Making Your Own Baby Food: Two Kits Aim To Help Parents Get Into the Groove

To start off Food Week at Z Recommends, we're welcoming our good friend Sylvia as a guest reviewer. She gamely agreed to check out two baby food preparation kits we've had our eye on, and sends us this review.

When our son neared the six -month mark we began thinking of introducing him to solid food. With all the books on parenting out there, we thought there would be some clear guidance on what and how much to introduce when, but we came across only vague guidelines, like "offer a small amount of (rice cereal, fruit, vegetable, etc.) and then gradually increase."

Although we don’t live our lives by most guidelines in life, we felt a little overwhelmed by the latitude this type of instruction offered. Eventually, we just dove in - got some books from the library, started trying a little of this and a little of that. There was, and still is, some trial by error, but by the time that our friends at Z Recommends asked us to review some baby food starter kits, we were full swing into making our own baby food. Although we arrived where the starter kits would have taken us, the kits would have made the process that much simpler.

The first kit to arrive was Mumi & Bubi's Solids Starter Kit (above left). It includes two trays that are 3 cubes by 7 cubes each, lids, and a recipe book. Using the term 'recipe' for the contents of the book that accompanies the Mumi & Bubi trays is a bit of a stretch. As long as you know how to cook and blend fruits and vegetables, the recipe book is more of a list of which fruits and vegetables you might want to start with. We didn't find it very inspiring in terms of providing us with ideas of 'meals' for our little boy.

The tray's configuration allows you to prepare seven three-cube meals, one for each day of the week, in each tray. We haven’t found the need to ration out servings so regularly, preferring to make large batches of food and then store the frozen cubes to use as we need them. But it's clear that Mumi & Bubi are thinking of busy, working parents and trying to ease their fears of not having enough time to prepare their own baby food - just once a week is all it takes.

The second kit we tried was Fresh Baby's So Easy Baby Food Kit. This kit includes two trays that are 2 cubes by 6 cubes each, lids, and a booklet that includes recipes, a discussion of introducing solids, and a small scrapbook section where you can document baby's first feeding and keep notes of how baby reacts to particular foods. The kit also comes with a laminated cheat sheet that you could, say, keep on your refrigerator, which goes through the basics of introducing solids. Lastly, the kit includes a short DVD that shows you exactly how to go about making the food. If you weren't sure how to wash your hands, for example, they will show you how to turn on the water at your sink. The DVD is 22 minutes long - the perfect time, they say, to watch while you are nursing your baby. These people think of everything!

Foreground: The Mumi & Bubi Solids Starter Set tray and lid. In back: The Fresh Baby So Easy Baby Food Kit tray, without its lid.

My one issue with the So Easy kit's food-preparation advice is its exclusive emphasis on microwave cooking methods. There is actually no mention of boiling, steaming or baking fruits and vegetables. Also, the DVD shows parents microwaving foods in plastic containers and the booklet suggests covering dishes with plastic wrap. We generally try to avoid heating plastic that contains food since some plastics leach chemicals into the food so we were disappointed with this perspective. The creators are obviously focused on the microwave as a time-saver for working parents, but their instructions for cooking apples have you microwave the apples for five minutes and then let them stand for five minutes before transferring them to a blender. You can easily boil or steam most fruits and vegetables in the same amount of time, so it's a shame that this is not mentioned as an alternative.

The recipe section of the So Easy booklet is more diverse than that of Mumi & Bubi. It includes suggested spices to add to your fruits and vegetables as well as what to pair them with. Recipes also extend beyond fruits and vegetables to include beans, tofu and when your kid gets older, seeds and nuts. (No mention of grains, though.) The recipes remain, however, very simple and won't take you too far in expanding your baby's diet. For this, we would recommend taking a look at other baby food books. Ones that we have found particularly interesting and helpful include Blender Baby Food by Nicole Young and Simply Natural Baby Food by Cathe Olson. (We loved New Vegetarian Baby by Sharon Yntema. - ed.). Each of these books starts with a simple introduction of single fruits and vegetables and takes you through more diverse and balanced meals for your child as they gets older.

All in all, the solid starter kits simplify the process of introducing your baby to solid foods by providing straightforward instructions for making your own baby food. Regular ice cube trays do the job of freezing baby food portions just as well as the trays these companies provide, and there are polypropylene options available for low prices. The one significant component these trays introduce is lids, which mean that you can store frozen cubes of food in the containers rather than transferring them to freezer bags. (Such kits can also serve families well beyond the baby years, storing frozen stock, leftover pasta sauce, or freezing leftover coffee to make iced coffee, or many of the other great suggestions here. - ed.)

If you find the idea of starting to make your own baby food overwhelming, either of these kits can help show you just how easy it really is, and can help make the routine easier. Avid baby food makers might also consider giving one of these kits to friends who would like to make their own food but just don’t think they are up for it - either kit would make a good gift.

You can order the Mumi & Bubi Solids Starter Set from the company for about $25 plus $8 shipping. The Fresh Baby So Easy Baby Food Kit is $29.99 from Amazon.com, and ships free. Both kits' trays are made of polypropylene (PPE) plastic.