Baby food recipes and snacks

minimooch

I used to make and freeze drop scones as snacks. Cold eggy bread used to be good too

lilyjune

Hi lilyjune,

This thread should give you some ideas:

Baby food recipes and snacks

I'll add your thread to it later to keep the suggestions together.

Pink

Thank you for those replies and sorry I didn't see the previous thread. I did look but found one on childrens snacks.

crumpets, teacakes, pitta, scotch pancakes

Toast spread with butter and marmite
Cheese on toast
Egg in a cup
Cheese chopped into long sticks
Tiny sandwiches with soft fillings that they could suck/chew on
As much sliced fruit/veg as they would eat
Bones. Yes really, bones! My middle child loved ribs from an early age (perhaps not quite as young as yours) and spent forever sucking on the bones afterwards.
Breadsticks
Cooked pasta, or fish
Pancakes
French toast soldiers

Oatcakes, crackers with Philly, halved baby tomatoes, grapes, raisins (from the baking aisle, not the wee boxes), pancakes, crumpets, bread sticks, cucumber and carrot sticks, mini sandwiches, plain rice cakes ( no salt), toast fingers

My problem is and probably should have said that I don't want to load them up too much on a lot of heavy carbs like bread, toast, pasta as both suffer from very bad constipation so I try to save proper carbs for mealtimes. (and we almost always have wholemeal) The toddler is starting to come out of it as he now has All Bran for breakfast every day but the baby is really getting into it. I do have medication for both of them although the toddler hasn't needed it recently. We do sometimes have pancakes for tea though or breakfast at the weekend

Also part of the reason I like the tomato wheels/carrot stick puffs, onion rings so much is that they are very very handy when out and about. There's no mess and I think the baby likes them because of the crunch factor and rubbing them on his gums but obviously they do melt in his mouth..

I hadn't thought of buying the ordinary no salt rice cakes though, so dopey sometimes so thank you for that nic2075, that will be much cheaper than the Organix ones.

They do both like Babybel and the toddler has grated cheddar sometimes on a cracker but not too often.

And finally, I'm very concerned about how much fruit is too much, should they really eat as much as they want? With no limits? My 2 year old is quite capable of eating 10 pieces of fruit a day, more if I let him. Yesterday he had 2 large oranges, banana, 2 apples, pear, raisins, 3 clementines. He will help himself to the fruit bowl and eat 3 pieces in a row.

adelight

Aldi sell very thin rice cakes that you could spread with unsweetened apple sauce (make your own by microwaving diced apple and mashing it up). You can "hide" ground flax seed in the apple sauce, even a teaspoon provides lots of good fats and fibre. Or a sprinkling of psylium husks? That is mainly a fibre supplement.

10 pieces of fruit is too much sugar and acid for their teeth, I would try to cut it down and talk to your dentist about what's a good amount for your little ones. You say they don't really snack on raw veggies but have you tried cold steamed ones? Cook some extra at dinner one night and see if they like cold pieces of soft vegetables to snack on, much more fibre than fruit.
Also, what about cold hard boiled eggs? Should keep them satisfied longer than a piece of fruit.
Smooth nut butters (make these yourself, much cheaper and very easy- just blend nuts!) on vegetable sticks?

ragz_2

Finding alternatives to the crips is a good idea as you snacking on crisps shouldn't be encouraged, even if they are 'baby' ones as the kids won't realise that. You've had loads of fab suggestions...

Regarding the carbs thing, I see your point. Maybe offer protein snacks instead. My younger brother used to have sausages a lot, handheld and filling! I should mention that it is recommended that under 2s don't have brown rice and pasta as it is too high fibre for them. Obviously this depends how often they have it and it is totally your choice, but little tummies have trouble with too much fibre.

Fruit, well I wouldn't give too much as it encourages a sweet tooth. Maybe have it after meals like a pudding, on on their breakfast and once a day as a snack. My daughter would eat grapes all day if I let her, so I have to ration them! Fruit is great, but it is STILL sugar.

Aarons_mummy

Cheese cubes, breadsticks, plain ricecakes and you can spread stuff on top, home made dips and crudites, cold meat spread with soft cheese and rolled up was something my son loved and still does, pancakes and things are always a hit, mini sausages, how about plain pasta with a home made tomato or cheese dip they can dip the pasta in. Plain cereals cheerios, cornflakes just dry to crunch on are cheap if you get the cheaper versions

lilyjune

Sorry it's taken me ages to respond, been super busy!

Some fab suggestions there so thank you all. Def going to try hrd boiled eggs and maybe a little roll of ham and baby beetroot was another thing I thought of.

Ragz, do you know how much fibre is too much? The advice is so mixed and when we saw our consultant, he made me feel like the worst mother ever because we weren't having wholemeal everything (at the time)

JohnSmith1986

Motherhow.com has a lot of useful advice on baby food. Check it. Your baby may love it):j