Can i freeze gerber baby food

We choose products and prepare complementary foods ourselves.
Cooking our own complementary foods: vegetables
Cooking our own complementary foods: cereals
Cooking our own complementary foods: fruits
Cooking our own complementary foods: meat
Cooking our own complementary foods: fish
Cooking our own complementary foods: fermented milk dishes cook food. It would seem that there is nothing simpler than home-made dishes: cooked, chopped with a blender, issued. A modern mother can be frightened by rumors and myths about terrible winter vegetables, in which there is nothing useful, genetically modified foods, the inability to prepare complementary foods that are not inferior to factory ones ... Before you start preparing complementary foods yourself, you need to decide and choose the best, but how? Everything is very simple. If you have increased suspiciousness, and dangerous herbicides and genetically modified tops appear in every carrot, feed your child with canned food, you should not prepare complementary foods yourself. Canned food is no more harmful than daily concern about the benefits or harms of natural products. Use canned food and sleep peacefully - there is nothing wrong with industrial nutrition. As for the eternal debate about GM foods, most of the vegetables and fruits we consume have already undergone genetic changes over hundreds of years of hybridization. In winter, do not buy imported vegetables (zucchini, cauliflower) for self-cooking of complementary foods - they are absolutely overfed with chemicals for long-term storage and transportation. There are no healthy vegetables and fruits in winter. But if you still want to make your own food, or have the opportunity to use your harvest, this collection of tips may be useful.

MAKE YOUR OWN FOOD: VEGETABLES

To prepare vegetable puree, choose the most beautiful vegetables without blemishes or cracks. For the first feeding, vegetables are used that do not contain coarse fiber: zucchini, cauliflower, carrots. Mixtures of vegetables are introduced when the child has already tasted all their components within a week. Vegetables should be washed well under running water - if you doubt the quality of water, use boiled or purified water. Try not to cook vegetables on the stove to retain as much of the nutrients as possible. It is better to cook for a couple - or use a double boiler. Microwave cooking is acceptable, but vegetables dry out in it - nowadays there are microwaves with a steamer function. They can also be baked, in which case the loss of nutrients is minimal. When cooking on the stove, vegetables are laid only in boiling water. Frozen at the same time, in no case are defrosted beforehand. In winter (and early spring), it is favorable to use a variety of frosts for feeding. There are many stereotypes about their usefulness, but they are all debunked. In winter, frosts literally save, but check their quality at least by touch so that large pieces of ice are not felt inside.

Nothing is added to the very first vegetables, after a month vegetable oil (sunflower or olive) is added. Ready vegetables are rubbed through a sieve or modern means are used: a blender or other chopper. You should not soften the first vegetables (that is, for the first feeding at 6-7 months) with a fork or crush, they cannot cope with the fibers, and the complementary foods will come out undigested.

What can be added for taste: vegetable broth, a little expressed breast milk or formula. Vegetables do not need to be salted. The child does not have salt receptors, this taste is imposed forcibly. What taste you accustom to, this will be a priority in the future. If a child refuses vegetables, this does not mean that they need to be salted - this means that vegetables are introduced too early. Every child has their own feeding schedule. You can start introducing vegetables at 6, 10 or 12 months, it all depends on the desires of the child himself. In the process of introducing vegetables, the main thing is not volume, but variety. If a child eats a crumb of this and a crumb of that (a spoonful of zucchini, two tablespoons of carrots) - fine. And in terms of benefits, it is much better than those fed by force - with the release of the family choir of grandmothers or "for advertising" - one hundred grams laid down according to the instructions.

Possible errors: Do not wash vegetables from which you want to prepare complementary foods yourself with soapy water. This is an extra precaution. The soap is not washed off completely, and its remains are by no means useful for the child. They prepare complementary foods on their own immediately before serving - and only at one time! Cooked mashed potatoes should not be reheated, this will increase the loss of nutrients.
What vegetables are not introduced into complementary foods for up to a year: white cabbage, beets, tomatoes, cucumbers - and greens. They are quite aggressive for the stomach, and for a child up to a year there will be enough of those vegetables that can be introduced: zucchini, broccoli, cauliflower, kohlrabi, green beans, carrots, pumpkin, potatoes, closer to a year - corn, peas. Some vegetables have a hard shell; corn and green beans sin with it. But in a double boiler, the shell softens easily and quickly. Mashed potatoes are a heavy dish, it is advisable to mix potatoes with any other vegetables.

