Calling Hunkermunker and all other finger food fans

[Windermere]

Hi, I remember from a few other threads that you are a fan of finger foods and I am looking for advice. Ds has just turned one and took really well to weaning has a very varied diet and has always loved everything I give him. My problem is when he is teething he goes completely off his food and will hardly eat a thing, at the moment he is teething and will not take more than a spoonful of anything, however he seems to still be happy to feed himself, he might also be asserting a bit of independance and be bored with me.

I am stuck for ideas I have always just given finger food to supplement his diet rather than being his main diet. The sort of finger food I give him includes toast, sandwiches, rice cakes, breadsticks, banana, pitta bread, pizza fingers, fishy shapes. Does anyone have any ideas as to how to make finger food his main diet? His faveourite foods until recently were poached salmon & cheesy mash, moussaka, fish pie, pasta bakes, I really can't think how I can turn a moussaka into finger food! Any ideas greatly appreciated.

[handlemecarefully]

This book is good, and available from Amazon and most book stores:

"Finger food for babies and toddlers" - Jennie Maizels.

I've got it and found it useful

[flashingnose]

I know it's not quite what you're asking, but what about giving him a bowl of something and his own spoon? You can have a spoon too and keep loading up and swapping to get him started .

[handlemecarefully]

Agree with flashingnose - a 1 year old will make lots of mess, but you are probably going to have to brace yourself and go for it. My ds was feeding himself (a little ineptly) with a spoon at just under 1. He absolutely resents and actively resists being spoon fed by anyone else.

[serenity]

Pasta is a finger food! DD pretty much lived on pasta as a main meal. I would cook her a portion (quick cook comes up softer than the usual ones) and mix some of whatever we were having with it. I'd keep portions of veggie sauce or mince etc in the freezer for when we had something that didn't work. As she got older the proportion of pasta to 'our' dinner got less, until she just ate the same as us.

[serenity]

Oh yeah, as FN and HMC have already said, DD had her own spoon and fork from the beginning. To start with they mainly got thrown around (we had a very big splash mat underneath!) but it didn't take her long to try and do it herself, or we'd spear the food for her and she'd try and poke it in!

[hunkermunker]

Haven't got time to post now, but wanted to say quickly that I'm not ignoring you and will post later. The Jennie Maizels book is good.

DS likes eating couscous...grain by grain... Not very useful, but thought it might amuse you! LOL!

[Tommy]

My DS2 likes soup (obviously not finger food lol )and dunks his bread into it - I shove every vegetable possible as well as lentils into soup to get him to eat heathily!

[Windermere]

Thanks for advice everyone. I have ordered the Jenny Maizel book and gave ds a spoon last night, most of it went down the back of the highchair but I am sure we will get there. I will let you know how I get on with the book. THanks.

[Hattie05]

As others have said, give him a spoon, and allow him to eat with finger also, every meal can be finger food!
Standard potatoes, meat and veg can just be chopped into small bitesize pieces for him to pick up. Pasta dishes (i used to limit the amount of sauce i put on dd's) and then let them pick it up with fingers.
My dd has always enjoyed peas one by one! and brocolli kept whole, so she can hold her 'trees' by the stalk and munch away on them.

[sweetkitty]

My DD is the same will only eat weetabix and yoghurt with a spoon and she tries and grabs it off you, every meal for us has been finger food since she was about 8 months, I feel I give her the same things constantly and struggle to come up with new ideas. She has sandwiches cut up, potatoes, veg, chicken, fish etc all as little bits she can pick up. Beans on toast is good as well (she picks up the beans too) I give her a spoon of baby fork and she practises with it as well (she has the idea it's about 50/50 whether any of it goes in her mouth) it's messy and takes a lot of time too.

[Saacsmum]

patties patties patties! you can make almost anything into a pattie.
add some flour, egg and potato to the salmon and cheese mash and fry,
grate zucchini and carrot and add creamed corn, flour, and egg, dip in breadcrumbs.
little felafel patties are great
also eggy bread is another good one nutritionally esp if you spread some avocado on the bread b4 dipping in egg.
Jaffles with baked beans, spaghetti, ham, moussaka in them
quiche and frittata
for some fruit ones you can do fritters with grated apple etc, fruity muffins, fruit loaf,
give hummus etc for dipping with breadsticks etc
will keep thinking hope some of these help

[NotQuiteCockney]

We're very big on pasta as finger food - penne and fusilli are great. Also, any veg cut into a chip sort of shape: carrot, cucumber, red pepper, mushroom. And some veg comes already in the right shape: green beans and asparagus.

My DS2 is 10+ months, and only eats finger food. Sometimes it is a bit messy - we had a couscous salad at lunch today in the park (in a park where the food truck thing only sells real food!), and I ended up putting spoonfuls of it in my hand, and letting him eat it out of my hand, as finger food. I couldn't face his grubby little paws in my bowl of food ...

We're on holiday at the moment, so I just make sure tea is somewhere that does some sort of penne type pasta.

[Windermere]

Great ideas and those patties sound delicious