But there's salt in EVERYTHING!

[NinaMyers]

I think I'm developing a salt phobia. DD is nearly 7mo and I've been starting to give her some non-vegetable food but the salt thing is scaring me. It is in everything. How do you avoid it? When does it become less of an issue? Can you get special baby versions of things without salt in?

I think DD may well be living on a diet of bm and carrot sticks until she's 10

I think what one is supposed to avoid is adding salt to baby food, rather than zero salt.

What non vegetable food do you mean?

bread has loads of salt doesn't it. gill rapley's book says kids under 1 shouldn't eat more than 2 slices a day. i eat loads of bread so i'm trying to modify my diet too!

if it's carbohydrate you're after, you can get salt-free rice and corn cakes. ds2 also chomped his way through loads of fried sweet potatoes at a friend's last night! you don't have to worry about littlies eating too much fat iirc (more of a problem if fat intake is restricted) so fried/ roast root veg might be a way to get more carbs.

Fried/roast root veg is another way of saying "Chips" by the way.

Give her chips. Give her what you have, minus jarred food, tinned food, ready meals and smoked meat and fish, and she'll be fine. DOn't add salt while cooking.

ouch! i'm not snobbish about chips, honest. just started typing 'root veg chips' and had visions of bags of fancy overpriced crisps!

best thing I did in order to chill out about salt was make my own bread - less than half a teaspoon in a whole large loaf so the salt he has per day is in other things, not just in one slice of bought bread. with a breadmaker you can get quite fast at making it once you remember the recipe by heart.

under 1s can have up to 1g salt/day max - government guidelines. so a bit here and there is fine, just try and balance a saltier meal or snack, like bread or cheese, with something non salty

if you want carbs, boiled rice and pasta (in unsalted water) are fine. as are things like quinoa, cous couse etc.

i also started to use low salt stock cubes (gallo ones from sainsbury's) when DD started to eat pretty much what we eat

i understand your phobia though - i was just the same, but a little bit of salt from half a slice of bread is fine, honest

just don't add salt to stuff, and make as much as you can from scratch so avoiding hidden salt.

with bread i never gave bread more than once a day. so a sandwich is fine, but not then cheese on toast or pizza later, and not after toast at breakfast.

Good thing I reread your message there Colditz - I thought you were giving a list of thing babies could have and was pleased at the thought of sharing our smoked mackerel with DD tomorrow. Then I got to ready meals and thought "wait a minute..."