Mountain Recipes

As you all may have gathered by my baby food jar solicitation a few weeks back, I am a maker of my own. I didn't buy babyfood with my first, and I won't be doing so with this baby. But I'm glad to share the wisdom of how easy, cheap, and nutritious it is to make the food your baby eats. To get a nutritious diet for your baby, it does not have to come from a ready made source, or in phases, or in stages...all neatly packaged (and over priced). Nah...just as you make your family's food at home (well,I assume you do if you're in this discussion group!), you too can make your baby's food! We're all so used to pediatricians telling us exactly what to do when, that I think this is an area where a lot of parents become afraid. I'll post here periodically to tell you what I made.

The first installment is rice cereal. Now everyone buys rice or oat flakes in a box from the grocery store...but you really don't need to. Cereal is a great first food, so are bananas and avocados, and even plain yogurt. But to make rice cereal at home all you need is a coffee grinder and some rice, either white or brown. Some say brown is better. Notice througout the orient and middle east people do not primarily eat brown rice. They eat white and are not overweight. So white is fine. It's still a whole grain.

To make it:

grind some rice to a fine powder in a your coffee grinder (you probably can use the blender or food processer as well, I just haven't). Once you mill it, put it in a baggie or an air tight container. I recommend storing this powder in the refridgerator as you have now broken the whole grain and it will be vulnerable to going rancid at room temperature.

To make cereal:
1 part rice to 4 parts water (1/4 cup to 1/2 cup rice to 1 cup or 2 cups of water is enough). Cook on a mediuim heat, stiring constantly with a wisk until it becomes the consistency of hot ceral, such as maltomeal. I store it 1-2 tablespoons in a container (the little rubbermade ones are good, or you can store it in an ice cube tray, or you can store it in a glass jar) and stick them all in the fridge. If the baby is eating this a couple of times a day, it will be gone in a week.

To serve:
microwave 1-2 tablespoons for about 15 seconds. Thin it out with a little breast milk or formula. Adding about a 1 inch portion of mashed banana is enjoyable to the baby.

Rice provides extra B vitimins and protein and iron! Nutrition packed it is!

Next installment will be fruits and veggies.

I was really poor when I gave birth to my only child and could not afford baby food or formula so I breast fed and used a braun hand held blender and fed her what I ate ground to a pulp with a little water. Cavewomen would chew food and feed it to their little ones like a bird..yeck. Baby food is a rip off anyway.

tonight I made applesauce. Tiny tummies and baby taste buds are sensitive to tart apples. So I bought some golden delicious, which are quite mild. I peeled them, cored them, then cooked them in my microsteamer (from tupperware, I love that thing) in the microwave until soft. Then tossed in the food processor. To get enough moisture to process, throw your steam water in with the apples. 6 Apples yields about 6 4 oz jars, so each jar is about one whole apple! Imagine all the fiber the baby gets! I serve about half a jar with an ounce or a little more of rice right now...he's only 5 months old. This y oung, definitely cook the apples so they aren't too tart and acidic for the little kidlets. This weekend I'll make peaches and sweet potatoes.

I too made my son's baby food and that was 21 years ago. Introduce new foods gradually.

Okay, this is not a baby food recipe, but an at home recipe that is good for the budget and good for reducing waste in landfills. In addition to making my own food, I make my own baby wipes. I got the idea from my tupperware lady years ago and believe I have perfected it. You need a tupperware square size 3 storage container (the modular mates that come from size 1-4 which refers to height that are used for storing pantry items like sugar and flour) and a bread keeper lid (flip top lid)
http://order.tupperware.com/coe/app/tup_show_item.show_it...

1 roll of Bounty Select size, cut in half
2 cups water
1 tablespoon baby wash
1 tablespoon baby lotion

wisk the baby lotion first into the water, then the babywash
pour over the paper towels.

To prep the paper towels before pouring the water over them, you can simply remove the paper tube and leave the towels on the role, or you can unravel them accordion style into the container (each sheet laying flat). This is my preferred method.

Within about 30 minutes all of the paper towels have absorbed the water. Folded in half, they are a perfect fit in the cottonelle containers.

I also make this solution and pour it over baby wash cloths which I use at home instead of wipes for wiping baby's face and bottom. Great use for all the zillions of baby wash cloths you end up with and good for the environment.

I like the way my home made wipes feel and smell better than wipes you buy...and they break down easier. They do not benefit soil, as they add nothing to it, but they biodegrade.

