feeding 8 month old

[OhWhatNoooow]

I'm looking for ideas what to feed my 8 month old. At the moment I make him purees, but hes not keen on them. I feed him some Ellas pouches and also give him some of our food in little pieces.

Can anyone tell me what they feed their baby this age? And how much and how often?

Thanks!

At 8 months old, DD was completely BLW and at this stage really wanted to be in control of her own food.

Instead of giving him small bits of food, have you tried giving him chunkier bits that he can hold and gum / bite down on?

We pretty much gave DD anything so long as it was salt free and by 8 month it was 3 meals a day as she took to food really well and I think 8/9 months was when she kind of discovered that food can fill a tummy and started to really enjoy it.

About a year ago my Dc2 was approaching 6mo and I was told to shove into him anything I could, and add cheese to whatever I could. Some of his favourites were:

Cheesy mash
Sweet potato mash
Cheese on toast (finger food)
Cheesy Beans with toast (mashed a bit, toast as finger food on the side)
Scrambled eggs with toast on the side
Little bits of cheesy omelette
Pancakes with cut up blueberries
A frozen pack of mixed veg (sweetcorn, peas, carrots, broccoli) is good for finger food
Little bits of quiche
Mashed up chicken casserole (if you make it with baby stock/no salt)
Spaghetti hoops
Little bits of roast chicken
Asparagus (excellent finger food)
Boiled egg slices

Basically try him with little bits of what you're eating, finger food or mashed up on a spoon, and see what works!

Breakfast: weetabix with a few little bits of toast and butter/Marmite as finger food

Dd was a total spoon refuser so we had to do blw. So at that age she would have ready brek with berries or with banana or raisins. Lunch would be something like egg and soldiers, sandwich or soup. Tea would be whatever we were having, spag Bol, toad in the hole, salmon and new potatoes, that sort of thing. If he's not keen on the spoon you can keep offering the purees and give him a spoon to hold as well or just feed him what you are eating and let him feed himself.

Have you read the Mn info on weaning? It's pretty good. If you post this in the weaning section you may get a few more responses too

Ditch the purees. At 8m he can eat whatever you eat barring honey.

my 8 month old absolutely loves holding a big (steamed) broccoli stalk and also any roast sticks of veg - ie. pepper/ onion/ squash etc...in big chunks. He loves lentil stew - not pureed - agree with others - you dont need to puree now.

The baby led weaning recipe book is brilliant - all the recipes are for 2 adults and one baby - dont bother with the BLW book itself its a bit bossy I thought! But the recipe book is good.

I definitely think give BLW a go - I am a huge advocate! my little one loves here food and wolfs down just about anything I give her.

If you want to find out about our adventures in BLW, I have been attempting to document them on my blog - there is a link to "this little one eats" at the top.

thislittlemum.blogspot.co.uk/

Exactly what waterrat said including the BLW cookbook -it's excellent, and the recipes are all very quick and have been big hits with my 8mo. Definitely time to ditch the purées. Eating the same as dd saves some time and makes me eat healthier and more varied food.

My favourite book is the River Cottage Baby Toddler Cookbook. DD and I bloody love the blueberry pancakes.

Thanks everyone for the great suggestions! I dont really get the BLW because if I stuck some veg on his tray, not much would be actually eaten, so I cant imagine he'd get full? Being that he has no teeth, how would he chew the food I eat? Does it just go down in whole pieces?

thislittlemum, I'm going to check out your blog, thanks.

He might surprise you with the BLW/finger food. My DS can eat his body weight in asparagus. Seriously.

My 7mo has weetabix and fruit for breakfast, soup (chicken, veg, potatoes/rice) and bread/toast for lunch and either pasta and sauce with cheese or chicken, veg&rice or meatballs/stew with veg and mash for dinner. He has breadsticks and rice cakes to snack.

DS (8mo) has no teeth but can nom his way through toast, sticks of steamed or roasted veg, mango, pear, etc. If it is soft, they just sort of suck and mush it up with their gums and tongue. If they try and swallow a bit that is too big, usually their gag reflex kicks in and it comes back out again - this has happened to DS with toast and mango so far. He's lazy not very good with his hands yet, so I have to hold all the finger food for him

OP, as others have said, they will surprise you by how much they can eat. Those gums of theirs have quite a lot of chomp power!

They have got teeth, they just haven't become visible yet! Their gums are hard as rock and perfectly good for chewing.

Just wanted to add that when my dd was about that age I got this book from our local library, which was helpful.

And they can eat, can't do a link at the moment to this but google youtube baby led weaning chicken, it should be the top video, the one with the 6 month old . Our DDs first food was a ham sandwich at 23 weeks (which she stole and scoffed) so your DS will be fine with things like spag Bol, fish pie, toad in the hole and omelette, in face anything you eat

I am completely naive as my LO is still tiny, but as well as these foods do your LOs still have milk? From a bottle or breast? Does weaning mean coming off the breast and having bottles of formula instead?

Delilah weaning can mean different things to different people but generally on Mn it means to introduce complimentary foods alongside baby's normal milk. So if you are bfing just continue if you are both happy to do so, in fact bfingbisvrecommended for a minimum of 2 years. If you are ffing Lo should be getting 20floz of first stage milk per day.

Until they are one its best to offer the milk an hour before offering solids, this is because they need the calories in the milk to help them grow and develop. Once they are one you can start offering solids before milk.

If you are bfing try going along to your local la Leche league, they sometimes have talks on weaning.
Have you read the MN info on weaning?

Hath, if not though and you've got some more questions about weaning ( introducing solids or ceasing or reducing bfing) feel free to ask or you maybwantvto start your own thread in Weaning or Breast & Bottle

Sorry about typos