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Now that my daughter Mia is almost eight months old, she is eating three hearty meals a day. Although heating a jar of prepared baby food is often the easiest and quickest option (especially when your baby is in the midst of a hunger attack), a consistent diet of traditional jarred baby food doesn’t seem particularly healthy. Not only is the food somewhat bland and usually laden with added preservatives and vitamins, but I sense that my daughter is craving something more substantial. A great way to supplement your baby’s diet of jarred food is to give her a little bit of what you are cooking for the rest of the family—especially if the foods are organic. It’s much healthier, less expensive, and a great way to introduce baby to new flavors and textures.
The larger reason to feed your baby organic food is because babies are at risk of higher exposure to toxins due to their developmental state. Because non-organic baby food often contains condensed fruits and vegetables grown with pesticides, the risk for exposure is prevalent. According to research recently conducted by Consumer Reports: Parents have good reason to be concerned. Children’s developing immune, central-nervous, and hormonal systems are especially vulnerable to damage from toxic chemicals. “A lot of these pesticides are toxic to the brain,” says Philip Landrigan, a professor of pediatrics and preventative medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, in New York City. “We have very good evidence that exposure of the fetus to organophosphorus pesticides produces babies with small head circumference, which is a risk factor for reduced intelligence and behavior disturbances.”
Exposure to pesticide residue is known to be highly damaging to the brain—and overall health—of babies, so reducing that exposure is key. Feeding your baby organic baby foods is a great and tasty way to do that.
Cooked it? Grind it!
For about $10, you can purchase a baby-food grinder, which quickly strains and purees soft food while screening out larger items such as seeds. For example, if you are steaming a fresh vegetable (such as carrots) to serve with dinner, set a few aside before seasoning them and put them in the grinder. You can mix the pureed carrots with a bit of milk for a quick and delicious meal. This works for potatoes, spinach, broccoli, beans, and any food that is cooked soft enough for the grinder. This is a very easy way to feed your baby organic vegetables. For fruits, peaches and bananas are easy to grind fresh. Pears, apples, and prunes can be boiled slightly before grinding. Any leftovers can be frozen in ice-cube trays so you have convenient servings on hand to defrost and feed baby later.
Buying It
Of course, busy moms and dads don’t always have time to grind their baby’s food—and sometimes what you are eating (sushi for example) doesn’t make for the most appropriate baby food for the grinder. In that case, you have to go to prepared foods. Nowadays, we are very fortunate to have a wide selection of organic baby food, in many different varieties. Besides jars of Gerber’s organic (formerly sold under the “Tender Harvest” label), and Earth’s Best, which can be found in almost every supermarket, there is an astonishing variety of premium organic prepared baby foods. One of the hottest new brands is Happy Baby, which features a large selection of fresh-frozen foods in ice-cube trays. Certified organic by the USDA, Happy Baby offers 15 additive- and allergen-free prepared meals, with choices ranging from “Wiser Apple” (yum) to “Super Salmon.” My daughter was not a fan of the latter, but maybe salmon is somewhat of an acquired taste for an eight-month-old.
If you have friends with kids in Los Angeles, you have probably heard them talk about TastyBaby organic baby food. As one of the first organic frozen baby food companies, they have gotten a lot of press and even a few celebrity endorsements. Until recently, TastyBaby has only been available in Southern California, but they are coming to Food Emporium in New York—and available via Boxed Greens, a terrific organic website. Flavors range from “Life is a Peach” to “Kickin’ Chicken.”
Makin’ It
One of the most fun and rewarding things you can do is actually prepare a special meal for your baby. In our family, with three kids, we are usually running around so frantically trying just to get dinner on the table that the fun part of cooking sometimes gets lost. It is amazing how cooking for a baby can really slow you down and help you appreciate the process. After all, you have a captive audience (literally strapped into a high chair) who is a very honest—and, hopefully, appreciative—food critic. To cook for a baby, you have to bring your “A” game and be willing to accept some criticism. Here’s a meal that has Mia’s highest recommendation (she finished it without making any faces or spitting it out).
Simple Organic Chicken Dinner
This pureed chicken dinner is nutritious, easy to make, and can be stored in a refrigerator in a sealed container for up to 48 hours or frozen for up to 2 months.
¼ pound boneless organic chicken breast
3 cups water
½ cup organic sweet potato, peeled and chopped
¼ cup fresh organic corn
¼ teaspoon fresh organic parsley
1 cup long-grain organic rice
Boil chicken in water in a sauté pan for 2 minutes or until cooked through. Remove chicken. When cool, cube into 1-inch pieces and set aside. In the same pan, covered, simmer the remaining ingredients in the water until soft, approximately 30 minutes. In a baby-food grinder, food processor, or blender, puree the chicken until smooth and place in a bowl or container. Grind or blend the vegetable mixture and combine with the chicken.
Chris O’Hara’s new daughter, Mia, loves to eat. She lives in Huntington with the columnist, her mom, and her brother and sister.