Today I made some sweet potatoes, peaches, and sweet peas. Altogether about 20 jars of babyfood, and maybe I spent $5 on the organic produce used to make them. So economical. A great resource for baby nutrition and making your own food is:

http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com/

Thanks again to my "jar ladies!"

Haven't posted on baby food in a while. We have had to eliminate fruits from the little man's diet since they cause rashes. I guess he's not ready for them...but he can still have bananas and does fine on all the veggies I have prepared so far. We have also added oat bran, which is great if you've never tried it. I don't like the texture of oatmeal, so I rarely buy it. But Oat bran is slightly higher in fiber and contains just the bran of the oat, rather than the whole oat. The texture of it when dry is very small fine flakes. To cook it you cook it on top of the stove (or in the microwave) at a 1:3 ratio. You can also add flax seed meal to it. You can increase the water if you want. Like the rice, I freeze it in little 2 oz containers. 1 cup of oat bran to 3 cups water yields about 12 of those little buggers. Also we added yogurt to his diet yesterday. With mashed bananas in it, it was a big hit and he didn't break out (yeah!). Have you ever made home made yogurt? It's a cinch:
1 quart any kind of milk boiled
allow milk to cool down to 105 degres (+/-)
add 1/2 cup of plain yogurt with active cultures
whisk until smooth
put in oven at 100 degrees with a towel on top of the bowl
allow to sit for 10-12 hours

Yummy yummy!

Sweet Potatoes:
bake 2-3 potatoes in the oven or steam in the microwave (or I have recently been told they are wonderful in the crock pot on low)
peel off the skins after cooking
toss in the food processor with enough water to puree
2 large potatoes make 6-10 4oz jars of baby food

peas:
frozen peas are fine. Just steam them and toss them in the processor...1 regular frozen pack makes about 4 jars. Costco sells a huge bag of organic peas very reasonably priced. You'll notice home made peas are BRIGHT green, not that weird army green color. They are sweet and a great compliment to rice (completes the protein). Rich in vitamin C.

Squash: start baby off with yellow or acorn squash. Cook in the oven with a little water, then puree. 1 medium sized yellow squash yields about 8-10 jars. It too is sweet and well received. Goes great with apple sauce.

Carrots: same as above instructions. Can be any type of carrot, bit or baby. They're all sweet and well loved by babies. A lot of carrots and sweet potatoes will result in an orange baby...since they don't process the beta kerotene as well as we do. But no worries, it's water soluble and harmless to the baby.

Hi Cathleen,

I have been copying your posts, my first grandson is due anytime. I will be sharing all of this with my daughter. Very wonderful ideas. I use to make my own apple sauce and then I would just blend our food to make my children dinner.

Best wishes.

Thank you for reading and passing on the information! Best of wishes to your daughter and your new soon to be grandson. Raising children is such a joy. I so strongly believe that introducing children to a life time of good and nutritious foods starts very young. We are so used to everything being prepared and processed in this country that we don't realize we can do it all ourselves with really very little investment of time and money. I work full time and manage to avoid processed and fast foods by and large...IT IS POSSIBLE!!! Your daughter certainly can e-mail me anytime for more tips. I love to share cafleen at msn dot com.

Good Bless.

I just gave the little man mashed bananas and kiwis the other night...what a hit! Now, when your bananas are all bruised and icky looking, DON'T THROW THEM AWAY! Babies love really ripe bananas and because the sugars are all broken down they are easier for the baby to digest. Many people think it's icky to feed your old bananas to the baby...but really it's great! And kiwis that are good and ripe are so yummy. Don't worry about the little black seeds, they just slide down the baby's throat and present no problem at all.

Cathleen

We recently made some green beans. Unlike my other son, he wasn't quite as thrilled with them. Of course they're not as sweet as peas are. I added about a tablespoon of applesauce and he ate them after that.

I made some porridge with brown rice...and I must say. Even I like it It's actually a little creamier than the white rice. Also a new thing he loves...pureed plums, blueberries, and bananas. mmmm. Plums and blue berries when processed really are quite tart. Adding a couple of ripe bananas in made it a lot sweeter and took the edge off. 4 med plums, about 2 tablespoons of fresh blue berries and 2 bananas yielded 5 4oz jars. This morning he had 2 tablespoons of the fruit mixture with 2 tablespoons of the rice porridge and gobbled it all up!

Thank you Cathleen, Baby Matthew was born last Wednesday he was 7lb 8 oz and 19 inches. Daughter and son are doing well. I will be helping her next week and I am so looking forward to spoiling him rotten.

When did you start introducing the new foods? I know doctor's have new ideas about not introducing too early. My daughter is breastfeeding and so far so good.

