Homemade baby food making

We picked and shelled peas from our garden yesterday, so I whipped up a batch of pea baby food. And since avocado's and banana's were on sale at Food Lion this week, I picked some of those up and made them in to baby food too! So here's a post on fresh baby food making!
First task is selecting the right fruits or veggies. Did you know that the the American Academy of Pediatrics doesn't recommend giving solids to infants until they are 6 months old? That's right breastmilk until six months, no juice, no cereal, no food. Why, you might ask......their little tummies are not equipped to handle anything other than milk until then, and sometimes not even until then. Also, it increases the risk of allergies and obesity, among other things. Also, you do not have to start with cereal. In fact, they really don't need cereal or juice, at all. If you're not careful, juice can be more harm than good anyway. Maggie does have about 2 ounces of organic apple juice once a day to try to help with constipation since we started solids. She is 6.5 months and is eating about 2 ounces of solids and 2 ounces of juice daily. She's not 100% ready for solids, so we're slowly working our way up. So far we have had, sweet potatoes, apples, prunes, avocado, banana, green beans, and peas. The sweet potatoes, green beans and peas were all home grown, and all the food was homemade. I like to use the website as a resource, when in doubt.
I chose these foods because they are good starter foods, and I had fresh on hand! I also chose the avocado to try to fatten my little princess up! Avocado has a lot of good healthy fat and a lot of calories! It is also great for mixing with other foods because of the bland flavor. My kids both love avocado and banana together!

I have a nifty Tupperware microwave steamer that I adore for making my baby food, and steaming veggies for the rest of us! My baby sister Mary Johnna gave it to me a long time ago! Thanks MJ!!!




Add whatever veggies or fruit you need to steam and steam in the microwave. Steamed peas are yummy:


I like to place the steamer basket in ice water afterward to try to stop the cooking. Then add to food processor and puree them. The peas were a little thick so about a tablespoon at a time I added water from the steamer until it was a good consistency!





Put the peas (about 1 ounce servings) into freezer safe containers and freeze! Or save some out fresh for the baby!



Then serve fresh, or microwave (make sure the container you froze them in is microwave safe, or put in a microwave safe bowl) for about 25-30 seconds at a time then stir. I don't usually get it warm, just room temp. Make sure there are no hot spots when you're serving it to the babe!




Here are the bananas and avocado before pureeing. 2 bananas and 2 avocado's made about 10 servings. I got this nifty freezer container at Babies R Us.






It's really pretty easy if you make it all at once for a couple of weeks!