BLW - Baby led weaning support thread

[chele]

Thanks ladies
I knew I'd get a more sensible anwer from you girls. I'm now offering 3 meals most days a week now, but he's really not a dinner or tea baby. He adores breakfast so will just keep persevering

Another question - when did your LO stop dropping any of their bottles?

 

[sun]

My LO was BF 5x/day even once he was eating pretty well. He went down to 4x/day at around 8.5-9 months, then at 10.5 months dropped his evening feed!

So now he is BF 3x/day and has been since. No sign of either of those feeds going any time soon! xx

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

Ruby was on 4 x 7oz bottles when we started weaning, and she dropped one at 9 months and one at 13 months. Now at 18 months she has 2-3 cups of 4oz cows milk.

 

[kitabird]

Hi, I'm just starting BLW and need some advice! I gave LO some banana today which he squidged in his hand and tasted, but didn't eat any. Do you think I should keep trying and give him time to get used to the idea, or should I take it as a sign that he's not ready yet and wait another week or so?
Also, what foods are good for starting out? What foods are ok to give raw?

Thank you!

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

Hi, I'm just starting BLW and need some advice! I gave LO some banana today which he squidged in his hand and tasted, but didn't eat any. Do you think I should keep trying and give him time to get used to the idea, or should I take it as a sign that he's not ready yet and wait another week or so?
Also, what foods are good for starting out? What foods are ok to give raw?

Thank you!

It's up to you tbh, he is still young so if you wanted to wait a couple more weeks that would be fine, but they do learn by exploring / feeling / playing with food so what your LO is currently doing is part of that.

I think the first foods I gave were slices of pear, toast with various toppings, pasta, roasted veg fingers, plus whatever we were eating, she liked roast dinners from the start

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

can anyone help am after a biscuit/cake recipe suitable for babies/toddlers and adults. Ideary no or limited sugar but still want flavour for adults!

This is the one I use for biscuits:

Sugar free fruit cookies / biscuits
Ingredients:

* 100 g butter
* 3 tbsp sugar free jam (we use St.Dalfour Strawberry)
* 1 beaten egg
* 50 g ground almonds
* 50 g dried fruit
* 100 g plain flour
* 1/2 tsp baking powder

Method:

* Preheat oven to 180 deg C/350 deg F/gas mark four.
* Cream together the jam and butter.
* Beat in the egg and mix well.
* Add the ground almonds and dried fruit and mix all the ingredients together.
* Add the flour and baking powder and give the ingredients a final mix. You'll be left with a slightly sticky dough.
* You can roll the dough if you wish, but I'm not good at rolling, so we just dig our hands in, make small balls with the cookie mix and flatten them into patty shapes.
* If you're rolling the dough, use a cookie cutter to make about 12-15 shapes.

Place the biscuits on a lightly greased baking sheet and bake for 18-20 minutes until golden.

And this is a lovely date cake:

Date cake

Ingredients

* 125g soft butter
* 1 egg
* 225g SR flour
* 1/2 tsp ground cinamon
* 75 mls milk
* 125g chopped dates

Method

* Preheat oven to 180
* Grease a 7" round cake tin or brownie tin
* Soften the butter with the back of a fork and beat it with the egg (the original recipe called for 125g soft light brown sugar in addition to the dates and you had to cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy before adding the egg, as per a usual cake recipe)
* Add the rest of the ingredients, mix well and put in the prepared tin.
* Bake for 1 - 1 1/4 hours until cooked through.

Tacey, would these be ok to freeze? I don't see why not, just wondered if you knew. Going to make both at the weekend hopefully.

These were yummy! Ruby seemed to really prefer the biscuits to the bought ones. I made them with apricot st dalfour and dried apricots.
My OH who has a really sweet tooth enjoyed these too. Plus I never thought to give Ruby dates before and she loves them.

 

[Tacey]

These were yummy! Ruby seemed to really prefer the biscuits to the bought ones. I made them with apricot st dalfour and dried apricots.
My OH who has a really sweet tooth enjoyed these too. Plus I never thought to give Ruby dates before and she loves them.

I'm so glad you liked them! I like the idea of putting the dried apricots in. I'll try that as I have some of the St Dalfour apricot jam in the cupboard. The date cake seems to disappear very quickly in our house!

 

[joeyjo]

What sort of tin do u usefor date cake ?

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

I think I used a too big tin tbh. Hopefully Tacey can help!

 

[Tacey]

I use a 7" round tin. The cake is fairly flat though, so it could be needing a smaller one. I might experiment with doubling the mixture as I haven't got a smaller tin than that!

 

[florabean1981]

quick question; I am sooooo bored with the rut we seem to have fallen into with regards to eating the same old things together at lunch times.

Harry's not a fan of bread or rice cakes, so I've had to be a bit more inventive when it comes to lunch as he just wont eat sandwiches (which I love, lol) so he's been having quite a bit of leftovers from the night before (pasta, rice, veges with some cold chicken etc, usually with chopped fruit/fromage frais for dessert), but was just kinda wondering what kinda stuff you ladies do for lunch time meals & snacks?

He's so hit or miss with lunch & sometimes I worry he's not eating enough, or enough of a varied diet by getting so many leftovers, lol.

