Making homemade baby food: a rambling guide to success

 
I have had quite a few people ask me for advice regarding making baby food. I have typed it out enough times that I thought maybe I should publish it here. The other thing is, while I hate to sound pushy or like "one of those moms," I cannot stress how not a big deal it is to and how satisfying it feels.
 
So, in case you couldn't tell, I'm a huge advocate for making baby food. I just figure you will be making food for your kid for years and years, and you spend so much time during those early months breast feeding, if you are able to and choose to, why not make your own baby food?? It saves a ton of money (even if you do all organic), and it tastes like, well, food! I bought Greta some jars of baby food to have on hand, and I thought they smelled and tasted weird - I personally wouldn't want to eat that stuff, and once she was used to the homemade stuff, she turned her nose up at jarred food.
 
I've never been succinct at this, but here goes:
I recommend getting an immersion hand blender and a few ice cube trays with covers (check if BPA-free or use these trays). I also used a rice cooker / steamer. You may also want to invest in a food mill, although I admit I didn't get much use out of mine.
 
Okay, so I would steam or roast fruits and veggies and then just puree them with the hand blender. Things I had great luck with were sweet potatoes, yams, pears, butternut squash, apples, peaches, and carrots. Bananas, and avocado you don't need to cook; you can just blend. For the most part, after cooking and pureeing, you can thin the veggies (especially sweet potatoes and yams) with plain water or the water from the steamer. I believe that young infants shouldn't have water that carrots are steamed in because of nitrates (wait until at least 9 months to use the carrot water). Once things were at the proper consistency, I would pour the puree into the ice cube trays, which made approximately 1 oz cubes, and pop them in the freezer. The next day, I just threw the batch all together in a freezer bag (and never had issues with them sticking) and used them within a couple months. Other things I would freeze were portions of plain organic yogurt and silken tofu that I purred. (Greta never liked meat, so she got most of her protein the first couple years from pureed tofu that I mixed in with other things, and of course milk. I did make chicken baby food once but it did not go over well!)
 
During the entire process, from introduction of foods and beyond, I would usually have to make only 1 or 2 batches of baby food a week, and I would just kind of rotate them as necessary. I estimate that it took 1 or 2 hours a week of my time total.
 
One tip is that apples are a pain in the ass. I mean, if I'm going to peal, core, and dice that many apples, you know I'm going to make a mofo pie. So I would often just buy big jars of natural organic apple sauce that had no sugar added and freeze those into cubes. And speaking of shortcuts, Greta loved peaches, but I could never yield much from fresh peaches unless we were in the short, magical window that they were in season in Rochester, so I would buy big bags of frozen peaches that had been flash frozen and figured they were still better than canned or jarred!
 
I never got into making recipe-recipes - I had one baby food book that seemed promising, but Greta never seemed to like what I made from it. When she was a little older, she did like when I'd mix different purees though, and her absolute favorite was 1 oz yam, 1 oz peaches, 1 oz tofu, and 1 oz yogurt. Sounds weird, but she loved it!
 
This site gives good guidelines on when babies can have certain foods. See the left column has charts for different ranges of months and the section on introducing solids. (But obviously follow your pediatrician's advice.)
 
Now, Greta is a great eater who loves plain, fresh fruits and veggies (although she got ranch dip on her veggies at school and it was like Columbus discovering America) and other good stuff, and I like to think it has something to do with her great start! (Pats self on back.)
 
Bon appetite! Other advice welcome in the comments section.
 
Fran