook for fifteen to twenty minutes. This is called poaching while floating in liquid and it’s a gentle cooking method that leaves the chicken tender and juicy as opposed to tough and dried out.

Take out the chicken and let it cool a little while you take out the sweet potato from the oven. Mash the sweet potato with a fork. Also with two forks, flake the chicken so that there are no choking hazards. Mix the two together, making sure it is cool enough to the touch to feed your baby. 

You can throw in some chopped dill or chopped parsley if you want to begin introducing your little one to herbs.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Fruits in Yogurt

Fruits in Yogurt

Ingredients:

Soft fruits of your choice, sliced or chopped into small pieces (avoid hard fruits that can be choking hazards, like apples)

Yogurt, plain

Cinnamon or nutmeg, a pinch

Preparation:

This meal is fast, easy, and nutritious. All you have to do is make sure that the fruits are small enough and soft enough to not pose as a danger to your baby and mix it in with the plain yogurt. Add a pinch of cinnamon or nutmeg and you have that something extra for your baby to enjoy.

Does the meal sound good? Make an adult version with your favorite fruits and pair with toast and a glass of orange juice.

Pork and Beans in Tomato Sauce

Ingredients:

Ground pork, lean

Baked beans

White onion, chopped

Brown sugar

Mustard

Molasses

Rosemary, chopped

Tomato sauce

Bacon (for the adult version)

Salt and pepper for seasoning

Preparation:

This recipe for pork and beans in tomato sauce makes for great comfort food. It’s something that you can serve the whole family while setting some aside for your baby.

To start with, make sure the baked beans that you bought are thoroughly cooked. If you want to use beans that haven’t been baked yet, soak them in water for a good two to three hours before boiling them in salted water to soften them up.

First, sauté the chopped onions then add the chopped rosemary. Add the chopped bacon too, if you’re having any. When the onions are completely translucent, add the ground pork and sauté until cooked. Then add the mustard, molasses, and brown sugar and sauté a little before adding the tomato sauce. For every cup of tomato sauce, add two tablespoons of molasses, two to three tablespoons of brown sugar, and half a tablespoon of mustard.

Let everything simmer until the beans are cooked through and through. Season with salt and pepper and serve. This is a great topping for white rice or with mashed potatoes.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - VIII. 1 Year and Above

VIII.  1 Year and Above

Congratulations! Your baby is one year old! This is just about the stage where you can start going a little nuts on what to feed your child. And while you’re trying out different fruits like lychee and blueberries and blackberries or vegetables like tomatoes, sweet potatoes, and salad greens, you’re going to notice that your baby’s preferences are going to be a little more distinct. There are food that he’s going to go bananas for and then there are those that he’s going to reject and throw around like a crazed Picasso. That’s because his tastes at this point have become more developed and so has his appreciation!

What’s important at this stage is to remember that your baby or, to be more exact, your toddler, still has a very little tummy which means you need to give him healthy, nutrition-packed food to help him make the most out of his meals. On how much to feed your little one at this age, you are much better off keeping an eye on how much he wants to eat and what amounts of food satisfies his hunger. He is at the age where he’s going to start asserting his independence and wants and needs and the table is a good place to do just that, although it is also important that you set some boundaries.

Another difference when your child turns one is that he’s now allowed to drink cow’s milk, an important addition to his diet. That means he can drink milk with his meals and eat dishes with dairy. But don’t forget; breast milk is still a very important source of much needed vitamins, minerals, and antibodies that your baby won’t get anywhere else. It is ideal for your child to continue to drink breast milk up to two years of age but you can transition him to drinking from a cup to make life easier for you.

This age is also the best time to start introducing iron-rich food like meat, poultry, fish, beans, and iron-fortified food. Iron-deficiency is a problem for kids around this age and it can affect their physical and mental development. It is easily curtailed with the right diet.

Here are a few recipes that are great for a toddler in terms of taste, nutrition, and overall health that are easy to prepare:

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Mashed Potatoes

Mashed Potatoes

Ingredients:

Potatoes, peeled

Salt and pepper for seasoning

Cayenne pepper, just a pinch

For the adult version:

Milk

Frozen butter nuggets

Preparation:

The first thing to do is to wash, peel, and boil the potatoes in salted water until it is completely tender to the point of being crumbly. When the potatoes are cooked, mash them with a potato masher or a ricer or a fork.

The next step is important because it is the secret to amazing mashed potatoes. Transfer the mashed potatoes onto a pan and place on low heat. Keep on mixing the potatoes so that they don’t burn while the heat makes sure that the excess water evaporates. Continue to mix the potatoes on low heat until there is very little steam leaving them.

At this point, you can set a little aside, season with salt and pepper, let it cool and feed the mashed potatoes to your baby. For the adult version, this is the stage where you add the milk. Add the milk a little at a time along with a little salt and pepper so that you are also gradually seasoning. When you reach the consistency where when you take some of the potatoes in a spoon and hold it sideways above the pan and it drops by itself, then you’ve put in enough milk. For the last step, add a pinch of cayenne.