 

[sun]

We often do leftovers too! Bun loves his breakfast and dinner, but eats less at lunch so we usually do little snacks. I make sweet potato pancakes and spread them with apple butter (he also doesn't like sandwiches), hummus and rice cakes, or his current favourite - sushi rolls. They are easy to make (once you've done a few) and I just stuff them with avocado. He really loves these. I also usually have congee in the fridge (like a thick rice soup) and he gets that quite often. You could also make thin crepes and roll them around cream cheese and jam. Bun isn't into dipping things yet, but if Harry is, you could dip breadsticks or crackers into hummus, baba ganouj, or a fruit puree dip. I have also made chicken spinach meatballs that he can pick up and eat, cubes of frittata, or roasted sweet potato (though he doesn't like roasted veg any more - sniff!)

Hope this helps xx

 

[joeyjo]

Another here that doesn't eat a big lunch - although he will eat sandwiches.

I quite often do eggs at lunch - scrambled with cheese grated in, omelette etc

Leftovers

crumpets

"picky plates" - sweetcorn, grated carrot, tomato pieces, chicken or ham, cheese etc

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

Ruby quite often refuses lunch outright. We also do 'picky plates' and they go down best!

 

[pinkclaire]

Hi Ladies, just a quick question, when do you start encouraging them to use cutlery? My LO eats fantastically, I am very lucky to how easily he took to BLW and he feeds himself brilliantly with his hands, I give him a spoon with every meal but he just picks it out and chucks it straight on the floor He will take a pre-loaded spoon if its something runny and he can do it easily but with anything else he just picks the food off the spoon with his hands!

Is this ok? I'm just worried because I dont want him to use his hands forever (bit dramatic I know!)

Would I be better off just starting him with a fork (when appropriate) so he doesnt get confused and therefore has the same as mummy and daddy? I thought he might be more inclined to use it then . Thanks in advance xx

 

[joeyjo]

I've never worried too much about cutlery. He always took a preloaded spoon well . At about 9 months if he spilt the contents he would try and reload - by picking up the bits (rice/beans...) and putting them on the spoon to eat

not sure when he started to use spoon properly - probably about 11-12 months.

Fork - one day he kept whinging & pointing at ours - gave him his own and he's had a good go with one ever since.

Same thing happened with w knife but he was rubbish - we only give when he really whines fir one which is usually about once a week when he has potato.

 

[florabean1981]

we're the same as Joeyjo- one day he seemed totally obsessed with our forks, so I let him play with mine & he knew exactly what to do with it, and even went through a phase of wanting to eat everything (and I mean everything) with the damn thing, lol He's kinda useless with spoons & uses them as catapault devices instead, but with a fork, he's a little pro. He probably eats 50/50 now with a fork & his hands, but is defo a lot less messy than he used to be!

re: the lunchtime ideas, thankyou so much for the repsonses! I've been doing little pickable plates of snacky foods the past 2 days & they seem to be going down pretty well so far, so that'sprobably the way forward for us for the time being.

Sun, may I ask for the recipe for your sweet potato pancake thingies? They sound yummy & sweet potatoe is one of Harry's fave veges, so I think they would go down a treat with him He loves to dip things, so I think I might start offering more dipable snacks too. It's like sometimes my mind goes blank & I settle for 'old faithful' food ideas & I really should start being more adventurous & thinking outside the box, lol.

Also, Tigerlady, still no luck in getting Harry to drink more than 1-2oz of cow's milk per day, however he's finally starting to get to grips with the doidy cup without covering himself, hehe, and he's cut out some of the snacky BF's now, so all in all, it's coming together nicely.

 

[Mum2b_Claire]

Hi Ladies, just a quick question, when do you start encouraging them to use cutlery? My LO eats fantastically, I am very lucky to how easily he took to BLW and he feeds himself brilliantly with his hands, I give him a spoon with every meal but he just picks it out and chucks it straight on the floor He will take a pre-loaded spoon if its something runny and he can do it easily but with anything else he just picks the food off the spoon with his hands!

Is this ok? I'm just worried because I dont want him to use his hands forever (bit dramatic I know!)

Would I be better off just starting him with a fork (when appropriate) so he doesnt get confused and therefore has the same as mummy and daddy? I thought he might be more inclined to use it then . Thanks in advance xx

Ruby still isn't brilliant with cutlery to be honest with you, she is 18 months. She has a low tolerance for frustration though! She can eat a bowl of cornflakes pretty successfully with a spoon, and meals involving rice, but most other things she has a few goes and then reverts to her hands. She certainly won't do it forever so I'm just lettig her learn in her own time.

 

[Tacey]

I'm having a bit of a wobble and am hoping for some reassurance!

Alice has had a cold for a week or so, and all that time she's barely eaten a thing. She's never been a big eater really, but her poo has gone back to proper breastfed baby poo with no sign of any solids. Should I be concerned that she's not taking in anything or just leave her to it? Apart from the cold, she seems fine in herself, and she's having more frequent milk feeds. I just feel like by now she should be relying on solids more than she is.

 

[TigerLady]

I wouldn't worry about it. Otter always eats less (especially solids) when he doesn't feel well. She'll eat better when she feels better. No worries.