Store-bought baby food is one of the most overpriced food items I can think of! Think about how much you’re paying for that tiny little jar of food that doesn’t even taste very good! I would much rather pay mere pennies to make my own food…especially since I know exactly what is in it, how it’s prepared and how much better it is for my baby!
I never made my own baby food when Ava was a baby. I even had the KidCo F5000 BabySteps Complete Natural Feeding System and I rarely used it, except to mash up avocados a couple of times. With Kelvin, I got up my courage and started making all his food as soon as he started eating fruits and veggies. Looking back, I’m not sure what I was afraid of when Ava was a baby. I guess the whole process seemed too overwhelming, but it’s really not. It’s so simple and doesn’t even take up much time!
If you’re not sure what is involved or are a little overwhelmed like I was, here’s a step-by-step rundown. Tonight, I made beef casserole (beef, peas and potatoes) and carrots. I usually make at least two different kinds of food at a time to save on set-up and clean-up time. I’ll tell you all about the different kinds of foods I make later in the post.

First I got all the food cooked. Here are the potatoes and the carrots. I heated up frozen peas in the microwave and had the ground beef pre-cooked from earlier in the day.

After all the food was cooked, I got everything set up. I mixed the beef, potatoes and peas together and got out the breastmilk (I’d rather use that than water to get the food to the right consistency).

Here’s a close-up of the food before it was mixed. I used 2 cups of ground beef and a cup each of potatoes and peas. You can easily scale that down if you don’t want to make that much, though.

Here it is in the food mill, all ready to go! I put about half of it in there at a time.

All pureed! I know the color is really gross, but this is Kelvin’s absolute favorite meal!

Then I spooned it into freezer trays. This tray came with the food mill, but I also use regular ice cube trays (as you’ll see later). I actually prefer regular ice cube trays because it’s easier to pop them out once they’re frozen. With this tray, I have to pry them out with a knife.

Don’t forget about the carrots! I steamed them for about 15 minutes and saved the water I steamed them in for thinning purposes. Then I pureed them and mixed a little baby cereal and breastmilk in (I like to mix a little cereal in with most of his food so he gets some extra iron).

And here’s the finished product! It only took about half an hour to produce all this baby food! Then I just stuck it in the freezer and tomorrow I’ll pop the cubes out and store them in Ziploc bags until I’m ready to use them.
You might think that this homemade food will be less convenient at feeding time than jarred food would be. But you would be wrong! Here’s what I do:

I keep all my baby food in this bin in the freezer. Every evening, I pull out this bin and three feeding dishes and put several cubes of food in each dish, for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Then I snap lids on the feeding dishes and put them in the refrigerator to thaw overnight. At feeding time, I just pull the dish out, heat it up for about 30 seconds, give it a quick stir and it’s ready to go!
Of course, there are far more possibilities than beef casserole and carrots! You have your basic single foods like apples, peaches, beans, etc. And there are endless combinations to try! Here are some of our favorite combinations:
- Apples and strawberries
- Plums and nectarines
- Beef, squash and pasta
- Beef, potatoes and green beans
- Chicken, pasta and carrots
- Turkey, rice, carrots and peas
- Tomatoes, pasta and cottage cheese
And that’s just to name a few! You can’t ever get bored with making your own baby food! Sometimes when we have leftovers of a dish Kelvin likes and that is appropriate for his eating abilities, I puree that up and freeze it, too.
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