How do you get a baby to eat savoury food?

[lulupop]

DD is 6.5 months now and well established on solids. Trouble is, she only likes sweet foods. DS was the same and I ended up having to "disguise" everything new in a cloak of mashed banane.

DD is even worse, and won't eat anything even when mixed with the banana/apple/whatever. For example, yesterday I pureed some butternut squash with a little potato. I thought this would work as the squash it sort of sweet itself. But she kept spitting it out and gagging even when I later mixed in some apple.

She's at the age where I know she really needs to start some protein, but how on earth am I going to get her to take chicken and fish based things when she won't even eat a vegetable?

I know they say just reduce the milk feeds, but she really doesn't have that much milk anyway, and when I've tried to make her really hungry by withholding milk for a couple of hours before solids, she gets in such a rage that she's in tyoo much of a state to eat any solids anyway.

Any tips? Any recipes?

Ds went through a period like this. I ended up buying a baby recipe book. Annabel someone or other. I think there's alot about her on this site. Anyway I started with butternut squash and pear puree. I thought he was still getting the sweet but there was savory in with it. He absolutly loved it. The it was trial and error with all of the other recipes. I think he liked about 95% of the recipes.

This is very common lulu - my DD1 was like your DS. It's really frustrating isn't it, to spend time preparing fresh food for your little one, only to have to throw the lot in the bin.

I think you just need to make up small amounts of different recipes until you find one that DD likes - then vary it. Maybe try apple and squash then introduce very small amounts of potato?? Oh and mine loved ripe avocado with banana - very smooth and creamy.

I think wp is referring to Annabel Karmel - I used her book too - she has fish recipes with orange juice in for example, so I think there is a general concensus that the little darlings are always attracted to sweet over savoury.

Good luck.

Hi LP

Try giving her something she can hold - steamed carrot stick, piece of toast, etc. She may just throw it on the floor, but just keep trying and she may well surprise you. DS (seven months) won't have a spoon near his mouth, but he's perfectly happy to munch away on various bits of 'real food'!

HM xxx

Start with sweet veggies - squash is ok, even sweeter probably are carrot, parsnip, sweet potato. My dd had a passion for peas and sweetcorn which are sweet too, they're quite fibrous due to the skin, but she never had a problem with that. Also don't worry - plenty of people don't even start solids at all till 6 months, so protein really isn't an issue just yet. She won't starve!

Annabel Karmel is good - and has lots of nice ideas for fruit and veg combinations, which can help the baby get the idea.

Totally agree with the suggestion of finger foods. So often they will eat something because they can do it themselves, whereas they wouldn't take it from a spoon.

Good luck!

My ds was exactly the same and I know how frustrating this is. The only vegetable he would eat was sweet potato and did the gagging thing with any other vegetable or meat. But he suddenly changed last week (almost 8 months) and now eats most things I put in front of him - chicken, fish, lentils.

I think babies have an anti-choke reflex which they are supposed to lose by 6 months, but maybe some of them lose it late - hence the gagging.

Have you tried mixing yoghurt with fruit to get protein? I mixed greek yoghurt with everything and ds was usually happy to eat it. You could melt some cheese into sweet potato if she will eat that.

Lulupop, I don't think you need to be concerned at this age. At 6.5 months she should only just have started eating any type of food. At that age my two were only having rice cereal. You don't need to withhold milk at this age - that should be her major source of nourishment. The solid food is just to get her used to the idea of eating real food. I would try and relax, keep trying to introduce vegetables, but don't worry if she rejects them at this point. I certainly wouldn't be thinking about giving meat yet.