talk to me about making baby food

438Suburbia · July 2011

I want to know it is really worth it? How much time do you spend preparing it? What things would I need?

I have one of these.

Right now M is only eating about 1/2 of a container of food once a day.

sroby · July 2011

I am curious too. My mom bought us/Ian a Baby Bullet Baby Food Maker Kit (even though we already have a Kitchen Aid Food Processor which can make baby food, I would have rather had diapers or something than another kitchen utensil, oh well).

TJ123 · July 2011

I totally think it was worth it. I used a small food processor that we already had, nuked or boiled or baked the veggies or whatever, then pulsed in the processor a few times, then gave it to DD. she is now a fantastic eater and not picky like DS is, who had only jar babyfood.

I don't think it took very long at all, and I felt comfortable putting the leftovers in the fridge and using them again and again.

CourtneyLVD · July 2011

Do you have a food processor? Its easy peasy. Just steam whatever you want to make. Put it in the food processor until it's the consistency you want. put it in ice cube trays, let cool for 30 minutes. Stick in the freezer and let freeze. I let mine freeze overnight, then I pop it out into ziplock baggies. It can be left in the freezer for 3 months. One cube is perfect size for right now. I just put in a bowl in the microwave and heat up. It doesn't take long at all and I make a ton in about an hour!

Haven1 · July 2011

I made all their baby food, and I loved it. Here's the website I used:

http://wholesomebabyfood.momtastic.com/

I'd spend a couple hours on Sundays making 3-4 foods and freezing them for the week. All I used was a bamboo steamer, food processor, regular ice cube trays, and ziplock baggies.

Look how pretty real food is!

kms34 · July 2011

CourtneyLVD:
Do you have a food processor? Its easy peasy. Just steam whatever you want to make. Put it in the food processor until it's the consistency you want. put it in ice cube trays, let cool for 30 minutes. Stick in the freezer and let freeze. I let mine freeze overnight, then I pop it out into ziplock baggies. It can be left in the freezer for 3 months. One cube is perfect size for right now. I just put in a bowl in the microwave and heat up. It doesn't take long at all and I make a ton in about an hour!

Ditto all of this.

I could have a squash and 4-5 sweet potatoes baking in the oven and a pot of apples steaming at the same time. Once everything was done, just puree it up (or use a potato masher if it's really soft), put in ice cube trays, freeze, pop into baggies, and done.

It was nice to have a variety of cubes to mix and match. Evan loved apples with squash and a whole host of other flavors. It also translates well to making your own finger foods. I'd cube up all the same foods and steam or bake them. The only difference was that it wasn't pureed. I'd lay it on a cookie sheet to cool and them pop into baggies. Evan ate that type of stuff for a long time since he was restricted due to allergies.

CourtneyLVD · July 2011

kms34:

CourtneyLVD:
Do you have a food processor? Its easy peasy. Just steam whatever you want to make. Put it in the food processor until it's the consistency you want. put it in ice cube trays, let cool for 30 minutes. Stick in the freezer and let freeze. I let mine freeze overnight, then I pop it out into ziplock baggies. It can be left in the freezer for 3 months. One cube is perfect size for right now. I just put in a bowl in the microwave and heat up. It doesn't take long at all and I make a ton in about an hour!

Ditto all of this.

I could have a squash and 4-5 sweet potatoes baking in the oven and a pot of apples steaming at the same time. Once everything was done, just puree it up (or use a potato masher if it's really soft), put in ice cube trays, freeze, pop into baggies, and done.

It was nice to have a variety of cubes to mix and match. Evan loved apples with squash and a whole host of other flavors. It also translates well to making your own finger foods. I'd cube up all the same foods and steam or bake them. The only difference was that it wasn't pureed. I'd lay it on a cookie sheet to cool and them pop into baggies. Evan ate that type of stuff for a long time since he was restricted due to allergies.

I never thought of doing this! Thanks for the idea!

AudreyHpbrn · July 2011

Making baby food is super easy! Dh will spend about an hour depending on the foods and made sawyer 2 weeks worth of food. Some foods are easier than othera. Ie..we buy unsweetened applesauce for him to eat so it is the purest. bananas you just cut and smash fresh. for green beans and peas. we ise no salt added cans of vegetables that doc said was okay. so the veggies he cooks is squash. sweet potato. and carrots. we have a hand held milkshake mixer that he uses. then we put them into ice trays and freeze and ziplock. we have two of the baby making trays and 4 trays of regular ice trays. for the ice tray cubes..ds gets 2 cubes. in addition, as you get to table foods...you will be able to take your food dummy downed on seasoning and blend it and serve so they are having what you are having. it truly is simple and easy and so much cheaper

tiff-n-nick · July 2011

I dont see why people dont do it, its so easy - and looks MUCH better than the crap in the can. Seriously.

I would just nuke a sweet potato, scoop it out, throw it in the blender, add some formula or breast milk - make it like a thick smoothie, then put into the icecube trays - when they were frozen, then I would put them into labeled ziploc bags.

The nice thing is, that you can make sweet potato, squash, peas (we used frozen peas, cooked them, then blended them) green beans, frozen carrots (same thing as the peas), apples, blueberries, pears, bananas, ect.....and then you can add them to each other - like, pour a few squashes out in the icecube tray, then maybe mix some squash/peas together in a bowl, pour that into hte tray, ect......so there is a big variety. You take maybe an hour, and you have weeks worth of food.

When its time to eat, pull out a few cubes and nuke them or whatever. I know some people are really anal about microwaving the baby food and says it kills the nutrients - but just looking at a dish of nuked pureed peas, next to a jar of peas - I'm leaning towards thinking my nuked peas are better. The color alone says everything.

Amy&Andy · July 2011

I'm one of those people that found it to not be worth the time and effort. I did it at first for a little while, but then just found that I didn't have the time to spend on it that I would have liked to have. And when I did have time, the last thing I wanted to do was be in the kitchen making baby food....call me selfish.

However, when he got a little older and started eating meal-type baby food, I would put whatever we ate in the food processor and freeze containers of that. I think it's just a matter of doing it and seeing how you feel about it. It's like anything else, some people enjoy it, and others don't.

cats3_98 · July 2011

It is super easy! We had a bullet that we use and for some of the bigger stuff we are borrowing SIL's food processor. I love doing it and it really doesn't take that long. Ditto what everyone said aboout the ice cube trays and then putting it into ziplock bags. Plus we usually just buy whatever fruit/veggie is on sale and that really helps save money. Like right now bananas are on sale so we will go buy a ton of them and freeze them. I also follow the wholesomebabyfood website. .

tonynbecky · July 2011

thanks for all the ideas ladies! I was really hoping to do this with Lexi now I am convinved!

talk to me about making baby food

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