Homemade baby food: a how-to

While I admit that not every bite of food that passes my baby's lips is made in my own kitchen, I do try my best to keep things on hand that are nutritious and wholesome for him. Now that he's bigger, that's pretty easy. A little corkscrew pasta, all cut up, some raisins, a chopped up clementine, some bits of tofu, some halved blueberries, that sort of thing. I can just plop an array of things on his tray and he'll pick them up and eat them on his own. He's sort of "over" being spoon-fed. Still, there are some things I would like for him to eat that he can't quite manage on his own. I make applesauce from scratch, for example. I also do a spinach puree, and I try to keep some sweet potato puree in my freezer.

Making baby food, for an infant or a toddler, isn't really as hard as it might seem.

For example, I made some sweet potato puree for my little guy this weekend. It only took a few minutes, and one sweet potato produced enough for six or seven toddler-sized servings. It would feed an infant probably twice that many meals.

To make baby food, you do need some sort of food processing device. I happen to have an actual baby food processor, which makes things incredibly easy, but if you just use your stick blender or Cuisinart, you'll be fine too.

Sweet potatoes are full of vitamins, dietary fiber, and potassium, and they also make your baby feel nice and full, so I like to feed them to Johnny fairly often. Which is great, because they only cost about a buck apeice. You get a lot of bang for your baby food buck out of one sweet potato.

sweet potato and bowl by meganstuke

I just poke some holes in the potato with a fork, and microwave it for about six minutes, or until it feels soft to the touch.

Then slice it open, and scoop out the guts.

microwave for six minutes by meganstuke

Put the potato into your food processor bowl and add about two tablespoons of formula or breast milk to smooth it out. You can add more later if you think your baby needs a thinner, more runny consistency.

cooked sweet potato by meganstuke

pureeing sweet potatoes by meganstuke

Blend until smooth. That's it! No added salt or fats - just pure, healthy potato that tastes divine.

As with all my purees, I then freeze them in individual servings in an ice cube tray. Just fill the tray, cover with saran wrap, and freeze.

freeze in ice cube trays by meganstuke

When they're solid, you can pop them out of the tray (and reuse it for your next batch), and just store the cubes in a freezer bag.

store in freezer bag by meganstuke

When it's time to feed baby, just microwave one or two cubes for about twenty seconds. Be careful you don't overdo it - baby food just be room temp so as not to burn a little mouth.