gelato

This is my baby #2 so I've been through this before but I was just wondering if any of you have completely ignored the Italian baby food thing completely like I have? My paediatrician advises giving brodo and omogenizzati at 6 months and then starting with pureed fruit, ricotta and processed cheese later on. With my first daughter I started out with rice cereal mixed with breast milk and then moved onto pureed fruit and veggies and plain yoghurt. Much later I gave things like cheese and meat and basically whatever we were eating for dinner either pureed or a bit mushy.

My paediatrician, for some reason, thinks ricotta and cheese are OK for babies but not yoghurt. She also gave me a little lecture about how homogenised meat has passed strict controlli whereas meat from the butcher's hasn't. I wasn't planning to introduce meat until my baby is a bit older anyway but I find that meat in a jar pretty repulsive and I was planning to just give my baby normal meat pureed or things like meatballs which she can eat with her hands.

So for those of you with kids how did you do the solids thing? Did you actually make the brodo? The jarred meat? Jarred horse meat etc?

Lorna at Vicenza

Ha ha - when Chloe was about 6 months I was told to start with the brodo and the powdered cereals and porridge type stuff so I followed the proper brodo recipe. It said something like 1 small courgette, 1 small carrot, 1 small potato and 200ml of water - simmer for 20 minutes.
20 minutes later there was no water left in the pan at all and the veg was stuck to the bottom of the pan and burning. I thought "sod that for a lark" and basically did what I wanted within reason and what she liked.

The smell of the baby meat in jars made me feel quite sick so I mostly avoided that. The fish ones were ok. I used a few cheese triangle things once and remember thinking "we used to spread this stuff on bread - not stick it in soup."

I do remember that the baby stuff was expensive so I only bought it when there were 4 jars for the price of 3 of there was an offer on and I mostly used them when we were out. At home it was easy enough to use ricotta and brodo and parmessan and other stuff like grated apples and mushy banana.

I don't remember anyone telling me to avoid yoghurts but I was careful with tomato, strawberry, eggs and nuts etc.

When Chloe was a bit older she loved mashed spuds with chicken which I'd mixed up with a bit of gravy to make it soggy and not dry and chewy and I started using fresh white fish fillets as well.

Somebody told me to let them knaw on the rock hard end piece of parmiggiano cheese when they teething. They both loved that and would sit for hours with the "culo" of the cheese.

Never ever bought horse meat although the paediatrician did tell me that it's very lean and full of iron and good for them.

Anyway, neither of them have any food allergies and are not picky eaters.

I remember Alex once complaining that he didn't want any green bits in his minestrone soup. He must have been about 3. I picked up his soup bowl, chucked his dinner in the blender, threw it back into the bowl and back at him saying "now you can't see any green bits so get it eaten." He loved it - so I carried on blending his for a while until he decided that he did like peas and other green bits.

I do remember saving some of the little glass jars and once a week I'd make a big pot of brodo, fill up the jars and freeze them.

K in Modena

Well we did baby-led weaning following the Gill Rapley book so basically gave her finger food, anything we were eating, from the age of six months. The only things we avoided were runny eggs, honey, nuts, etc. The paediatrician took it very well, considering. Her only concern was that she'd had another baby who'd lost weight with it but she said that it wouldn't be a problem in Emily's case because she was such a big baby. At the next check-up she was delighted with Emily's progress and weight gain and said more people should use this method and the other parents must have been doing it wrong. The in-laws were a bit concerned that we weren't following the usual rules - "you gave her mushrooms? Are you out of your minds?" but they were pretty much won over too when they saw how well she ate.

gelato

K - I can just imagine how my paediatrician would take BLW since she nearly bit my head off for suggesting that I'd use non-jarred meat and plain yoghurt.

I guess once again I'll just ignore the paediatrician and just do what I did with my first daughter which was a combo of BLW and purees.

K in Modena

Tell her those jars contain way too much salt and it would be irresponsible of you to give them to your baby! I don't know about Rome, but in Modena people have heard of "l'autosvezzamento" even if they don't really understand what it is, so I guess it was less shocking. And I think we probably have quite a laid-back paediatrician too. Anyway, smiling and nodding and doing as you like sounds like a plan!

ballerina

Hello,

I agree with the above, the jars generally have too much salt, even the Mio formaggiono has more sodium and less calcium than the Parma Reggio brand. OH says that if it is made for babies, it must be good..... i just remind him that the baby food business is a big BUSINESS.. it's about making money!

OUr Paediatrician advised us to start weaning at 4 months, give him Plasmon (full of sugar!) and homogenised stuff and brodo that sounded like it took hours to prepare.... I ignored everything about that. In the UK they advised me not to wean until at least 6 months because they now know that the little babies' digestive systems can't cope with solids so young.

Our boy is 7 1/2 months and we give him mostly stuff that we would eat, minus the salt. We bought chicken breasts, orata and filleto and cooked and pureed it for him and froze portions. However, OH still wants to really puree stuff for him and boil or poach the meat and I prefer to sautee it (more flavour surely!) I also give him finger food, which he loves and can handle really well... OH thought this was madness until he could see that he is ok with it. We also give him yoghurt mixed with fruit, the normal bio full fat yoghurt, no added sugar. Our paediatrician said we should give him the baby yoghurts... I always look at labels and they put sugar in them. OH reckons that babies 'need' sugar!! It is one of the things I have put my foot down about. I have been compromising on loads of stuff that I don't agree with like putting him in a 'box to play. I never use the playpen because it is like solitary confinement to me, but if OH is looking after him, I let him go in there for an hour, max.

OH seems to think that the paediatrician must be always right, because that is his job, and says I read too much in books and on the internet... but i argue that the paediatrician probably qualified 20 or 30 years ago and hasn't updated his knowledge since then. The book I have is written by paediatricians so must be more up to date with latest research!

However, I too have learnt to just nod along with the paediatrician when his writes the baby's 'menu' down for us! I have discovered that in these parts, you are not supposed to question doctors and should treat them like gods.