Introducing solids to Babies : What, When and How
Once your baby is 6 months old, doctor would suggest to start solids for your baby. There will be many confusions about what would happen and how would baby react. Do not worry, with my personal experience I am sharing few things
What kind of food you can start
You can start with fruits like banana, chikkoo, apple and papaya. Make sure that the fruits are mashed well so that it will be easy for baby to eat it. For apple, peel the skin and boil it in water till it is soft. You can also grind the boiled apple to male it smooth.
You can also start giving vegetables like carrots, potato, sweet potato and pumpkin. Make sure to cook them well because if its not boiled well, it would be dififcult for your baby to digest.
You can also start giving cerelac to babies after consulting your doctor.
You can start giving ragi ( finger millet mixed with other cerelas ) to baby which is a very healthy option. I have mentioned the recipe below.
When can you start
Once your baby is 6 months old, baby would need nutritions other than mother’s milk. Do ask your doctor and start the solids for your baby.
How to prepare them
Vegetables:
Cut them into small pieces and steam or you can pressure cook it for 5-6 whistles so that it will be soft.
Fruits:
Fruits like apple has to be boiled and given to baby. You can grind them into fine paste also.
Ragi ( Finger Millet ):
You can have your own recipe if this does not suit your kid.
To make the ragi seri powder we need below ingredients.
- 1 kg of Ragi ( wash them thoroughly, sprout it and dry fry it to remove moisture )
- 200gms of Wheat ( wash them thoroughly, sprout it and dry fry it to remove moisture )
- 200gms of Chickpea ( wash them thoroughly, sprout it and dry fry it to remove moisture )
- 200gms of Groundnut ( wash them thoroughly, sprout it and dry fry it to remove moisture )
- 200gms of rice( preferably brown rice) ( Wash them well and dry them )
- 200gms of Black channa ( wash them thoroughly, sprout it and fry it to remove moisture )
Once your baby is 7 months old, you can add 100gms of cashews, pista and almonds each. You need to wash them and dry them well.
Make sure that all these are very well dried and there is no moisture. If there is moisture it would spoil the entire thing.
You need to mix this mixture with water and add some jaggery and boil it in water. Once the mixture thickens, you can cool it and feed it to your baby.
Brown rice :
You can wash the brown rice and dry it well. Once dried, grind it to fine powder. You can use this to prepare rice for your kid. Add water to the rice powder and boil it till it is cooked or pressure cook it.
Mix the cooked rice with some ghee and salt and feed it to your kid.
Food routine for baby
You can set a routine for your baby while giving solids. I followed this routine for my kid.
Morning – Ragi seri mix
Afternoon – Brown rice +ghee + salt
Evening – One fruit or One vegetable
Night – Ragi seri mix
Once you start solids do not try too many things at once. First start with one vegetable and one fruit and observe if baby is able to digest it. Once you know that your baby likes it and is not having any issue then continue with it. But in initial days wait for 1-2 days once you give them each variety of food. Especially when we give ragi to babies as it is little hard to digest, babies might take time to digest it.So once baby is adjusted to it you can continue and have a routine for your baby food.
With my personal experience my baby had little issue in digesting ragi and carrots for 2-3 days. I could understand it because baby did not poop for one entire day. Later it became normal to my baby and he loved eating them. So be patient for 1-2 days and start again.
Normally doctors suggest it is completely ok for a baby not to poop for 5-6 days maximum. If it exceeds 6 days then you need to consult doctor.
Stay healthy. Stay safe!!
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