My daughter is a huge fan of vegetables. When she turned six months old last year, her first food was homemade sweet potato baby food. Even though she is now seventeen months old, she still loves the homemade baby food that I made her from fresh fruits and vegetables. I love that popping a few frozen food cubes out of the freezer is so easy. I also love that I can combine a variety of cubes at each meal to ensure that my daughter gets all of the nutrients that she needs to keep her growing body healthy.
One of the most recent baby food mixtures that I made my daughter was mushroom and asparagus. Mushrooms are low in saturated fat and very low in cholesterol and sodium. Mushrooms are also a good source of vitamin D, thiamin, vitamin B6, folate, and magnesium and a very good source of dietary fiber, vitamin C, riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, iron, phosphorus, potassium, zinc, copper, manganese, and selenium. Asparagus is low in saturated fat and very low in cholesterol. The vegetable is also a good source of vitamin B6, calcium, magnesium, and zinc and a very good source of dietary fiber, protein, vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin E, vitamin K, thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, folate, iron, phosphorus, potassium, copper, manganese, and selenium.
To make my daughter some mushroom and asparagus baby food, I started by washing the mushroom and asparagus that I had purchased from my local grocery store. I then put both foods into microwave save bowls with a little extra water for cooking. I then cooked both in the microwave until tender, which was about twenty minutes total for each.
After the mushroom and asparagus were cooked to tenderness, I allowed both foods to cool slightly. I then put some of each in my baby food processor and mashed up the mixture. Once the baby food was mashed, I spooned mixture into ice cube trays for easier freezer. After the cubes froze, I moved the frozen baby food into a freezer bag for easier storage. As my daughter needs food, I simply unthaw a few cubes. Easy and delicious!
Do your kids like mushroom and asparagus? Have you ever made your own baby food?
Image Credits
Mushrooms in a Colander © 2013 Heather Johnson
Washing the Asparagus © 2013 Heather Johnson
Cooking the Asparagus © 2013 Heather Johnson
Cooking the Mushrooms © 2013 Heather Johnson
Cooked Mushrooms and Asparagus © 2013 Heather Johnson
Mashing the Mushrooms and Asparagus © 2013 Heather Johnson
Mushroom and Asparagus Baby Food Cubes © 2013 Heather Johnson
At what age can you introduce berries? My son is 8 months old and we’re slowly introducing different foods cause he has food allergies. I’ve been wondering when to give him blackberries, cranberry, etc…
I like that you use such a variety of foods! Hopefully you can avoid having a picky eater:)
My 8 year old would never eat this, but I am hoping that our new baby will be a bit more adventurous! I like this recipe, I would eat it ; )
My daughter has a food allergy so we’ve stopped trying foods until we see the doctor but she LOVES asparagus! Never tried mushrooms yet – we love doing homemade too!
We did baby-led weaning, starting at 5 months, so my little guy never really did purees. However, he loves ALL types of foods and will even eat foods he’s not really fond of (fingers-crossed he stays that way).
This looks like an interesting idea. I had never thought about giving my kids mushrooms. I don’t particularly like mushrooms, but I hadn’t even considered that maybe they might. I’ll have to try a bigger variety of foods next time around.
This looks so simple 🙂
I have never tried making actual baby food for my boys, but with my youngest son (who is now 5) I would put what we were eating in a food processor & make it so he could eat it! I will probably try something like this with my daughter (now only 2 months) when she gets older! I would have never thought about putting it in ice cube trays though!
Wow neat- I didn’t try asparagus or mushrooms but my son loved carrots, sweet potato and sqash (and of course it was fall so that was readily available.) My son loves fruits, veggies and chickpeas. I would love to see what he would think of these 🙂
That’s awesome your daughter loves vegetables! My daughter isn’t a big fan. Occasionally she’ll eat some carrots or broccoli but she prefers fruits-apples, oranges, strawberries, blackerries, bananas are her favorite
Your daughter is a very adventurous eater! My kids have never really liked much vegetables. Now that my oldest is 3.5 he is slowly starting to try more though.
Love fresh baby food
this is awesome! i am getting ready to have a newborn and have been wanting to make our own baby food! thanks for sharing this 🙂