 Be careful not to add too much. Cayenne requires heat to release its flavors so it may take a little while before you can actually taste it.

Want to make the mashed potatoes more interesting? Throw in some chopped chives or some roasted garlic.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Poached Fish

Poached Fish

Ingredients:

Chicken stock

Fish fillets, any white-fleshed fish

Yogurt, plain

Dill, chopped

Lemon juice

Salt and pepper for seasoning

Preparation:

Poaching is a great cooking method for fish because when you’re cooking fish and other seafood, you’re always running the risk of overcooking this tender and delicate meat. With the low temperatures that poaching requires, you can get to that sweet spot of just right and enjoy a great dinner. This is a dish that you can cook for your family and friends while setting a little aside for your baby.

But first, make sure that the fish is completely deboned with the skin removed. If you want it skin on, make sure there aren’t any scales but I would highly recommend that you buy skin off especially when you’re feeding your baby.

In a pan, season the fish with salt, pepper, and lemon juice. Add chicken stock to the pan until the fish are halfway covered. Place the pan on low heat; make sure the liquid is only steaming but not bubbling and it should definitely not be boiling. Once it starts steaming, you can cover it halfway with a lid or foil. The fish will take about ten to fifteen minutes to cook.

You can prepare the yogurt sauce by mixing the chopped dill, yogurt, and a little lemon juice together. Season it with salt and pepper and maybe a little sugar if you prefer.

This dish will not only make for a great and healthy dinner for your family but it is also soft and tender enough for your baby. The fish should be fine with just the sauce for your little one but for the rest of the family, this dish is best served with white rice, fried rice, or mashed potatoes. 

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Chicken Mushroom and Rice Casserole

Chicken Mushroom and Rice Casserole

Ingredients:

Chicken thigh, deboned and cut into bite-sized pieces

Mushrooms, preferably Portobello, chopped or sliced when using small mushrooms

Rice, white

Sage, chopped

Garlic, chopped

Onion, chopped

Paprika, just a pinch

Salt and pepper for seasoning

Preparation:

This is another meal that you can prepare for your family and friends while also setting a little aside for your baby.

A chicken casserole is a lot easier to prepare than you think. Place all of the ingredients together in a casserole with a little olive oil and give them a toss. Add chicken stock until the mixture is completely covered plus an additional centimetre and a half of liquid before placing it in a pre-heated oven at 180°C. Let the casserole cook for 45 minutes or until the rice is tender. Before serving, top with a few frozen butter nuggets.

For the baby’s share of the casserole, mash it up a little with a fork, especially the chicken which should be shredded. Also, make sure that the casserole is cool before you feed your baby.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Hard Boiled Egg

Hard Boiled Egg

Ingredients:

Egg

Preparation:

Place the egg in a pot of boiling water and cook for 11 to 12 minutes. When it is cooked, take out the egg, peel it, and chop it up into small pieces. Let it cool before feeding it to your baby. If you want to make things more interesting, you can add a spoonful of plain yogurt.

When feeding your baby egg, you don’t have to stick to just hard boiled. You can try scrambled eggs too and maybe grab the chance to introduce a few light-flavored herbs like chopped chives or dill. At this age, you can also start introducing spices in very small amounts. For scrambled eggs, a tough of nutmeg or white pepper wouldn’t hurt.

But remember; when feeding your baby egg, always make sure that it is cooked through and through especially when he or she is less than a year old. Don’t try to cook in ways that leave the yolk undercooked like sunny side up, over easy, or poached. There is still an element of risk and your baby is more susceptible to bacteria than most adults are.

Macaroni and Cheese

Ingredients:

Macaroni Pasta

Cooking cream

Butter

Cheese of your choice

Salt and Pepper

Preparation:

Macaroni and cheese is a staple in most homes because it is delicious and it is very easy to prepare. What you basically do is cook the pasta until al dente. To prepare the sauce, you melt the butter and add the cooking cream. Let it heat up a little before adding the grated cheese and seasoning the salt and pepper. When the pasta is done cooking, you mix it into the sauce and you’re done! To make things more interesting, add a touch of cayenne and some herbs like parsley or basil.

When you’re cooking macaroni and cheese for your family, you can also prepare some for your baby. Just set aside a bit of the pasta and let it cook for longer until it is soft enough to eat with just gums. This way, your baby begins to eat what you and the rest of the family eat.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - VII. More Solid Food: 10 to 12 Months

 VII. More Solid Food: 10 to 12 Months

When your baby reaches the age of ten to twelve months old, you’re going to find that he or she might suddenly become a ‘picky eater’. It’s not that they don’t like the food; they don’t really become truly picky about what they eat until their toddler years. Chances are they’re just distracted by the things around them, like toys or different sounds or all the hundred different little things that they’re just beginning to notice. Take heart, this stage where you’re struggling to feed them solid food won’t last forever.

At this stage, your baby won’t appreciate thin purees anymore and will begin to enjoy the chunkier, soft cooked finger food like the ones they get to sample when they’re eight to ten months old. But don’t forget; even at ten to twelve months old, solid food is only supplementary to breast milk. Breast milk should still be your baby’s main source of food for complete nutrition and development.

