Best Solid Foods to Start With

I did bananas then sweet potatoes then summer squash - then I think I quit keeping track, but maybe carrots?
All steamed, then ground or blended.
S.

With all three of my kids I started feeding them baby food at 3 1/2 months old and started with bananas and then went through all the fruit except for peaches. It gave them all really bad gas. So I just stay clear of that. Then after that I go through the veggies and then at 6 months I start stage 2 foods. Good Luck

It is best to start with Veggies since once they taste the sweetness of fruits they tend to want only that. Save sweet potatoes for the last veggie to try since it is much sweeter than others. If I remember correctly they suggest that you start with the green veggies and then move on to the orange ones.

My little girl tried (baby food) green beans first, just because that's what I had! By around 6 months, though, she would rather eat something by herself, so I gave her little pieces of avacado and banana. Basically anything soft that she could pick up by herself.

I don't think it matters so much and I think all doctors will give you different advice. My pedi said to start with veggies because if you start with fruit they may not like the veggies because they are not sweet. We did this and our little one is almost 2 now and LOVES her veggies. I have no idea if what we started with had a thing to do with it- she has always been a good eater.

Good luck- it's so much fun to start moving on to solids.

Hi E. - I started my daughter on peas. I know it's a "myth," but I wanted her to get a taste for veggies first before I introduced sweeter fruits. If I remember right, I did peas first, then carrots, then green beans, then sweet potatoes last. All kids are different but Eva eats anything now, including spinach (although she only tolerates 3 or 4 bites). For a while, she didn't want anything to do with mashed potatoes, but she eats them now.

Good luck!
L. K.

Our pedi said fruit first, then veggies, then meats. I even started adding the fruits to the cereal sometimes. Good LUck!

YES!!!!!!!! There is the best baby food book, THE SUPER BABY FOOD BOOK. WONDERFUL!!!!!!!!
I would go to avocados, organic bananas, then some sweet potatoes and carrots.
I started my little girl at 5 months or so with no pressure. I really enjoyed this book- highly recommended. It's more than a baby food book, they give lots info and it's easy to skim through and use as a reference. It's a MUST HAVE. Hands down.

I think we tried avocados pretty early on. They are good early foods to start with.

Try boiling a potato maybe with a lil margine on it.

Hi E.,
Ask your pedi what he recommends. My son started out on yellow veggies like squash. We went through all the veggies and then moved on to fruits. My pedi told me not to give him bannannas until he had developed a taste for other foods. My son is now 8 months old and LOVES to eat almost everything (except peaches....weird). But, the yellow veggies are sweeter than say their green counterparts. Good luck!
lace

We were told to start with vegetables because if you started with fruits, the child wouldn't eat the vegetables since they are not as sweet. We started both our girls with squash then rotated green and yellow vegetables, trying a new one every three days.

E.,

Every baby is different, so yours might be ready for more.

Starting with vegetables, either pureed that you feed him yourself or small pieces he can feed himself, is always a good plan.

If you want to start finger foods, a nice one to try is steamed broccoli. Steam it until it's nearly mush and then cut it into tiny pieces and let him try and feed himself.

Children that get their veggies before anything else, like fruit or meat or cheese, are more likely to develop a taste for them.

My son is almost 3 and broccoli remains one of his favorite foods.

Another good finger food is the veggie puffs or fruit puffs by Gerber. Keep in mind he's not ready for these until he can crawl with his belly off the floor.

But these are great because they're tasty and they melt in your mouth (I tried them).

The foods he's most likely to be allergic to are the ones that you or his father have been allergic to in your lifetimes. You want to hold off on letting him have any of those until he's 2, if you can.

Good luck with everything.

C

I started out with Gerber's stage 1 green beans with my son (who is now 3 yrs) at around 4 months. Of course, you pick the brand to your choice and liking and I think people keep changing the agr you should start things to keep you guessing. I read or was told to start on veggies because fruits are sweet and babies will hook onto them and may be reluctant to veggies. My son did great and loved everything. Good luck! Hope this helps.

some of my son's fav starters was mashed up banana (just be careful of constipation with this one), applesauce, and mashed avacado. but we started solids a little later (around 8 months). i'm also a firm believer in 'if it doesn't taste good to me i'm not going to force my child to eat it', esp when first introducing them.

