Guilt Mongering Health Visitor

[Limoncella]

Now I now that Im extremely lucky to have a nice HV, but at DS's 8month development check last week, all was going swimmingly until she asked about how he eats.

'Very well' i said...a jar of whatever ( chicken & veg eg) for lunch, bit of fruit, jar of whatever for tea, yogurt etc. loads of milk. Anything that I put in front of him infact.

The look on her face was priceless - 'So you don't do any cooking for him?' she finally asked...

I then got on the defensive (prob a bad thing) and explained about not having the time. She then said it would be a good idea if I 'made the effort'. Grrrr. This dragged on for 15 mins until she finally gave up. I left feeling annoyed that she was questioning what i did with my days (eeerr, work, commute 1.5hrs, come home, play, put him to bed, eat and then put myself to bed!!)

Now I know its not ideal to feed him jar food, but its organic and no salt/sugar etc. Is it really that bad to do this?

Sorry long post!

Maybe I do need a 'system', but it does seem totally impossible at the moment to cook for him.

Baby lead weaning sounds good, but DS is very much an all or nothing chap...ie the whole thing goes in his mouth or he just crunches/mushes the whole thing up.

We do need to eat properly ourselves which would sort half the problem out.

DP cannot cook

Jars are very bland though.

Cooking for your ds is a really good habit to get into if you can. I'm not sure what percentage of children who start off on jars end up with ready meals on a regular basis - I'm sure there's been a survey somewhere

It's so much easier to make extra of whatever you are having and freeze it. I make gallons of curry, chilli, bolognaise, casseroles, apple crumble, and freeze them. Your ds will only need small portions so a bolognaise from just 500g of mince will make at least 6 meals for him.

You can still end up with a child like my DS3 who ate home-made food readily until the age of 18 months and now at age 2.8 will only eat jars though!

But piglit this is only really easy if you are already cooking this stuff. With 3 older children now, I certainly cook in buld for them and find it easier but with ds1 and a non baby friendly adult menu it would have taken ages to do this specially.

I don't think its affecting his reaction to 'real' food, as he'll quite happily chomp away on anything (plums and oranges being a particular favourite at the moment!)

Its just that for his main meals I really do not have the time to cook him nice sauce with veg (even in a steamer!), mash it, cook pasta for him, mash that, freeze it and then defrost it all again for when he decides it's lunchtime.

I do feel guilty about jar food, but I cannot see when I would actually get round to making him home cooked food.

Limoncella - don't feel guilty!

Where do you live Limoncella? Only asking because there is a company where I live that make your babyfood for you, homemade style, to your specifications, then deliver it to you frozen (kind of like having a personal cook!). Maybe there is something simialr you could use so your baby still gets home made tasting food? There are quite a few companies that deliver frozen organic babyfood too, if you can fork out for the high proces that go with them. They are free from the bulking agents and bland tastes of jarred foods. Do a google for organic baby food.

Don't feel guilty though, as many people have said here, far better that you spend what time you have at home playing with your son rather than cooking for him.

"a non baby friendly adult men" What's non-babyfriendly about it? Unless you use a lot of salt (I stopped cooking with salt when DS1 was weaning 8 years ago )

Limoncella, you need to find some recipes that you can cook and freeze and that you can share with him. You don't need to do it all the time. Also, if you sort your own diet out () you can put by a portion of left overs for the next day for your DS. BabyDragon has a mix of BLW, home made stuff spoonfed and sometimes jars.

OK let's not say BLW as everyone gets in a big old strop about it for some unknown r
eason
let's say finger food
can you not cook some:
brocolli florets
carrot sticks
pasta (then add some pesto or tomato puree)
cheese on toast
beens on toast
scrambled eggs on toast
noodles
grated cheese
slices of ham or chunks of chicken
flakes of tuna or salmon or mackerel
peas and sweetcorn
slices of hard boiled egg
fish fingers
lumps of cooked potato
soup with chunks of bread to dip
vegetable dips with bread sticks
falafel

that is basically all I give my dd's most tea times. (with some cashew nuts for the older one) and none of it takes any cooking as such

Non baby friendly includes eating spicy food, ready meals (yes I did do this in my former days as I had priorities other than cooking, salad (pureed lettuce anyone?).

I don't think as new parents, we had a particularly balanced diet and we were certainly not careful about including all the major food groups.

But this was our choice for us - not for baby as I was aware of what good nutrition was while not adhereing to it myself.

seriously, there is no need to puree for an eight month old baby, surely?

my dd had jars as i was not good cook and worried about poisening her,and also not good eater so i worried id give her wrong things.it got to a stage though where jars where no longer ok,she outgrew them and i had to cook anyway,now with both ds theyve had homemade except on odd occasion.i stay up late one night,fill freezer with goodies and defrost when needed.im still worlds worst cook but with the help of annabel karmel and a extra vegetarian book(for when i cant replace with meat substitute)were well away.ds2 whos 15 months is fantastic and loves all foods!and its made me eat alot better than i was and given me confidence because i know whats going in my lo's mouth,and am trying to cook new things(my mum finds me cooking hilarious-thats how bad i was!).jars arent bad and you shouldnt let your hv make you feel guilty but i think she does have a point,even if you used jars half the week and homemade half a week.i know its hard but the way i see it,your lo will eventually grow out of jars and if you still havent got time/confidence to cook for him itll be ready meals.