This is the age when your baby really starts to eat soft versions of grown up food. You can feed them pasteurized cheese (but no cow’s milk until after a year old), mashed proteins like chicken breast or white-fleshed fish, eggs, and tofu. This is also the time when your baby starts to feed himself, although not always successfully. But you can hand him a plastic and baby-friendly spoon and see where he goes from there.

Here are some great examples of baby food for the age of ten to twelve months.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Soft Cooked Pasta

Soft Cooked Pasta

Ingredients:

Penne pasta or fusilli pasta or any kind of pasta that is short enough for your baby to hold on to

Preparation:

Cooks on TV will tell you endlessly that pasta should be cooked al dente or with just enough bite to give it texture. But when cooking for your baby, you definitely can’t go for al dente.

In fact, you need to push the pasta as far and as soft as it can go without falling apart.

The best part about feeding your baby pasta is that you can just give him a smaller amount of what the family is having, just an overcooked version of it. 

Penne in tomato sauce? Your baby can have some of that too. Cold fusilli salad in the summer? Just cook the fusilli a little longer than usual and it will make for a great snack for your precious one.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Kiwi Slices

Kiwi Slices

Ingredients:

Kiwi, ripe

Preparation:

Peel the kiwi by cutting off both ends, standing it up, and carefully running your knife along the sides of the fruit. When cutting the ends off of the fruit, you may encounter some resistance; don’t try to force the knife through. Instead, move your knife down the fruit until you cut through the part that easily gives way. You don’t want your baby to be chewing on the hard part that gives your knife trouble.

Cut the peeled kiwi right down the middle and into slices that your baby can hold on to.

Boiled Carrot Sticks

Ingredients:

Carrot

Preparation:

Wash, peel, and slice the carrots into batonettes or small sticks that your baby can wrap his hands around. Prepare a pot of boiling water and season it with a little salt. Drop the carrot sticks into the boiling water and let it cook until the carrot sticks are as soft as possible while still holding its shape.

Prepare a water bath with ice right beside the boiling pot of water to shock the carrot sticks with. When the sticks are done cooking, transfer them into the ice water bath and let them cool. This will ensure that the carrot sticks are never too hot for your baby and it also immediately stops the carrots from cooking any further.

Carrot sticks are hard so you need to make sure that it is soft enough for your baby to eat. The best way to do this is with a fork test while its cooking and by actually tasting it before giving some for the little one to eat.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Soft Baked Peaches

Soft Baked Peaches

Ingredients:

Peaches, fresh

Preparation:

Wash the peach, peel it, and remove the seed. Cut into slices and bake in the oven at 180°C until it is completely tender that it will basically fall apart in your mouth when you eat it. Before feeding a baked peach slice to your baby, make sure that you chill it first or that it is at least in room temperature. Never feed your baby any food straight out of the oven. Also, always make sure that the food is completely soft so that your baby can eat with just his gums and there’s no risk of choking.

Sliced Ripe Avocado

Ingredients:

Avocado, ripe

Preparation:

Wash, peel, and remove the seed from the avocado. Slice it into sticks or batonettes so that your baby can hold on to it and eat the avocado with his own hands (but it never hurts to help him out). Make sure to choose an avocado that is completely ripe but not overripe so that it is firm but is easily eaten with just gums but will still hold its shape when your baby handles it.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - VI. Purées and Finger Food: 8 to 10 Months

VI. Purées and Finger Food: 8 to 10 Months

At the age of eight to ten months old, your baby is going to be eating more pureed food aside from the usual breast milk but he is also at the stage where he can start making the transition from eating puree to eating ‘chunks’. Chunky food or finger food introduces new textures to your baby and is their first real step towards, adult food.

It is ideal to introduce finger food at this stage because your baby is beginning to develop teeth and the ability to chew as well as the ability to grasp food in their hands. He’ll not only start to learn how to chew, he’ll also be working on his motor skills! But what exactly qualifies as good finger food for your baby?

·         Finger food can be eaten even with just gums (not all babies have teeth at this stage)

·         Finger food should be in soft, mashable bits

·         Finger food should always be fed to the baby while he or she is sitting upright to avoid choking

Does this mean that you can completely shift to finger food and ditch purees when your baby reaches eight to ten months old? The answer is no, you can’t really take purees completely off the table yet but your baby will be able to start sampling soft-cooked finger food.

 Don’t worry, pretty soon they’ll be eating finger food version of what your family regularly eats and those thin fruit or vegetable purees will be a thing of the past.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook

Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook - Ripe Papaya Puree

Ripe Papaya Puree

Ingredients:

Ripe papaya

Water or apple juice

Preparation:

Is your family having some delicious slices of ripe papaya for a snack or for dessert? You can take a little bit for your baby too. Just take some of the papaya, making sure that there are no seeds hidden in there, and mash it up until it is very soft.

To get that soupy consistency that is ideal for four to six month old babies, you can add a little water or fresh apple juice while mashing.

This is an excerpt from the book: Homemade Healthy Baby Food Recipes and Cookbook