Shark Bait: Feeding Baby Boy

I’ve been blessed with a good eater!

Hopefully he keeps this up because John refused to eat meat when he was a kid, and I refused to eat….anything when I was a kid. Fingers crossed that this shark’s appetite stays healthy!

We started him out exclusively breast feeding and supplemented with formula when necessary. Then we tried him on the boxed cereal and he liked it. He still has cereal (and fruit) for breakfast, but I sometimes give him homemade oatmeal instead of the box version.

Then I started making purees. (Apples, Pears, Sweet Potatos, Bananas, Carrots, Beets, Peas, Avocado etc)

I dig making purees thanks to my beloved Ninja. And after he was ok to eat more texture I was able to thicken up his “purees” into … i dunno what you’d call it…”whips?” “mashes” maybe? I dunno but all I have to say is my blender is earning it’s keep.

After the puree combos I used THIS FOOD CHART for ideas of what all I could give the boy. I noticed that different sites say different foods are OK at different times. I guess parents just end up doing what they’re comfortable with.

So he’s gone through all the vegetables, and started having beans, scrambled eggs, tofu etc. But this kid refuses to eat meats. Chicken makes him gag. I even made a puree of it and he acted like I was trying to kill him. He even knows when it’s mixed in with something else. I haven’t tried beef or lamb yet though.

“hooray, food!”

He’s now moved on to finger foods and is such a big boy! I’m loving the finger food stage despite the mess it makes. He loves banana pieces, blueberries, sweet potato cubes, tofu cubes, steamed broccoli florettes, sweet peas, etc.  He surprised me and enjoyed quinoa and sweet peas mixed together. And he likes curry! The Jamaican in him is showing!

Making his food is not as time consuming as I thought it would be. I just bake off a bunch of sweet potatoes, broccoli and I use the steamer for almost everything else and then just use the ninja or dice it up depending on what it is. Despite this,  I want to start integrating his meals into our meals as much as possible. It’s getting easier to do now that he’s able to eat more stuff. I just will have to cook without as much pepper. He digs spices and herbs but his little mouth can’t do pepper yet.

We’re not giving him sweets like cake, cookies, ice cream, etc… and won’t be for a LONG time….(read: years. but that’s a separate post)… but he does get one “junk” food item. His puffs! This kid loves a puff like nobody’s business. A puff can save us from a meltdown, and has the bonus of working on his little pincer grasp! We tried the Gerber brand. (Can I just say that sweet potato puffs should be made for grown ups too.  I’m looking at you, Nabisco.)

Another non-homemade food we tried out recently was those pouches of organic veggie and fruit blends. I got a couple when we were traveling, and this kid sucked it down like it was manna from heaven. I have a few that we keep stashed in his diaper bag now just in case. We’ve tried the Plum brand, Sprout and Happy Baby. It’s perfect for on the road. No mess, no muss, no fuss.

Now that Roey’s turning 9 months (tomorrow!!) I am excited to give him more stuff. I gave him some of my wonton soup today and he was loving it. I was all happy about it til I reallized I just gave him like a salt and msg cocktail…but whatev.

Up next for him to try is:

• Pasta with sauce
• Lentil soup, split pea soup
• Retrying hummus and curried chickpeas
• Retrying chicken
• Baked salmon
• Toast cubes (regular bread cubes just got ripped up and rasberried all over me the place)

When did you start integrating “grown up” food with your babies?
Did they ever eat a food that surprised you?

Any good finger food suggestions?