That someone being my 11-month-old, who is slightly physically underdeveloped for her age (only recently started crawling, refuses to stand). She’s massively teething, so she could have more than 4 teeth soon, but she’s had those 4 for a while and knows how to use them to bite Cheerios and the like.
Seriously, this phase between feeding her a jar of something pureed and a sandwich is the WORST. I have no idea what to make her that she can reliably eat. We’re running out of stage-3 baby food and I really don’t want to buy more if I can help it, but I’m not entirely certain what she can eat and what she can’t. I’ve made her broccoli and cheese nuggets from a recipe from a baby food site, and she’ll eat one of them cut up before she gets bored and starts smashing it all over the place. She can eat about half of a cut-up grilled cheese, and she’s had cut-up banana before (although not often, because she tends toward constipation and that’s one of the worst things you can feed a constipated baby). Beyond that, I’m totally clueless. I can’t see her being able to chew actual meat at this point, although maybe I’m selling her short, and she’d be fine with something slow-cooked and tender in small enough pieces.
Anyone have any good recipes for older babies/toddlers?
At 11 months, you can probably do that, only skipping the food mill. Here’s a videoof my completely toothless 6mo eating turkey breast quite happily.
Broccoli trees are great - a nice handle with easily gummable buds all over the top. But anything that you can cut into baton shapes will work. Or you can do what I do now - just cut what’s on my plate into manageable chunks she can pop in her mouth. Oh, and she loved canned pears (in juice) - sweet, soft enough to gum, relatively easy to pick up.
Avoid chokable stuff - nuts and nut butter (also an allergy concern), whole grapes, hot dogs, unless cut lengthwise, raw carrots and apples - anything that might get lodged in the windpipe easily. Other than that, go to town.
Also, don’t worry about crawling - it isn’t a developmental milestone, and some babies never do it!
Pasta spirals are good. So’s soup - I used to fling some rice cereal in to thicken it up so they didn’t spill it everywhere. Any kind of fruit - in long sticks if it’s softish, grated or cooked to mush if it’s not. Pumpkins. Avocados. Eggs (you can do an allergy test on her cheek if you want. I can’t remember which bit of the egg is supposed to be 1+ but I just let my kids loose on it after about 8 months). Rice crackers and anything which will “sog up” after being gummed for a bit.
I fed my kids all sorts of crap, inculding lunch meat and peanut butter. But I’ll be good and not recommend those
If she’s teething and has mastered a pincer grip (which it sounds like she has), maybe try some frozen peas. My nephew loved them, straight out of the package. They mushed up nicely when he gummed them and he could pick them up himself. And frozen is good for the sore gums.
Generally, this will work. Some foods don’t need to be run through the mill.
Mostly I fed my daughter whatever we were eating, unless it was something like pizza with jalapenos (my husband’s favorite). She could handle something like a veggie pizza, or pizza with hamburger or sausage and veggies. Pepperoni is a bit of a challenge if you only have four teeth. If she seemed to be having problems with a particular food, I cut it into smaller pieces for her.
I have to admit, I fed her hot dog chunks and peanut butter sandwiches at that age. She was able to eat those foods very nicely, and also bananas. She was allergic to any non-human milk, so I breast fed her for a little over a year, and gave her soy milk when I weaned her. She eventually outgrew her milk allergy.
I thought that Lisa was never going to walk, until one day she pulled herself up and started toddling. She didn’t go through the “hold onto the furniture” phase. She did have a walker, and she enjoyed it, so she understood the whole business about getting around bipedally, she just skipped the holding onto things phase.
The OP’s suggestion sounds like my daughter, who is now 17 months old - small, late crawler, late to get teeth. She started crawling at about 12-13 months, and went rapidly to cruising and then walking. She now runs around the house at top speed, occasionally colliding with things along the way. Doesn’t seem to slow her down any.
As for food: pasta is good, if you can get small pasta shapes and buy or make sauce with minimal salt and spice (or try her on plain pasta first). Try small bits of regular food - turkey, cheese, fruit. You’d be surprised what they can chew even without a full set of teeth.
ETA: We tried her on peanut butter sandwich pieces but it did make her choke (not surprising, really - big sticky food ball, tiny throat), so I’d advise against it until she’s bigger.
English peas are good, and both of my kids loved blueberries, or pretty much any fruit. Spaghetti (no sauce, just a little butter or olive oil) is always a big hit too.
If she knows how to chew even a little bit, you can probably feed her just about anything as long as it is either fairly soft or cut into really small pieces. My niece only has four (or maybe six) teeth, and she ate baked ham, bread, potato salad, and vegetables at Christmas dinner without any trouble.
My kids never ate “baby food”. My oldest hated anything pureed and then when his sibling starting eating it was easier to feed her regular food so she could self-feed. Typically I would use whatever I was cooking for dinner and set aside some for the kid before I added spices or sauce. And at that age they do just fine without teeth.
Some suggestions (food is cut into bite-size chunks as necessary):
pasta shapes(cooked well)
avocado
pear
apple (cooked until soft)
chex soaked in milk until soft (that was my son’s favorite)
canned green beans - no salt (a huge hit)
cooked sweet potato
cooked chicken
cooked peas
cooked broccoli
cooked carrots
bread, lightly toasted with lots of butter (cut into strips)
cooked hamburger
grapes (cut in half)
hot dog (cut in strips)
hard-boiled or scrambled egg
Steamed veggies, pastas, soft meat, bread – they’ll all work. Basically feed her the same thing you’re eating (absent raw foods, etc., of course), but cut up smaller.
Frankly my kids went right to table food from Stage 2 baby food. Once you introduce tasty foods with salt and seasonings, they’ll never go back.
