Homemade Baby Food

We've been making most of our own baby food. Why? It's cheaper and we control what goes in it.

Think about costs. We really like the Beech-Nut baby food jars, which run about $0.95 per jar for a 4 oz. jar. We still buy them when we see them on sale, because they are convenient to take with on trips. However, for day-to-day use, we make our own and freeze it.

To do the math, our kiddo eats about 4 ounces (1 jar) per meal twice a day (sometimes more, she also get Cheerios, bread ends, and whatever other soft veggies and fruits we might be eating). Over the course of a week, that's about 14 jars of baby food (so about $13.30). A head of cauliflower is $3.69 at our local Meijer, and yields about 20 1.5 ounce cubes (or 30 ounces/about 7.5 jars), so for about $7 you can make the same amount of food that you would get for $13.30. And that's one of the more expensive types of produce. Sweet potatoes are about $1 per lb., so for $4 you can get about 56 ounces of food. Doesn't seem like a huge difference, but over the course of a year, that's about $700 in baby food jars versus about $370 on the high end or just over $200 on the low end.

When looking for produce that will puree up well, I prefer to find ones that aren't too acidic (so no mandarin oranges, rhubarb, pineapple, etc.) and don't have a huge water content (watermelon, oranges, etc.). I prefer to have several different types on hand so that I can mix and match 2-3 cubes per bowl. Some of our favorites include cauliflower, zucchini, sweet potato, acorn squash, butternut squash, carrots, apples (apple sauce), turnips, bananas, and parsnips.

Something to watch out for is the Dirty Dozen. They are foods that you really should buy organic, because the regular version uses a crazy amount of pesticides. And while those might be fine for most adults to eat (with some washing), you probably don't want to expose your 6+ month old to those levels. Here's the full list (anything over 20 or so, you can probably buy regular, but it's good to be informed, regardless. It's up to you to make choices for your child).

Once cooked and pureed, I like to freeze them in 1.5 ounce portions in my WeeSprout freezer trays (silicone, top rack dishwasher safe, with a clip-on lid). Once frozen, I transfer them to a freezer bag (although freezer safe containers would work too) and stash the freezer bags in a bin from IKEA. Make sure to label and date what's in the container/bag.

To reheat them, I put them in a glass bowl (usually 2-3 cubes of whatever combo strikes my fancy - but I like to put more watery things like zucchini with at least one cube of drier stuff like cauliflower or sweet potato), and heat them up in the microwave. For my microwave, I do 1:15 for two cubes and 1:25 for three cubes, but test your own. The goal is to melt enough of the food so you can stir the rest of the frozen stuff into it, which melts and cools down the nuclear hot food enough that it's edible (or almost edible with a bit of blowing). Always make sure you test the food before you feed it to your baby, because temperatures may vary even from batch to batch and bowl size to bowl size.

If you have a baby (like I do), who is a bit underweight, our pediatrician recommended adding some olive oil into pureed foods. Although we don't ever add salt to our purees, we are not shy about adding other spices, like nutmeg, pepper, cinnamon, and so on.

So, here is my first recipe:

Butternut Squash Recipe

Ingredients:
2 Butternut Squash (medium to large)
Olive Oil
Nutmeg (optional)
Rosemary (optional)
Ground black pepper (optional)

Directions:
1) Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
2) Cut the squash in half lengthwise and scoop out the seeds (I like using my metal ice cream scoop for this task).
3) Place the squash flesh side up on a baking sheet and sprinkle with olive oil (if you want additional olive oil for calorie loading, I like to pour a good amount in the middle of each squash and then use my hands to distribute the oil over the squash).

4) Sprinkle with any seasoning/spices you choose and bake for 45-50 minutes or until the flesh is tender.
5) Scoop out the flesh, being careful not to get any shell (I again used my ice cream scoop), and puree in a food processor or with an immersion blender. Add additional olive oil, if desired.
6) Feed some to your kiddo once it cools down and freeze the rest.

Yields about 20 1.5 ounce cubes, depending on the size of the squash. And actually tastes pretty decent even to me, although I would prefer a bit more salt and less olive oil.