Easy Baby/Toddler Meal: Baby Bites

Our little Bean has been on a bit of a growth spurt lately.  She's been eating and eating and eating!   I wanted to share one of my baby food "recipes", for those of you with hungry babes.  Let's call them Baby Bites.

Until she was 6 months old, she was fed breast milk exclusively.  At 6 months we started spoon feeding her purees, but I began to learn about the "Baby Led Weaning" approach.  There's a book, and lots of websites, and I read a little about it here and there and liked the idea.  I haven't read the book or anything official, but as I understand it the idea is that you start your babe off on finger foods from the get-go.  Because they're controlling how much food they consume, they'll also control the weaning off of breast milk, only taking what they need, based on how much solid food they ate.  You would give them foods of a manageable size and texture from the beginning, starting, lets say, with big soft, ripe pieces of banana or avocado.  Using this method, babes gain finger dexterity much more quickly and they tend to be less picky eaters when they're feeding themselves, among other benefits.  As their skills increase, the texture and size of the foods you give changes.  Often you're able to feed them some or all of what you're eating.

So, after a month or two of feeding purees, we started to shift to the BLW approach.  It was great!  It's so much easier than sitting there, spoon poised, waiting for the babe to open their mouth.

I came up with the idea for these little muffins when I had a bunch of foods in the fridge that EB couldn't quite grasp:  brown rice, shredded cheese, beans, etc. 

The beauty of this is the versatility.  [Recipe is at the bottom of the post.]  Take whatever foods you have around (that you feel good about feeding to your babe) and combine them all with a raw egg or two, then spoon into mini muffin tins, bake, and you're set.  I like to make a bunch and freeze them.  I try to include a protein, whole grain, and cheese to make them a balanced meal.   We have found that EB likes flavorful, and even some spicy foods, and we are comfortable feeding her a diverse diet.  So, sometimes I'll even use prepared foods, like casseroles, soups or side dishes for these EB Bites.  

Here are some that I've made:

broccoli, brown rice, white bean, cheddar

chicken, brown rice, parmesean

mashed potatoes, cheese

Recently I used string beans, black beans, brown rice, cheddar and pepper jack cheeses, and the eggs.  It's the cheese and eggs that help bind the bites together.

We only had this sliced cheese on hand, so I just chopped it up,

 combined everything in a big bowl,

 then decided to pulse it in the food processor a few times (if you don't have a food pro, I've made some suggestions at the bottom of this post),

Be sure to grease your pans well.  Use Pam or butter or olive oil, or whatever you're comfortable with.

Spoon into the tins,

and bake.

Once they've cooled, I spread them out on a big cookie sheet and freeze them.

Then I toss them into a labeled zip lock.

When I'm ready to feed them to the babe, I take a few out, nuke them for a couple of minutes, and she's got a well-balanced homemade meal she loves.

Here are some ideas of foods you could use.  I want to be clear, these are just ideas of foods that we would use.  Please do not feed your baby anything unless you are completely comfortable with it. 

I tried to type out a recipe, but it's all so subjective, I'll just recap general instructions:

Baby Bites
    by domestiCate

• Grease mini muffin tins.  Preheat your oven to 350F.  
• Combine a grain, a veggie, and a protein in a large bowl.  
• Add one or two raw eggs, and some shredded cheese.   
• Depending on your baby's age and chew skills, you may want to use a potato masher or food processor or blender to break down the mixture a bit.  
• Spoon mixture into mini muffin tins. 
• Bake for 20 minutes.  
• Cool in pans for 10 minutes.  
• To freeze:  arrange the muffins on a cookie sheet and place in the freezer.  Once frozen, move to a freezer bag.

With leftover soup I added cooked brown rice and left it in the fridge for a few hours to soak up some of the broth.  Then I added several eggs, and the bites turned out like mini frittatas.  You could even do a breakfast version with oatmeal and apples with cinnamon or other fruit combos.  With enough egg in the mixture, the cheese isn't necessary.

A couple of extra photos for the Grandparents: :)

Have you mamas made something similar?  Do you have any other food ideas?  I'd love to hear.  It's funny...I read shelves full of books about pregnancy and labor, but since the Bean's been here, I've mostly been going on instinct and what seems to just make sense (combined with what our doc tells us).  I do occasionally google around for info and I have a general baby-care book, with a chapter for each month or so, but it's very broad. 

I would love to hear about it if you give this a try!

Check out my fave link parties:  At the Picket Fence,  Serenity Now, Teaching "Good" Eaters, and Making Lemonade

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