Moving Forward With Solid Feeding (How to Introduce Solids continued)
After a few weeks of rice cereal, when your baby has built up an appetite of solid foods, you can begin introducing baby food. There are many baby foods available in the market today. They come in a wide variety of flavors and ingredients. If you’re going to be feeding your baby commercially bought baby food, begin with the single flavor or single ingredient foods. This will allow you to observe how your child reacts to the food, and you will determine if your child is allergic to the food or not.
It’s always best to space different kinds of foods at least a week apart. For example, give your child baby food that is made from one fruit, say banana. Watch your baby for the week that they are eating banana. If there is no allergic reaction, you can try introducing a new flavor, say melon. Spacing out the food introductions will allow you to determine whether your child has a food allergy, and it will also allow you to pinpoint which food it was that gave them the reaction.
Though it can be tedious work, try making your own baby food rather than buying baby food. You can mash fruits or vegetables, or both together. Sometimes babies do not like the taste of baby food, and making your own can get them to respond to eating solids better. This also gives you a chance to lightly season (never salt) your baby’s food in order to introduce them to other flavors. Just remember that seasonings should also be spaced apart when being introduced.
Making your own baby foods also saves your baby from ingesting some preservatives that are found in commercial baby foods. It’s best to try and give them a well balanced diet of fruit, vegetable, protein, and grains, and try not to add any sodium. Promoting healthy foods now will also help you encourage them to eat healthily in the future.
Some good foods to mash up and try are squash, pumpkin, potatoes, carrots, and peas. Don’t limit your baby to these foods though, as there are many others out there. If you place your baby food in a container, always take a little of the food out and put it on a plate. Never feed your baby directly from the container, as putting the spoon in and out of the container can breed bacteria, especially if you will be storing the food for a later feeding.
Pretty soon, your baby will be eating solids three times day. Each time they will probably eat a different amount. You know your baby is full when they stop eating or accepting the solids, if they start playing with their food, or if they turn their head away when you try to feed them. Even if your baby is eating solids regularly, continue to give them milk. They will need to drink milk at least till their first birthday, and longer than that is good for them too.
After introducing fruit and vegetables, you can slowly introduce your child to table food. You can mince some meat, beans, or fish and see how your child likes it. Allow your child to try as many flavors as they can, but never mince up any fast food product and try serving that as baby food. The sodium and trans fat or saturated fat levels of these foods are too high for you or your baby. Remember that just because you don’t like the taste of a certain food doesn’t mean your child will not like it as well. Giving them a well rounded diet with a lot of variety will be good for your child.
Next Article: Advice for Feeding Solids
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