What do you give a 6 month old for tea?

[Janus]

My dd is nearly 6.5 months and we have been weaning for about 3 weeks and she is loving her food! Typically she has some kind of porridge/baby cereal for breakfast, vegetable medley/chicken casserole type thing for lunch but I'm getting stuck on what to give for tea and alternate between more vegetables or toast fingers and a yogurt. Just wondered what you all give please??

some of whatever we are having

why would she only be able to have toast finers or a yoghurt for tea

give her a bit off your plate
chilli, spa bol, roast dinner. pasta and sauce, whatever you eat
salmon, shepherds pie whatever

Trinity is right, you know

pasta is great. fish with mashed potato and green beans. rissoto. As the others have said, anything you're having really.

Not toast fingers or a yogurt, either that or vegetables again, just thought it may be a bit boring having similiar as lunch. Haven't yet moved on to 'proper' meals as she has only been weaning for a couple of weeks so thought it may all be a bit quick but maybe I need to speed things up and get on with proper meals then?
I also find it very difficult with the 'give what you have' as Friday I made Thai coconut chicken, Saturday creamy prawn pasta, yesterday roast beef, would she really eat this sort of thing at 6 months?

Sorry, me again! Also, do you puree the pasta/fish etc or let them suck on it whole? She will happily suck on toast so I assume she has no issues with 'lumps' but is this too much for a 6 month old?

all the things you made would be fine
just serve up a small portion and let her get on with it
it will be messy
she will love it

oh and I waited till 26 weeks to wean and then she grabbed a chunk of broccoli off my plate and ate it
then she just had whatever we were habving straight off

DS had roast dinner yesterday, he's 28weeks. He gnawed the yorkshire pudding to death, and sucked the beef dry!

xx

MarlaSinger - did he scoop it up with a spoon? What did you mix rice with to make it easier?

i'd give all that to a 6.5 months old. if you werent too confident giving the prawns (though if you weren't then you probably shouldn't eat them either) then i would just give her some of the pasta and the sauce, pick out the prawns.

no need to puree meat. they just chomp and suck on it.

OK, tried giving her a pasta lunch, ie spaghetti pasta with chopped onion, red pepper, some tinned tomatoes, peas, etc. I think she quite liked the taste but the consistency was so different from her pureed stuff that she gagged all the way through and gave up pretty quickly. Perhaps this is a step too far?
So, tonight I'm cooking fish in a cream and cheese sauce with mashed potato. I think/hope this will be more to her liking for consistency, ie fish is very flaky and easy to break down in her mouth and mashed potato is puree really.
I think I may buy some of that soup pasta as it is smaller and probably easing for her. Haven't tried rice yet but that may be tomorrow's effort!vvvhh
It's so good to hear what you are all doing with yours, they all seem so advanced compared to mine now!! I think I need to relax more and just offer her more and see how we go. Do any of you worry how much yours eats or is it more about experiencing different tastes at the moment, eg mine didn't eat that much of the lunch so would you have offered something else or just carried on until tea time?
Thanks again everyone.

Don't worry about how much she eats! If she is feeding herself, it might take her anywhere up to an hour to finish a meal...my DS always takes his time, but it is much nicer - for both of us - than having to stuff him with spoonfuls of mush before I can settle down to my meal (as happens with my friends when we are in cafes).

Some days she might wolf the lot, others she might just pick at it...let her be the boss. Sometimes my DS (16mo) won't eat in his highchair but will happily eat a 'picnic' lunch of sandwiches etc instead - he picks at it in between playing, until the whole lot is gone

Remember too that it can take up to 10 tries before they decide if they like something so keep offering it every month or so if it gets rejected at first. This was true of baked beans, potatoes and carrots for us.

Have fun!

To me, it's about learning to eat, more than just taste, it's about texture as well. He has nothing pureed, but I do try and give him things I think he'll be able to pick up. Some days I'm sure nothing has gone down, others I can see that he has eaten a lot. But as milk is still the main source of nutrition, it really doesn't matter.
He does gag, but gagging is part of learning how much to bite off,and to hew before swallowing and if he didn't do it now, he'd only have to do it later.

