{Baby Food Diaries} The Berry Mash

Honest confession here:: I haven't been as faithful as I'd have liked in posting Maylin's progress with baby food. Maybe my goals were a bit lofty, but somehow real mom life got in the way, and well, I just haven't posted about it.

However, there are some things that are just too good not to share. This baby food recipe is one of them. Surprisingly, I didn't get it from a baby food recipe book or anything like that. I created it just by looking at the scraps of food in my kitchen and whipping up something Maylin could eat. And quickly, because at the moment she was screaming in her high chair. We've all had those moments, right?

I'm not generally prone to feeding my child kitchen scraps, but literally, our kitchen was about empty.

So here's what I did. In a food processor {which is now my new best friend} I threw the leftover blueberries from our overnight refrigerator oatmeal {hopefully a post on that coming soon}, a very ripe and heavily spotted banana, a handful of steel cut uncooked oats, and a pinch of cinnamon. I whirred them together until they made a paste. Viola. Berry Mash.

Maylin inhaled it. Win.

Although, if we're being honest here, anything I can throw together in a moment's notice for my child while she's wailing in her high chair is a win for me.

Blueberry Banana Mash

• handful of blueberries*
• very ripe banana
• handful of uncooked steel cut oats
• pinch of cinnamon

Mix together in food processor and serve immediately.

*You can tell I'm very exact with my measurements these days.

I've also used frozen thawed blueberries, strawberries, and blackberries before with the oats. Which is the original Berry Mash. Now I'm just experimenting. Which is basically all being a mom is. One huge experiment. If it doesn't work the first time, try something different the next. That's my motto these days anyway.

Happy eating, friends!

{Baby Food Diaries} Baby Oats with Fruit

I'm always trying to mix foods together for Maylin that will give her different taste experiences. I want her pallet to be well accustomed to many different flavors and textures. The last thing we need around this house is a picky eater!

Ain't nobody got time for that.

Also, I know I'd be pretty bored if I ate the same thing every day, so I can only assume that Maylin is the same way, even at 7 1/2 months.

One way I've discovered to introduce flavors to Maylin, as well as provide her with a plethora of different nutrients, is to mix various fruits with her breakfast oatmeal in the morning. Sometimes I even mix two or three fruits at a time. And usually I add a little sprinkle of cinnamon. This, really to me, is the flavor that melds all the other flavors together and really kicks it up a notch.

I've long since given up taking pictures of baby food because no matter how hard I try, I have yet to make baby food look decent in a picture. Really, it's just shapeless and mushy. And after I mix the oats and bananas and cinnamon together it's all brown anyway. Not very pretty to look at. I'll just give you a few oatmeal and fruit combinations {without the pictures} that have been winners at the breakfast table for us.

Oats + Applesauce + Cinnamon

Oats + Applesauce + Bananas + Cinnamon

Oats + Blueberries + Bananas + Cinnamon

Oats + Peaches + Cinnamon

Oats + Pears + Mangoes + Cinnamon

Oats + Applesauce + Pears + Cinnamon

The great thing about adding fruit to Baby Oats is that I can toss in any extra fruit I have on hand to make a really scrumptious and nutritious breakfast. Since I've been doing this for a couple months I've stopped stressing out about a specific "recipe" or "formula" and mixing different foods to create different flavors. And honestly I have yet to make something Maylin has refused to eat.

Postscript::
Refer to this post to see how I prepare Baby Oats.
All fruit I use in Baby Oats, except the bananas which I mash, has been steamed/baked and pureed.

{Baby Food Diaries} Oatmeal

I broke down and decided to start Maylin on solids last week. I began with oatmeal because my pediatrician recommended it over rice cereal. She said oats have greater nutritional value than rice cereal, which the body processes as sugar, and they are heart healthy. Seems like a win-win to me. 

To make the oatmeal, I ground the oats in my food processor until they were a powder, then cooked them in simmering water. They turned out a little lumpier than I expected. I thought by grinding them into powder the oats would be fine and smooth after they'd been cooked. Uh. Not really so. The oats ended up plumping back up during the simmer. I went ahead and tried feed them to Maylin, but you can tell by her reaction to the first bite that she wasn't a fan of the lumpy texture!!

