Our baby is almost nine months old. A few weeks ago, he picked up and tasted his first Cheerio. Since then, it’s been nearly impossible to get him to eat baby cereal and jarred baby food. He’s decided that he much prefers tiny pieces of food that he can eat with his bottom two teeth (the top two are coming in, too) and gums. He prefers any texture but mushy.
I was concerned at first but after speaking with the nurse at our pediatrician’s office, felt better. I told her that he’d rather eat itty bitty pieces of cooked carrot than pureed carrots, like most babies his age. She said that’s just fine and even chuckled a bit, saying, “He wants real food! That’s great!”
So now we’ve quickly moved on from the mushy baby foods to soft foods which can be chewed by an eight month old. If you’re trying to come up with healthy foods for baby during this transitional stage, there are lots of options.
Our little guy likes cooked carrots, cooked sweet potato, tid-bits of banana, mango and peas. This week we will try avocado. He also likes grains of cooked oatmeal (which takes the place of baby cereal), rice and tiny pieces of pasta.
He really enjoys Gerber Graduates Table Time foods, which are conveniently packaged in microwavable cups. He’s tried the chicken and veggie dinner and this week will try the turkey and rice dinner. I prefer to alternate these meals with the whole foods, as I believe that whole and freshly prepared foods are healthier.
Baby and I also recommend Healthy Times’ organic teething biscuits. They come in maple and vanilla and are really quite tasty (I tried one!). Earth’s Best wheat teething biscuits are good, too. Our baby probably likes Gerber Graduates’ Biter biscuits best because they are the only one of the three he’s tried which contain sugar. I didn’t realize this until I’d bought them and brought them home but figured I’m not going to go nuts and eliminate sugar entirely from his diet.
He also likes Gerber Graduate Puffs, little snacks which look like cereal and contain lots of important vitamins and minerals. He’s had three flavors: sweet potato, apple and banana.
Have any of your babies snubbed the jarred baby food early on? Any recommendations for baby finger foods?