How and when to introduce solid foods to your baby?

When you want to give your baby new food, remember to wait at least four days between introducing new products. It will help you to notice if your baby has allergy and on which food. Allergy can lead to diarrhea, bloated tummy, increased gas or to rash. It will take some time for your baby to get accustomed to eating a wide variety of foods. Baby will have to get used to new taste and texture. Every baby is different and has his own food preferences. But the transition usually looks like this: semi- liquid cereals, strained or mashed vegetables or fruits and next are chopped table foods also meat and other protein products.

Good fruits and vegetables to start with are pears, peaches, avocados, apples, bananas, sweet potatoes or carrot. Offer your baby few tablespoons of fruits or vegetables. All food should be strained or mushy.

It is recommended by some experts to introduce first yellow fruits and vegetables because they are easy to digest. However other experts say that it is better to start with green veggies because they prevent your baby from developing preference for sweeter taste of yellow foods. You have to decide what is better for your baby.

If you feed your baby with ready jars of baby food, put some food on a dish and feed your baby from that. Remember to throw away any baby food jars within a day or two of opening them.

Don’t push your baby to eat if you notice that he turns away from this particular food. You can try next week again. Baby changes his mind many times.

Homemade Baby Food Recipe - BANANA-PEAR

Ingredients:

1 banana, cut into 1-inch pieces
3 medium pears, approximately 1-1/2 pounds or 3 cups cubed, peeled, cored, and cubed

How to make banana- pear?

First place pear cubes in a steamer basket to fit a 4-quart saucepan filled with one inch of water. Place a tight fitting lid on pan and place over high heat. When you see that liquid comes to a boil turn heat down to medium and steam pears for about 15 minutes, until they are soft.

Place steamed pear and banana in the processor. Process for 30 seconds. Scrape work bowl. Process for 20 more seconds. Serve cold. You can store this food. Put it into ice cube trays and freeze.