The Best Tools for Homemade Baby Food
Congrats to you on surviving the first months with a new baby. Each stage of a baby’s development provides new challenges for parents, and leaves you searching for answers on how to do things correctly. If you’re wondering what to do now that your baby is ready for the exciting world of fruits and vegetables, I’ve included what I think are the truly necessary tools to make homemade baby food.
Jarred baby food can add up, it’s not very appealing, and it can contain additives or chemicals. To keep costs down and ensure that your baby is receiving the best nutrients possible, homemade baby food is a fantastic alternative to jarred baby food. Making your own food is also a great way to feed your child organic baby food while keeping costs down. There are a lot of specialty products on the market for making and storing baby food, but these are not necessary investments. Who wants to be left with another appliance that’s gathering dust? There are three main tools that you really need to make homemade baby food, and all of these you can use once your child has stopped eating purees.
1) Steamer basket - Steaming fruits and veggies are a great way to cook food until it is soft enough for a baby. Steaming doesn’t require adding any additional ingredients to the food, and food that is steamed retains lots of nutrients. (Use the steaming liquid to thin food when you puree it to add even more nutrients back in.) A steamer basket that fits inside a pot you own is a great, low-cost method for steaming food. You may already have one, and if you don’t, you can use it to make yourself healthy meals in the future. Getting your hands on one of these is win-win. You don’t need a special appliance to steam food. These can be a hassle to clean, and require much more room to store. I endorse any kitchen item that serves multiple purposes or doesn’t take a lot of space.
2) A stick (or immersion) blender- Once you’ve cooked your food, you’ll need some way to puree it. Our mothers used food mills, but luckily we’ve got better options on hand. You can use any type of blender, but my favorite kitchen tool is a stick blender. Again, stick blenders are slim and easy to store. They also serve many other purposes than making baby food - use them to make soups, scramble the fluffiest eggs, and whisk salad dressings. A huge advantage to stick blenders is you can make your entire batch of baby food at once, rather than having to blend only in batches that will fit in a traditional blender. This definitely helps in saving time, which we all know is limited now that you have kids.
3) Ice cube trays - Homemade baby food only lasts a few days in the fridge. To really save yourself time, make big batches at once and freeze them. The one investment I made when starting to make baby food was buying new ice cube trays. I bought ones from Amazon that were specially made for baby food. They had lids to prevent from spilling and were easy to pop individual cubes out of. I would recommend buying these trays, but the good news is, you can use them to make ice once you’re done making baby food.
My daughter only ate pureed baby food for a few months before she wanted to claim her independence and feed herself. Don’t buy unnecessary gadgets that have limited use. These tools will allow you to easily make food for your children, and then can be used for your own adventures in the kitchen. If you know an expectant mother, these items bundled would be a great baby shower gift, especially when you include a few recipes inside.
