Homemade Baby Food

As I've mentioned previously, almost all of Ethan's baby food is homemade (the only exception is puffs), and the majority of it is organic, with much of it being local as well, coming from our CSA. While this has gotten me eyerolls from many people (including my husband), it is important to me that Ethan eats organic as much as possible for at least the first year because I just don't see the point in feeding my child stuff with pesticides, hormones, etc. in it. His daddy is fond of sneaking him Fla-Vor-Ice and Cool Whip, but there's not much I can do to stop him at this point so hopefully the good stuff Ethan eats will cancel that out!

So is making homemade baby food as easy as store-bought? No, but it's definitely more fun and tastes better! Plus, the cost savings are enough to make the time spent worth it. I'm a big believer in "don't feed your kid something you wouldn't eat yourself" so I taste every food and combination before giving it to Ethan. That includes the store-bought organic baby food he ate while in Atlanta, and let me tell you, after tasting it, I wasn't that thrilled to be feeding it to Ethan, nor was Ethan that thrilled to be eating it. How does the addition of ascorbic acid make apples and pears so very bitter? And the organics had less stuff added to them than conventional baby food! Anyway, suffice it to say that homemade baby food is better than store-bought in expense, peace-of-mind, and flavor, even if not in convenience.

So how do you get started? It's quite easy! For basic mashed foods (like bananas and avocados), just mash it up with a fork and you're good to go. For other purees though, you'll need a few things first (You can buy gadgets like the Beaba Babycook that do all the work in one machine, but they're fairly expensive, and since we already had all the tools we needed on hand, I don't mind the extra steps):

- Saucepan and steamer basket with lid
- Skillet with lid
- Oven
- Food Processor/Blender/Food Mill
- Ice cube trays (choose ones with a silicone bottom to make the less-hard-freezing varieties easier to get out)
- Saran wrap (to cover the ice cube trays)

Most fruits and vegetables can be steamed by boiling an inch of water in the saucepan, placing the fruit/veggies in the steamer basket on top with the lid on, and steaming until tender. For some vegetables (like green beans), boiling is better so you bring an inch of water to boil in the skillet, put in the veggies, put the lid on, and boil until tender. Likewise, ground meats will require the use of a skillet and some olive oil. Finally, the oven is useful for roasting vegetables like potatoes, sweet potatoes, and other root vegetables.

I've always used our food processor to puree, but I believe you can also use a blender or food mill. Depending on the fruit or vegetable, you may need to add additional water to get a smooth puree (this is where the recipe resources below come in handy). This is another benefit to making baby food at home because you can puree it to a texture your baby can handle, allowing you to leave it chunkier as baby gets older (Ethan was not a fan of how watery the commercial baby foods were).

Cereals are made using many of the same tools. For rice cereal for example, you just place brown rice in a blender and pulse until it turns into powder. Then add the rice powder to boiling water, and it magically turns into cereal! (For the exact ratios, check out one of the recipe resources below.)

Once you have made your puree, you can store it in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to three days or divide it into ice cube trays to be frozen for up to three months. Once the purees have frozen in the trays, you can put them into labelled freezer bags for easier storage.

Here is a step-by-step picture tutorial for making summer squash baby food:


You can find instructions with cooking times and recipe ideas in many places, but my favorite book is Cooking for Baby and my favorite website is http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com.

Did you know you can even make yogurt? After buying Stonyfield Farms YoBaby for several weeks, I decided to switch to Stonyfield Farms plain whole milk yogurt and mix my purees in. Then I discovered how easy it is to make my own yogurt, and I haven't bought any for Ethan in months. Here's a step-by-step:

1) Heat oven to 100 degrees. If your oven won't go that low, set it to the lowest setting and then open the door and fan the hot air out for a bit. Turn off oven.
2) In a large casserole container, mix 3 Tbsp. whole milk yogurt with 1/2 gallon whole milk. Make sure you stir them well because it won't work if you don't.

((Once my yogurt supply gets low, I transfer it to an empty Stonyfield container for easier storage than the casserole dish))

3) Place container in oven and close the door. Turn on the oven light and allow to sit overnight.


4) The following morning, pour off any liquid on the top and enjoy your homemade yogurt!

We've made four batches so far, and I don't foresee buying whole milk yogurt again.

So there you have it! Homemade baby food is well within anyone's reach, and your baby will thank you! And you can rest easy knowing exactly what is going into your child's food.