A few questions please :)

[Jen114]

I really need some advice please with a few questions.

what types of breakfast do you give a 7 month old???

Is there an alternative to baby rice??

What about wheat cereal??

When it comes to lunch time i have been giving my DD two different types of veg 2 cubes of each and Chicken.... Is Fish and beef just as good or is she too young??

i hear alot about youghurts, what type can you give? adult ones? which meal?

What types of dinners do you give a 7 month old?

Wehave no kids in our family so really lost hope these are not too may questions..

thank you in advance

[Freya'sMum]

Hi Jen,

I think the thing to do is take a deep breath and relax try not to think about solid foods as foods, but as edible toys. Babymilk is your lo's primary source of nutrition until 12 months old, the solid food you offer is for practice and it only supplements the nutrition in the milk, not replaces it, so really, she's got a good 5 months to just experiment with foods before she really needs them!

Bearing this in mind then, there is no rush to introduce loads of different foods - what might seem boring and uninspiring to us is quite often something they love (plain weetabix, plain pasta spirals, plain mashed potato)! The important thing is to make eating fun, to focus on the social aspect of eating, sit down and have meals as a family, let her watch you eat with fingers and with cutlery, she'll watch and learn, and she'll see it's a lovely, fun, social, relaxed, pleasurable thing to do! This is far more valuable as an experience than what you offer and how much she swallows!

But to answer your questions... breakfast can be anything at all, at 7 months she has no concept of what a breakfast should be, so you can offer her anything you like! There are plenty of cereal alternatives, but if you are looking for something similar to rice, why not try oatmeal/porridge? Adult cereals tend to be quite processed and contain a fair amount of salt/sugar, but if you want a finger food cereal, why not try shredded wheat soaked in a little milk or pure orange juice?

I don't believe that there are any limits on when to introduce different meats - salmon is a good starter fish, or cod, haddock and plaice. Beef is quite a course texture, lamb has a strong flavour, but pork is quite tender and easy to mince.

Yogurt... best to offer plain full-fat yogurt (Greek or otherwise) - I favour Yeo Valley organic yogurts, if you want to flavour them, add some homemade fruit puree.

There are loads of recipes in the Recipes section of this forum (click the link at the top of the main forum page), I know there's a thread on breakfast ideas not long past so...

HTH to get you started?

Ax

[Mommymac]

A really great book that lays out when, what and how is Super Baby Food, by Ruth Yaron.

[Molsmum]

Hi,
My LO is 7 months too.  He will eat just about anything.
Gave him porridge with dried apricots and pear which he loved this morning.  He likes ready brek and weetabix too.  He has also tried and enjoyed plaice, cod and salmon.  I cooked a beef casserole with sweet potato so meat was tender and there was a flavour he recognised.  Is good for iron.
As for yoghurts I have given petit filous and greek yoghurt with pureed fruit.
A usual day for us is
Breakfast - oat cereal, ready brek, weetabix or porridge and then fruit
Lunch - Fish, pork, lamb or chicken with veg with yoghurt
Tea - Soup or vegetables followed by fruit dessert.

Finger foods next x

[potlaura]

Hi

When my lo was starting to eat he loved sunrise orange breakfast and bananna porridge as well as weetabix and ready brek.
For lunch it is a mix of veg and meat pureed.
Same for dinner and my lo loved yogurts. Like pp said it is a case of offering new foods for when milk is not their core diet.

HTH x