DIY Babyfood

I have always wanted to make my own baby food but never realized how EASY it actually was to make! In reality, it takes me less time to make several meals for my baby than it does to make one meal for myself and my husband. I love being able to choose fresh, organic, in season, fruits and vegetables straight off the farm for my baby's food and it is great knowing exactly what is going into her meals. Other benefits include low cost, a wide variety of options, its healthy and it is environmentally friendly.  All you need is a good blender, some nice produce, and a stove/microwave/steamer and you're ready to go!

Here is my list of go-to baby food recipes that I always have stocked up in my freezer (I often make double or triple batches to really stock up!):

Spinach, Peas and Pear

• Blend together 2 cups steamed spinach, 2 cups cooked peas, 2 cups steamed pears

Pumpkin Applesauce 

• Equal parts pumpkin (I often use canned pumpkin) and unsweetened organic store bought (or homemade) applesauce. Blend and season with cinnamon and ginger (as tolerated by your child)

Plums

• Steamed and blended (great for when baby needs a little extra help pooping!)

Potato Squash Stew

• Steam and blend together 3 small yellow potatoes, 1 sweet potato, 1 butternut squash

Green Baby

• Blend 1 cup steamed green beans, 1 cup steamed broccoli, 1 cup sauteed kale (I usually sautee in olive oil) and 3 ripe bananas

Bananas

• Blended and frozen (they will turn brown in the freezer but they still taste fine!). Great to mix with oatmeal.

Eat your Greens Puree

• Steam and blend together 1/2 cup of the following: sweet potatoes, carrots, green beans, broccoli, peas

Carrots and Cauliflower

• Steam and blend together 1 cup of carrots and 1 1/2 cups of cauliflower 

Pears

• Steamed and blended (keep the peels on for more nutritional value if you have a good blender!). This is another great fruit to mix with oatmeal!

Sweet Potatoes

• Steam sweet potatoes. Blend with 1 tsp cinnamon per sweet potato.

Banana Berry Quinoa

• Blend together 1 whole banana, 1 cup of berries and 1 cup of cooked quinoa

Homemade applesauce

• Blend together 8-10 apples. My favorite types of apples to use are Macintosh for a less sweet sauce or Jona Gold or Ginger Gold for a sweeter sauce. Add cinnamon to taste.

Other tips for DIY baby food

I always leave peelings on all fruits and vegetables (except sweet potatoes and butternut squash) for added nutritional value. Also a huge time saver!

Need more time savers? Buy pre-cut, frozen or canned fruits and veggies (check the labels for additives that you may want to avoid though). Some frozen veggies can even be microwaved in the bag they come in for fewer dirty dishes!

During the cooking process, some of the vitamins and nutritional value transfers from the fruits and veggies into the water they are being cooked in. In order to add that nutritional value back in, I pour some or all of the water that that they were cooked in into the blender with the fruits and veggies (to desired consistency).

I taste all of my recipes and make sure I would be willing to eat them. Some of them are not my first choice for food but I want to be sure I am not forcing her to eat foods that I find disgusting. This isn't a big deal to some people but in doing this, I have found that I have never given my daughter a food that she doesn't like!

I freeze the food in silicone ice cube trays from Walmart that are "double cubes." When we first started solids, I filled up the trays half way for smaller portion sizes but now at 7 months, she eats a full "double cube" for each meal. After the cubes are frozen, I store them in ziploc freezer bags. I prefer the kind with the pull zipper on it as opposed to the traditional snap zip. 

When heating up the cubes to eat, I put them in the microwave in little pyrex containers (I have a thing about avoiding plastic in the microwave). I heat them for 20 seconds the first time, then stir/mash it up and then continue to heat and stir in 10-15 second increments until it is heated evenly to the desired temperature.

Happy Freezing!