Weaning - any top tips for increasing calories?

[vincettenoir]

We are 6 weeks into weaning and not making the progress hoped. My baby shows little interest in finger food although I continue to offer her bits of egg and broccoli.

She will happily take a few teaspoons of sweet potato, banana or avocado purées, but eats only a little. For example she might take a sixth of an avocado on a good day.

Her weight is not on progress and I recently heard that she is supposed to get approx 200 calories from the food she eats. I don’t think she gets even a quarter of that. I am continuing to breastfeed and she has a couple of bottles of formula in the afternoons.

Has anyone got any tips about what time of day to offer food or what food to offer, to maximise nutrients and calories please?

I don't think you need to worry about increasing calories. At this age most of their nutrients and calories come from milk not from the food they eat.
My DC didn't start eating proper amounts of food until about 10months, we were told to just keep offering milk and that babies won't go hungry.

There are much more calories in your bm compared to the food you mentioned. 6 weeks into weaning it’s all about exploring.

Dont overly worry, food before 1 is for fun.

But it is for fun, put some more interesting foods out - bits of pasta etc. Eat your food at the same time shes in the highchair see if she looks over shows an interest, let her try anything from you.

Cheese, yogurt, porridge fingers (made with full fat milk if she can have it), pasta, salmon, toast and toppings (avocado or nut butters would be good for extra calories). Just keep offering, giving her milk and modeling good eating behaviour and she'll get it.

Coconut milk is really calorie dense and can be added to purées. Try this recipe www.madeformums.com/baby/mixed-veggies-in-coconut-milk/
She can have nut butters in small amounts and my dc used to love peanut butter mixed with mashed banana. Asda sells quite a cheap one which is pure peanuts with nothing like palm oil or sugar added.
Add cheese or cream to savoury purées or give her matchsticks of cheese to snack on.
Sesame seeds are really dense in calories and healthy fats, and can be given to babies from 6mo. Stir some into purée.

Thanks everyone for the good ideas and reassurance. I really like the look of that coconut curry one, it’s exactly the kind of thing that I eat a lot of so she may even be familiar with the flavours (if you believe what some say).