your help with weaning please?!

[loafofbread]

I'm about to begin weaning my 5month old daughter tomorrow after ongoing reflux issues. We are starting her on pureèd vegetables first, rather than the baby rice and wondered
a) what pureèd vegetables you would recommend (we're starting off with carrot and a bit of baby milk)
b) Is my hand blender going to be good enough or should I invest in a food processor?
c) which food processor would you recommend.

Thankyou :)

I never really pureed anything excessively; I used a little blender we got from mamas & papas which was brill (and I still use for onions lol). Can't help on the veg front as we never bothered with baby rice and more or less just went for a mix of jars and blitzed versions of what we ate.

Try fruit first it's more palatable - just a little mushed banana with a fork or mango goes down well. Veg is tricky to get a good texture but sweet potato works well.

I know she is not popular on here but get Anabel Karmel's book on baby weaning - It worked well for me.

Good luck!

Any food blender will do - you might not get the right texture with a stick blender so a cheap one that you can shove in the dishwasher should do the job!

Mashed sweet potato is a good one.

Hand/stick blender is fine as long as you've got a narrow-ish container to blend in. My stick blender came with a milkshake/smoothie container that I use when I want to get something really nicely puréed as the confined space pushes everything back under the blades more efficiently. You wouldn't actually get it smooth enough with a food processor, and you'll need it really smooth, rather than just mashed, with a refluxy baby (gag reflex is probably hair-trigger) who may still have a bit of tongue-thrust otherwise it'll never go down or just get vommed straight back up again.

Oh I can't remember, but I had the Sainsbury's Little Ones book which went from pregnancy to family meals, root veg are best as they're sweet. I had no problems with my hand blender.

Also, I don't really think much stuff needs pureeing if they're 5-6 months. I did mashed foods straight off with DS. I had a bit of a shock when I waited religiously until 10 months to try a '10 month' Ella pouch and it was way smoother than anything he'd ever had!

Thanks for all your advice! I hear that sweet potato is a good one too so I'll try that based on advice :)
I guess it seems much more daunting than it actually is! And yes Elphaba I guess there's a good chance she wont be ready yet anyway.

I've just read this with interest... Will start weaning in January. I thought Annabel karmel was popular but am I wrong? I've just for a couple of her books from the library....

My DS is 8 months so I'm a couple of months ahead of you! We started with carrot, banana, apple, mango, sweet potato. I have a hand blender and steam the harder fruit/veg then blitz. Ice cube trays are fab- you can blitz loads then put into trays and freeze. I still do this now and then just pop a couple of fruit portions out to go on breakfast in the morning. When she hits 6 months, just give her whatever you have (minus the salt obviously!) it saves so much time and hassle!

Olivia Annabel Karmel is more popular in real life than on Mumsnet where baby-led weaning is The Done Thing. I did BLW with my first partly because of MN influence but mainly because he was a total spoon-refuser and would only feed himself (hence why I'm familiar with vomiting and gag reflex...Lordy, everything was covered in vomit at mealtimes with DS1 trying to ram things like quiche past his uvula )

DS2 seems a bit more amenable to having non-boob items past his lips so I sense I may have more success spoon-feeding him and avoiding some of the mess and puke of BLW when we start weaning in Feb. That said, I still won't be bothering with AK because I think her recipes are just too much faff, hassle and planning for baby stage.

Thanks Elphaba.

I went to a Talk with the health visitors a few weeks ago on weaning and they suggested a mixture of both (mush and finger food). It may be my baby makes the decision as to what he prefers anyway from what you say. It's a bit daunting to be honest but I'm sure a lot of people think that to begin with.

I found it more boring than daunting. Going from the convenience of just sticking a boob in DS1's face to having to think about giving him actual food without too much salt or sugar, with the right balance of nutrition blah blah was dull, dull, dull. And he really wasn't much interested in food for several months, despite my efforts. Still is a fussy, picky eater who only likes beige and white carbs Can you tell I'm breathless with anticipation at the prospect at weaning DS2? I really don't get why people wean early (reflux/medical reasons like the OP's aside). Put off the ball-ache for as long as you can, I say.

YY elphaba - my experience was similar. Boring, messy and supremely inconvenient after 6 months of ebf! I just mashed up what we were having but it was still a ball ache. Cannot understand people who start early just because they're excited about it! I'm seriously hoping that DC2 isn't ready until 6 months like my first DC!

I'm in no hurry either to be honest. Despite a rocky few weeks breastfeeding initially, I now want to breastfeed for much longer than the 6 months. In fact, even thinking about stopping breastfeeding makes me want to cry.

With the intro to solids the health visitor said to start at 51/2 months in case you had to delay it a week or so as ds should defnitely be on some kind of solid at 6 months. I've still got a month to go so will definitely not start much earlier than 6 months. It seems a right faff

I always start with puréed pear, its quite mild and easy on their little tummies and can be easily mixed with baby rice. Then go onto apple, then all the different root veg which are easy to get smooth. My tip would be mix with a lot of breast mix or formula which makes the texture much smoother and easier to eat to begin with. Once babies a bit older I find they eat better if combining more savoury veg with fruit to sweeten it up. As in pea and pear, Apple and parsnip. I actually really enjoy the weaning stage, I find it quite fun!

Thanks all :) we started with pureed carrot today, mixed with plenty of formula milk. DD was ridiculously excited at playing with the food and started to put it in her own mouth! She pushed a lot out with her tongue which made me think she may not be quite ready, however I realised she's swallowed some when she vomited some orangey coloured milk during her next feed. Will continue with carrot tomorrow then maybe try some fruit. Do I need to boil/steam pear to soften it first or just pureè away?

I think I would always steam or boil to begin with, you can make it really smooth that way. At the start you're really just looking to give them a little taste of everything and make sure she doesn't react to anything, she will still be having main nourishment from milk so don't worry about how much she actually eats. My ds took to it really quickly at 5 months and would eat whatever I gave him, my dd took a bit longer to really show an interest and start taking a reasonable amount. They're all different.