While our first attempt at eating oatmeal was good for a laugh for Michael and me, it was a fail at getting any of the food down Maylin's throat. She absolutely refused to swallow any of it!

So, attempt number two consisted of adding breast milk to the oats to make them soupier. Also, the added milk brought a familiar taste to them. These went down better, but still not ideal.

After a week of trial and error, I finally landed on a method that works for us. The goal is to get the oatmeal as texturally fine as possible, so that it looks like the picture below. Oatmeal and breast milk soup, if you will.

Baby Oats

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup old fashioned rolled oats
• 1 cup water
• 2-3 oz breast milk

Get Cookin'

1. Put water in a small sauce pan and let come to a simmer.
2. Grind the oats in a food processor until they are a fine powder.
3. Once water is simmering, add powdered oats to water. Stir continuously so they don't stick to the pan.
4. Remove oats from heat once oats are plump.ed and desired consistency is reached. I usually let mine simmer until they have absorbed a lot of the water, but still have a runny consistency rather than a thick, lumpy consistency.
5. Place oats in food processor with breast milk. Puree until the oats are thin and runny, with no lumps.
6. Serve at room temp.

This recipe makes oats that lasts us approximately 3-4 days eating 1-2 oz servings each morning.

Maylin now eats oats every morning as a solid breakfast after her wake feeding. She loves them this way!

{Baby Food Diaries} The Beginning

This week I started feeding Maylin baby food. This is a big step for me because she has been exclusively breastfed since birth {minus a couple weeks that we supplemented formula to increase her weight}. I waited longer than the customary age of 4 months to start feeding her cereals or solids partly due to the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics, and partly because I wasn't ready to relinquish a piece of our breastfeeding relationship. However, when Maylin started showing signs that she was ready for solid food {even though I wasn't, and even though she's still not quite 6 months} I decided to begin our journey into solids a wee bit early.

By the way, here are a few general "signs" that your baby is ready to start eating cereal/ solid food. This was something I was always a little confused about because people would make comments like,

"Oh, don't worry. Your baby will tell you when she's ready to eat solids."

"You'll know when your baby wants to eat real food."

"Just watch your baby. She'll give you signs."

What. Like, what signs? My baby doesn't talk, how will she "tell me" she's ready to eat food?? And no, I've never had a baby before, so I won't just "know" when she's ready!

So, I finally did some research to find hard core evidence regarding when your baby should start eating cereal/solid food. Granted, this may not be the case for every baby. Always consult your pediatrician first.

According to The Wholesome Baby Food Guide by Maggie Meade (here and here), there are 6 "signs" that your baby is ready to eat solid food:

1. Has Baby lost the tongue thrust reflex? {when tongue automatically protrudes if anything is brought to/in the mouth}
2. Has Baby developed the ability to signal that she is full? {turning head away, pursing lips}
3. Is Baby ready to sit up and hold her head up unassisted? {to prevent choking}
4. Has Baby's birth weight doubled?
5. Has Baby shown interest in your food?*
6. Is Baby frequently waking in the middle of the night when a consistent sleeping pattern has been established?

* This sign is less reliable, as babies tend to become interested in everything around the age of 4 months, and will bring objects to the mouth regardless of whether they are food or not.

Thank You!! Now there are some signs that I can see in my baby and know that she is ready for more.

Since I am staying home with Maylin, I decided long ago that I would attempt to make her baby food {you know, with all the free time I have} rather than buy the little jars. This way, she can eat organically, her food can be without preservatives, I can control the ingredients, and it should save our family money. We received a Baby Bullet as a gift from Michael's parents before Maylin was born, and it's been upstairs in the closet waiting to be brought out.

Today, I brought it out.

Hopefully, making homemade baby food really will be as easy as Baby Bullet and Wholesome Baby Food Guide say it is. I guess we'll find out!