My little one loved avacados. She would eat a whole half of an avacado when I couldn't get her to eat anything else.

She doesn't really like the fruits since they are a little sour. My ped said to try veggies first starting with the yellows and orange ones. Elizabeth likes green beans and garden vegetables (also green). So you never know what they are going to like.

We also did Baby Yo yogurt in the beginning. We still have this once a day.

GL!

Begin with a vegetable, preferably a green one. Then later, introduce a new vegetable every few days in isolation to make sure it is tolerated. Then move on to fruits after a taste for vegetables is established.

I did veggies first because I was told that if you do fruit first, they may not like the veggies because they are less sweet. I'm not sure if that's true, but honestly, it probably doesn't matter much. Once we moved on to fruits, I sometimes mixed a little in with her cereal. It's so much fun to watch their reactions when they eat, so enjoy it! :-)

i guess every pedi says something different! ours said start veggies before fruit so they don't only prefer the sweet taste of fruits... she suggested sweet potatoes and squaush and to try each for a week to make sure there are no allergies...

I gave my son avocado and he loved it. Still does. Bananas are good too.

when my kids were little we did a veggie then a fruit and alternated back and forth. by 6 mos old my kids were eating mashed potatoes, fried eggs, pinto beans, and anything else that was soft and my mil could get in them. they all have really good appetites and are healthy kids.

Our pediatrician suggested using 'the colors of the rainbow' as a guide. Basically you start from the lightest and work your way up to the darkest. For example lightest being applesauce, pears, bananas...work your way to squash, sweet potatoes, carrots, peas, beans, prunes etc. That has worked really well for us. It's all new flavors and sensations...you'll think they don't like something and the next time you try it with them they are smacking their lips and saying num num. Keep trying different choices and combinations. It's so much fun watching them learn to love healthy foods.
Good luck...

Hi E.. Wholesomebabyfood.com has some great info on starting solids. It's all i've used for both my kids. I started my kids on food when they were 6 months old. Cereal is much easier to deal with if that's all he wants. I would wait if he seems content with cereal. But if he seems ready to you then go for it! Every baby is different. But 5 is definitely ok. I started my kids on squash first. Butternut squash is easy on their little tummies and has a good flavor. Then i did green beans, peas, applesauce, pears. Some things it is better to wait until they are 8 months or older such as carrots, broccoli, meats(i wait until 11 or 12 months) Anyway, wholesomebabyfood.com is extremely helpful. It also tells you good ways to make your own baby food if your schedule allows for that. It tells the pros and cons of starting each fruit and veggie and the best age to introduce them. It has a great menu plan to go by and it helps a lot at the beginning stages! I hope this helps you. Good luck!

I started my son off at 4 months so dont worry you are doing great.The best thing I was told was if more food is staying in their mouth than what is coming out then they are developmentally ready for the food.If they are pushing most of the food out with their toungues then wait a week or two and try again.You probably know this but just in case start with the foods that say 1st foods they are alot more runny.My doc told me to start with veggies.Do the same colors together for example one week do peas and greenbeans next do carrots and sweet potatos.Start with veggies because fruits are sweet and they might not like the veggies after the fruits.have fun it is exciting.

Pears and applesauce are both good fruits to start with, green beans and peas are good veggies. I would not go to mixed or meat for quite awhile. Both my kids are grown and started on food around 3 months, just the difference in what they recommended then and now. I would not worry too much about it, if cereal is doing the job no reason to be in a hurry about it.

My doc suggested told me start with the fruits, move on to veggies then do the meats. I started with bananas, then applesauce then moved to pears & peaches. With the vegs, I did all the orange ones first, then the green ones. I never could get any of my kids to eat the meats, but tried nonetheless. :)