Homemade Baby Food

Hello everyone! Today I have something that may or may not apply to you, but it’s what I’ve got :).

About five months ago, when we moved out of the apartment and into the house, I started reading more blogs, and with the information I’ve gleaned from sites like this, this, and this, I decided to really embrace my housewife/stay-at-home-mom status. Seahawk is 9 now, and I’ve spent most of his life as a non-working mom. The difference between that and a stay at home mom is the amount of time spent on the house and kids. I’m sorry to say that I was quite selfish for a while, especially during my 2-year writing stint. It doesn’t do any good to dwell on the past, so I’m not going to. Instead, I’m going to look to the future and continue to be the wife and mom God intends me to be.

What does that mean for today’s post? I’m glad you asked :). Part of being a better mom (to me) means providing a healthier existence for my family, from homemade laundry soap (to avoid chemicals) and cloth diapers (to save the family money, as well as being environmentally friendly), to homemade baby food for Small Fry. The latter is what I’m going to talk about today (duh).

It’s really easy to make baby food, and less expensive than the jars or plastic tubs. Not to mention, there’s virtually no garbage associated with it. That last item alone is worth it to me. Well, that and the fact that I can use organic fruits and vegetables and control the ingredients used.

So, here’s what you do. First, peel (if necessary) your fruit or vegetable:

I made this on Monday and was using organic sweet potatoes (or yams, I’m not sure; I don’t like either, so I don’t usually buy them). After peeling them, I was left with a nice pile for our compost :).

Next, cut it into smallish chunks and place in your steamer basket. Add enough water that it won’t all boil off and burn during the cooking process – I speak from experience on this!

Steam the food until it’s fork-tender. These sweet potatoes took about 15 minutes. You can kind of tell from the picture that they changed color from a dull orange to a nice bright one:

In stages, so as not to overwhelm your blender (unless yours is better than mine and can handle it), puree the chunks until they’re the consistency you want. If you need to add liquid, use what’s left from your steamer; that way, you’re adding any nutrients that were lost in the cooking process back in. One word of advice, though: make the baby food thicker than you think you’ll need. You can always thin it out by adding breast milk, formula, or water when you feed it to your baby. By leaving it thicker, you’re prepared in case your baby advances to ‘heavier’ foods while this is frozen.

When it’s all pureed, put it into ice cube trays and freeze.

My three potatoes made more than enough to fill the two trays I have designated for baby food, so I just put the leftovers into Small Fry’s normal feeding jar and didn’t have to worry about thawing food for two days.

That’s it! Well, actually, there is one more step, but I forgot to take a picture, and that is to move the cubes to a ziploc freezer bag once they’re frozen. Thaw the food as needed for feeding your baby. A really young baby will probably only need one cube per feeding; Small Fry will be 9 months tomorrow and he’s up to 2, sometimes 3.