Making Baby Food: Part 1

Making my own baby food was something that I always wanted to do, but when it came time to introduce solids, it was much easier to buy a jar... 6 weeks and many jars later I have decided it's time to experiment making my own food.

I'm lucky because in my music class at least 2 mammas do this (and gave me some tips), and there's 1 person in my Mom's group who does. Who knew so many people made their own food? (and I live in a pretty mainstream area).

I wanted to buy one of those baby cookers, but $150 seemed pricey for what I've been told I can do with a steamer and a food processor (I already own both).

A good website with lots of info is Wholesome Homemade Baby Food Recipes (if anyone knows others, please share).

I started with carrots yesterday. I had 4 small-medium carrot (I said I was testing, right?). I peeled and chopped them and put them in the steamer until they seemed soft enough - which was 55 minutes...  It turns out that was NOT long enough. When I pureed them, I had a lot of chunks and ended up mashing it through a strainer... NOT RECOMMENDED, took FOREVER (even though I got a nice puree from the result).

Matt looked at me and said, "We have the money to buy jarred food, don't do this if it's going to take more time than it's worth."  That seemed to me like a challenge! I got 2 jars worth of the carrots, but I think what I need to do next time is steam it for 1 hour and add some water to the processor to thin it up.

Moving on.

Today I made pureed apples.  Seemed easier. I peeled and chopped up 2 apples and put them in a pot of water to boil. 25 minutes later, I put them in the processor. They were pretty liquidy so I didn't end up needing to add any liquid (but I had it on reserve). Now this worked and 2 apples gave me 2 jars of food (for immediate consumption) and 4 ice cube trays (for later).

Cost:  
7 servings of jarred organic pureed baby food (Stage 1) = $5.53 + tax (.79/jar)
vs.
2 organic apples (which yielded 7 servings) = $1.36 + tax