I love all of the recipes and will be sharing with her.

Congratulations, Grandma! Babies are just so wonderful and sweet. My little guy was exclusively breast fed up to 5 months. My older son up to 3 1/2 months. The American Pediatric Association recommends waiting until 6 months...but I think a mother needs to decide based upon what the baby is dong. When I reached a point that I could tell he was not staying full for very long on breast milk alone, setting aside growth spurts, then I decided to try. If the baby spits the food out and generally doesn't seem to crave it, then it's not time to give solid food. If they hold it in and seem to "get the concept" and seem to enjoy it, then it might just be fine. I started him out with really milky rice in the beginning and let him sort of suck it off the spoon. Within a couple of days he knew what it was and when he saw that bowl and spoon come around he'd start breathing fast and kicking his feet! Now he just has solid food a couple, three times a day, and demand breast feeds throughout the day. Days when I think he really doesn't care if he has solid food I find I'm wrong. I think he's reached the age when he wants that full and satisfied feeling of having a meal. So he has oatmeal with fruit almost every morning (the oat bran I cited above). In the afternoon he has rice with home made yogurt with peas or potatoes (or some other veggie) and maybe a little fruit. Dinner is about the same as lunch. I'm not sure why, but I always give the rice. He seems to like it, keeps him regular. I think your daughter will know if she just follows the baby's signs. Enjoy that little creature. Oh how fast they grow up. But as a mother, you already know that!

Cathleen

And if your daughter hits any bumps on the breast feeding road, encourage her to stay on it! It's only hard the first couple of weeks, then it gets way easier once the baby has had his first growth spurt. When you hit the "golden age of breast feeding, "as I call it," that magical time when you can just whip it out without cringing about the nipple pain to come, or you can lay next to the baby and he's strong enough to nurse while you lay on your side, then you're in like flinn! And at that time, breast feeding really is so much easier than bottle feeding. I love nursing, but have had my share of problems this go round. Nonetheless, we stay with it and get through those times. When people ask me what my plans are for stopping, I say, "as long as he wants is my timeline." Tell her to cherish every moment of this most precious gift! Oh, and my little guy's middle name is Matthew. his brother picked it out. Declan Matthew.

Beautiful name and thanks for all of the information and advice. My daughter is doing well and I am very proud of the new parents. They are following the doctor's direction, but they are smart enough to realize their common sense is just as important.

Thank you Gramma Dawne

Another babyfood update.

The baby is now nearly 7 months old (where has the time gone?). His diet is diversifying and I am adding new things. Last night I made 3 jars of chicken very finely pureed. We'll start trying this tonight and see how he likes it with some rice and peas. He's still lovin' the brown rice. I made...oh...9 4 oz jars and about 10 2 oz jars of the stuff last night! Oh my, I must have been rice crazy! I made about 7 jars of sweet potatoes, 3 of peas, 3 of mixed veggies (carrots, wax beans, and green beans), 3 of broccoli (we'll see how that goes...he made a very interesting face when I offered some to him last night!)...I think that's it. This weekend I'll make some more fruit. I've thought of mixing up the food in the jars...but nah. I have more flexibility in making his meals when I keep them separate. Just keeping the thread and the tips alive.

draggin' this thread back up! My little guy is now 8 months old (where did the time go?) and he's doing finger foods now. Not very expertly...but he's doing them! Of course you know, if you've lost something really itty bitty and have given up on your search for it, just put the baby down on the floor and he'll find it right away! Last week when we were at a picnic, while I was sitting on the ground holding him, I looked down and saw yellow mush on the front of his shirt and realized he had managed to find some old muddy Dorito and was eating it! Well, the dirt nor the Dorito appear to have caused permanent harm Some advocate a little dirt for good measure. he he

Anyway, the baby can eat pancakes now. Pancakes made from scratch are so much better than bisquick. Here's the basic recipe:
1 cup flour
2 tblsp butter melted
2 tblsp sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 cup milk

You can use whole wheat or white...or a blend of flours. I usually do a blend. You can throw in fruit, yogurt, what ever you like to make your recipe work better for you.

And if you're going to go through the hassle of making pancakes, then make a triple or quadruple batch and freeze them 2 pancakes each in a sandwich bag. They warm up great in the microwave.

The baby is also eating pureed chicken now. He's going more for table food than baby food. It's the natural progression. So I anticipate I'll not be making babyfood for much longer.

correction on the yogurt. After a bit of tinkering I've discovered it does just fine if you allow it to only sit 6 hours. Sitting longer makes it too sour.