Making up formula

[Milligan123]

Quick question.... How does everyone make up/cool down your formula when out and about? Tia x

We took ready made cartons and an empty bottle

A tommee tippee flask filled with hot water. Usually ask a restaurant or something for a jug of cold to cool it

Yeah ready made is great, we used it for all formula feeds (DS was mix fed).

I take a little pot of formula which I've measured out - my baby on 8 scoops. A bottle of cooled, boiled water (in a sterilised bottle), an empty sterilised bottle and a flask of boiling water (flask only ever used for this). Then I use about 90ml of boiled water to sterilise powder and top up to 240ml with cooled water. It tends to be the right temperature then. I can then use the bottle which had the cooled water in for another feed.

I just buy bottles of ready made and take an empty bottle.

I have seen people pour powder from a pot into a bottle of, I assume, pre boiled cooled water and feed immediately. I am not sure how that works though as then the powder is not sterilised. It is supposed to be hot water.

You do know you can make up formula in advance and there's no need to heat/cool, take it from fridge and by the time you're needing it it will be room temp. You don't have to make it from scratch every time.

Readymade for us.

Bookworm that’s against current guidelines to make fresh at each feed.

If you take a cold bottle out of the fridge then you should keep it cool in a cool bag

@mrs
Millions of kids have had previously made bottles and still do. Guidelines are just that a guide.

We dispensed the power into the bottle, top up with 2oz of boiling water and the rest cold tap water!

It's what you've done afterwards that's against guidelines. You keep cold milk cold or hot water hot. You don't leave bottles at room temperature as that's the ideal temperature for bacteria to breed

@demented
So if your child takes awhile to drink do you whip the bottle away once it changes temp? It's an occasional thing you're not doing it with every bottle.
@feedmyface
Tap water?

@bookworm is not wrong. Although the nhs don’t recommend it the world health organisation (WHO) have different guidelines which state you can premake formula rapid cool it and the. store In the fridge for up to 24 hours. It’s a personal choice though.
I have a prep machine at home so use that for making mine but when out it really depends. I either make a feed with entirely boiling water and use an insulated bag to keep it warm if I know it’ll be drank within a few hours or I use ready made. Although dd has started only wanting milk warm so the ready made isn’t going to last long now.
I do have a tommee tippee on the go bottle warmer though so I will use that if need be

You said you took it out and let it warm up to room temperature which implies it is sitting about for a few hours. It should be kept chilled until required. Once they start drinking from it it should be used or discarded after 1 hour.

@demented
'Should' again guidelines
Fortunately my youngest is now 13 and has grown up healthy despite on the odd occasion having formula that wasn't transported in a fridge and tested under lab conditions for the dreaded bacteria. 🙄
I thought you might be more horrified at the tap water comment🙄

I take a flask of water that's at pretty much the right temperature. I don't worry about boiling water going on the formula as it says used cool boiled water on the packet.

Then I use about 90ml of boiled water to sterilise powder and top up to 240ml with cooled water.

Doesn't this make the formula too concentrated though, because you're not taking into account the volume of the powder? 8 scoops of powder should be made up with 8oz of water which will give a total volume larger than a total of 240mls.

I thought you might be more horrified at the tap water comment🙄

Why? The poster used boiling water to sterilise the powder. Boiling water is for killing bacteria in the powder, not in the water

as it says used cool boiled water on the packet

The formula I use says to boil the kettle then leave it for no longer than half an hour, after which it will not be hot enough to sterilise the powder.

www.nhs.uk/conditions/pregnancy-and-baby/infant-formula-questions/#what-do-i-need-if-im-formula-feeding-away-from-home

If made-up formula is stored:

in a fridge – use within 24 hours
in a cool bag with an ice pack – use within four hours
at room temperature – use within two hours

Making fresh each time is preferable but it's perfectly acceptable to do the above.

Doesn't this make the formula too concentrated though, because you're not taking into account the volume of the powder? 8 scoops of powder should be made up with 8oz of water which will give a total volume larger than a total of 240mls.

Hmmm.... I hadn't thought about that. I use a perfect prep machine at home. I'll have a look to see what mls that fills it to. Thanks for the heads up! I've only done it occasionally but don't want to carry on if I've been doing it wrong!

We use anti reflux milk and have a perfect prep machine at home. As this type of formula can't be made with boiling water, at home we press the pp button twice so it does the hot shot then the cooled water and we add our powder last. When we go out and about we use the pp machine in advance to put water into a sterilesd bottle but use 2oz less (so for 7oz we put 5oz into a bottle). We then carry a flask of boiling hot water and carry the powder in a plastic pot. When needed we pour 2oz of boiling water into the bottle to top it up to 7oz and then add the powder.