xx

Oh dear! Complete disaster, she screamed all the way through and ate barely a thing, hated the fish, ate a tiny bit of mash and a few squashed peas!
When I give her puree she eats loads, about 4 or 5 icecubes worth, opens her mouth constantly for more until she is filled up. She barely opened her mouth tonight, except to scream.
I am embarrassed to say she is my third, my previous 2 are older now and so they were weaned at 4 months and worked up to 'lumpy' food at 7 months so they had plenty of time to get used to 'eating' before they really had too. I feel I'm racing too fast this time.
Also, we have major issues in the evening with things like Rainbows/Brownies, swimming, etc, so I cannot spend an hour trying to feed her as I usually have to get the other girls ready and race out the door. I'm stressed and this isn't good!
Think it's back to the puree for another few weeks with introducing things like cooked carrots (she has already had and loves broccoli).
Any other ideas for finger food I can offer? Can I try sandwiches at this age?

ds used to love soup. We used to have soup and a sandwhiches at lunch and then something a little more exciting for tea. Cheese or beans or egg on toast is another great easy favourate of ds's at lunch time.

You poor thing, that sounds difficult as in the lack of time that you have. How about serving the purees with pitta bread or spreading them on a rice cake? It is early days, your baby is only used to puree at the moment but definitely keep introducing the lumpier food - she will hopefully get used to it very quickly. How about omelette cooled down and cut into strips? A fairly quick, easy meal. Hopefully things will get easier for you fairly soon.

Janus, my twins are 6.5 months too and eat about 12-14 ice cubes of food between them, plus milk and baby rice mixed in, and then a banan or a bowl of baby rice for dessert! I have also tried BLW but they won't pick anything up yet.

They have just started sleeping through the night again so I just keep shovelling the food in .

They have stuff quite lumpy, I just mash food with the potato masher cos can't be bothered with the blender. They love everything as long as it has sweet potato in it .

I always try to give them a 'balanced' meal, with one third protein (eg fish, lentils or haricot beans) one third complex carbs (sweet potato, brown rice) and one third veg (broccoli, cauli). I sometimes have a bowl of just baby rice on the side to spoon in if they get fed up of the taste of the main meal - like a sorbet .

You don;t necessarily have to make stuff and freeze it. You can boil veg in a bit of water then mash without draining the water so keepign the nutrients. You can mash beans out of a tin (get beans in water with no salt or sugar) and you can bake a sweet potato and use it for a few meals over the next 1-2 days.

All the BLWers are shaking their head at me... I know, I know... I love the idea of BLW, I just can't cope with twins waking in the night through hunger!!

It sounds like you are doing a great job Janus

Im with Neenz on the BLW front, my LO doesnt really pick anything up yet, has tried a bit of brocoli, sweet potato chips etc but loves her purees, which now she is 6 mths are more mashed with bits.

For tea I give her things like sweet potato with cinammon or apple, Tofu and apricot, Yoghurt with fruit or baby rice (vanilla flavoured over here!) with fruit etc. Frozen dried fruit fingers are a hit too. Annabel karmel book has loads of lovely recipes

Cause we have tea/dinner later 7.30pm when Dp gets home cant really mash up what we have so i use our dinner for her lunch and at teatime just give her tea time foods like you would have with cuppa tea in the pm

Paro, I have that timing problem with BLW - the twins have their lunch at 11am and their tea at 4.30pm - I have lunch at 12.30 (when they are in bed ) and dinner at 7.30pm (when they are in bed ). I could always save a bit of lunch/tea and give it to them at the next meal I suppose. But they are loving the food I am spoonfeeding them and it doesn't take an hour, thank goodness. I think they would be so tired by then they wouldn't eat anything anyway.

My top tip is make sure you put enough protein in their meals cos that is more satisfying and should help them sleep better at night.

Yep agree with you re tired thing Fleur gets sooo tired eating sticks etc that she gives up, thats why if i have time i try to give her something finger food like with something mashed up

didnt know bout protein but anyhow unlike you i dont know what a whole nights sleep is!!!! might try more protein though and than i might get one haha!!!

Janus Hello!!!! My ds is a few days younger than your baby. I feed him purees with a few lumps in. WHile I feed him I also put some food on his highchair tray for him to play with like broccoli or pitta bread. He can pick the food up and get it to his mouth buts doesn't actualy eat much of it. The puree/finger food combo works really well for ds.

this book has alot of really nice recipes in it.

DS usually has cereal for breakfast, a meal for lunch (pasta or lentils/chicken) yoghurt or fruit for pudding, for dinner a different meal to lunch and also a yoghurt or fruit for pudding (which ever he didn't have for lunch), he also has some cereal before bed.