When is too much salt? easy food ideas please

[OuiOui]

My dd goes to nursery 3 days a week and she eats everything they put in front of her but recently at home she's been refusing all her savoury purees and eats finger foods (but not much) pasta, sauce, veggie sausages etc. She's eating so much less than when she was eating purees - I'm not unduly worried as she eats so well at the nursery but I feel bad about throwing away so much food (starving children around the world...) Anyway, I've read the discussions on "naturally salty foods for babies" but it seemed like everyone was still making their baby foods from scratch. As I'm now back at work full time, I resort to jars and things like ham and rice cakes etc. I do fresh pasta and r/made sauce (which is salted) and sometimes give her organic veggie suasages - which tasted really salty. Are these things too salty? any suggestions for f/t working mummy? Last night we got in from nursery at 6:30 and I was frantically cooking pasta whilst little one was gettign tired and hungry... Any ideas?

[ionesmum]

I'm a huge fan of Baby Organix, they make pasta sauces and pasta meals which I fill out a bit with more pasta if necessary. They also do a really nice chicken with fruity rice, to which I add some more boiled white rice. Another quickie is to stir some rice into a jar of fruit puree, perhaps adding some fromage frais. Whilst I'm cooking I sit her in her high chair and give her some rice cakes (sometimes toppped with puree) which keeps her occupied until it's ready. My dd is 7 mo ; my friend whose dd is nearly 2 buys the Blue Parrot range from Sainsbury's. HTH

[Tillysmummy]

OuiOui how old is dd ? When my dd is at nursery (one day) she has all her meals so I just give her a snack when she comes home because she has already had tea (very early at 3.30!) so perhaps some sandwiches and some fruit or yoghurt and fruit. However my home days with her are obviously much more and feeding is a bit of a struggle now she's older (13 months) she was great till about 10 months and then she got fussy. So how do I get her to eat ? With finger foods although she eats quite a lot a large proportion still ends up on the floor. So I generally tend to make her something like spaghetti bolognaise and I give her some to feed herself with and then she lets me feed her a bit.

With regard to quick snacks, how about baked beans on toast or something like that ? Or blue parrot fishfingers ? I never season any of dd's food and generally now I try and cook stuff for us that she can then have the next day so that should save on you having to prepare too much. We then season ours once hers has been taken out. I don't think the negligible amount of salt though in something like baked beans will hurt. Have a look on ingredients though because they generally put the them in order of quantity, ie. first being highest.

I normally do a cook up for dd once every couple of weeks and freeze stuff and then defrost it the evening before for her meals the next day or more often than not nowadays, cook something she can also have and keep it in the fridge.

I also agree with Ionesmum. Baby Organix are very good and have some nice things. The other thing you could give as a healthy but tasty snack is some vermicelli with grated cheese and a little milk to moisten it. Not much hassle there. Also, how about Scrambled Eggs ?

Hope some of this is useful.