I don't think you have to COOK for your baby to have fresh food, it's not the cooking that's important it's the 'fresh' bit.

• avocado, mango, banana are all there and waiting.

If you want to push the boat out - mashed potato, stewed apple, scrambled egg. I HATE cooking, but I would have hated even more to pay out for jars all the time.

Hi,

Well......I used jars large amounts of the time when DS was weaning and growing - they are quick and easy (if a tad expensive).

And do you know what... (whispers) I'm a HV!

Okay so there are times when I look back and wonder why I didn't make more of an effort to cook batches of food for him - I guess it was because I was always so tired and stressed. If it matters my DS now eats what we do and loves fruit/veg etc so I don't stress about it that much.

Oops - I've given my dses the same stuff as us since they were about 8/9 months. Have I made a big mistake? (I don't use salt or packets etc etc, cook from fresh etc etc)

oh and also: sandwiches, chunks of fruit, rice pudding, fruit loaf, chunks of cucumber and tomato

Very close to my heart as I have a similar prob. DD gets about 50% jars at the moiment and I would like it to be less. I work 4 days a week and try and exercise (for sanity as well as vanity)so time is short. I am aiming to increase the homecooked stuff, but I quite often use shop bought sauces for us, which are too high in salt.

So far, the following is working....I just need to do it more often:

Cook in bulk every couple of weeks. Two/three baby receipes, puree and freeze.

Also steam and puree a load of veg and freeze, these can then be defrosted and served with jars....some extra quality vitamins!

When cooking in bulk, try and liaise with a friend with a baby and swap some portions, giving you a wider range of food.

Lastly, don't feel guilty. You need to spend time with your LO just playing, not with them sitting on the kitchen floor whilst you are preoccupied. Doing this once a fortnight is ok, but don't feel you need to do every night when you get in from work....at least thats how I feel!

Do you never cook for yourself Limoncella? Do you never make, say, a pasta sauce for you and DP where a small portion could be left out for your DS the next day? You don't have to freeze everything, up to 24hrs in a fridge is OK. As for the pasta, substitute it with instant cous cous - boil a kettle, pour on water and 4 mins later it's ready, no need to cook anything.

Do you not have a microwave for defrosting? It can be done without althought admittedly it's a pain - when I started weaning DD I lived in a tiny hovel with no mw and defrosted things in a small pan on the stove, you just have to watch it doesn't burn and add a splash of water. It still took less time than cooking from scratch.

Another idea is to do the odd "picnic" meal. You can do sandwiches and chunks of veg or even just lumps of cheese and cucumber with strips of toast, or hummus and breadsticks, with fruit and yogurt afterwards. Omelette is also a quick standby when you're late and haven't got anything ready. Just some ideas

All your advice is great peeps - it is much appreciated.

We are reasonably healthy but this does mean time saving short cuts due to when we eat at might (around 10pm, once we can actually sit down and eat in peace!).

For example, cheese sause is made partly from a packet, smash is a wonderful invention , and so on. I wouldn't give DS our cauliflower chesse for example as the sauce is made from a packet.

The BLW/Finger food thing is a good way to look at it (beans on toast is a good one that i didn't think I could give to him)

Limoncella - I would personally skip the jars which are tasteless as a few people have said.

For the times when you absolutely have to rely on preprepared food then fork out a little bit extra for a "proper" pre-prepapered baby food like something by Babylicious. It actually looks and smells like food and isn't orange. There are other similar brands out there of fresh baby food - just frozen.

Jars of baby food are heat treated twice to make them sterile which is why they can sit on supermarket shelves for years. That means any nutrients left are literally boiled out of them.

Asda sell frozen baby food, but Tesco are apparently being a bit stroppy about some brands atm.

Do a google on Frozen Baby Food and you'll find loooooads of brands

limoncella, fwiw I am the original slack mum (macdonalds, fruit shoots, the lot) and I wouldn't really contemplate jars tbh except very occasionally

OMG - now you lot are making me feel guilty about DS 2 jars a day habit between 6-12 months.

I DO cook extensively from scratch now BUT - he's 4 and it's all so much easier - more time etc.

Charming health visitor.
Got to be time your DP did some cooking. Everyone can cook, it's just following a few instructions in a book.
It's difficult distributing all the new chores that come with a baby. For us, what seemed fair was that when DP looked after DS he also did a bit of cooking, at least sometimes, even though he had never really cooked much before. He was always very pleased when DS happily stuffed in whatever he'd made.
I know just what you mean about not being very good at eating regular meals, but it's maybe worth thinking about how you're going to manage this when DS is older? I don't really know if the jar / homemade thing matters that much, but I do think for slightly older children trying to eat meals together and eating the same stuff whenever possible is important if we're going to have a hope in hell of them not refusing to eat anything except chicken dipppers or whatever.
Maybe you could start making a vague move towards eating together sometimes, with DS eating some of your food mashed up? Without getting too hassled about it, of course.

may I recommend Ragu pasta sauces for children?

they do not have any salt or sugar in and are smooth

sachets, in the aisle near all the hideous Dolmio etc

they are always good to have in, cook pasta, stir in sauce, add tuna or chicken or whatever, serve