WE PREPARE COMPLETE FOOD: PORRIDGE

For the first complementary food, low-allergenic cereals are taken: rice, buckwheat or corn. Corn porridge is the heaviest, so you yourself should prepare complementary foods from rice or buckwheat. Rice is washed with warm or hot water to separate the starch. The groats are ground in a coffee grinder to the state of flour and boiled in water. In principle, you can grind ready-made porridge, but in this case, vitamins and trace elements are lost much faster. Groats (the resulting cereal flour) are placed only in boiling water, ideally they are not boiled until cooked, but left to swell. Otherwise, there is a chance that it will continue to swell in the child's stomach.

In order to properly prepare a healthy porridge for feeding yourself, you need to observe the ratio of water and cereals. Do not add water during the process. All cereals - except buckwheat and rice - are stirred in the process. For the first feeding, a liquid porridge is made: a teaspoon of cereals (cereal flour) per 100 ml of water. After 1-2 weeks, the amount of cereal is doubled. Cow's milk is not added to self-prepared complementary foods for up to a year, only a little breast milk or a mixture immediately before serving, and a month after the introduction - butter (3 g). Sugar or fructose in complementary foods is not needed! Permissible additives: fruit puree; closer to a year, ground dried fruits, pumpkin, carrots are put in cereals.
When a child has tasted all three types of low-allergenic cereals, mixtures are made from them. At 10 months, you can try oatmeal, the rest of the gluten-containing cereals are introduced into self-cooked complementary foods no earlier than a year. At home, whole grains cannot be processed perfectly, they will still be heavier than baby instant cereals in boxes, so it is better to push back all the deadlines. Semolina porridge is not introduced until two or three years; recently, experts have increasingly doubted its value. Semolina contains 70% starch, proteins and very few vitamins and minerals. As well as phytin, which binds calcium salts, that is, it prevents calcium from entering the bloodstream. When there is little calcium in the human body, the parathyroid glands "withdraw" it from the bones and send it into the blood. All cereals, one way or another, bind calcium - that is also why they are recommended to be introduced after vegetables and meat. But semolina tries the most, having a pronounced “rachitogenic” effect, it contributes to the formation of rickets in children of the first two years of life.

WE PREPARE COMPLETE FOOD: FRUITS AND JUICES

Entering fruit starts with green apples and pears. It is advisable to find your native fruits, such as Semerenko apples, Kuban Champion or Antonovka. They are sourer (and much more useful) than imported ones, and the acid is “knocked down” by baking. Most imported fruits ripen along the way, being picked unripe, this already impoverishes their composition, not to mention chemical additives to preserve their appearance. Fruit for import is grown and harvested in less than ideal conditions. When preparing complementary foods on your own, do not use apples with dark (black) spots, one such spot indicates a loss of vitamins by a third. Apples and pears are given fresh, making a “scrape”, or baked, in a baked fruit, the acidity decreases and the amount of pectin, a useful substance that removes toxins, increases. How to bake: peel, cut into pieces and remove the part with bones. Or bake whole: add a little water to the container, loosely cover with foil and bake at a temperature of 200 degrees for 20 minutes, the time depends on the type of oven and the number of apples. You can also "bake" in the microwave for 2-3 minutes, while the fruit is covered with cling film.

Puree is made from fruit, it is offered for an afternoon snack, then added to porridge or cottage cheese - or left as an independent dish. Fruit is also given in pieces, in this case, make sure that the child does not choke. Fruit should be peeled and pitted. The peel is cleaned not only because it may contain paraffin residues, the peel is too hard, it is simply not digested. The banana is next after the green fruit, it is fibrous and starchy, so it should be crushed with diligence. Peaches, apricots and berries are tried last. Berries have a lot of fiber, tiny bones, they can cause serious intestinal upset, hence the moral: the norm of berries for a child is exactly as much as he can keep in his handful, and this is a lot.
Freshly squeezed juices are introduced not earlier than one and a half years and only in a diluted form (50:50).

WE PREPARE COMPLETE FOOD: MEAT

Meat is a heavy product, it takes a long time to digest, so there is no need to hurry with its introduction, especially if the child is breastfed. Begin to introduce meat puree with half a teaspoon. You can give this norm for three days and monitor the reaction. If you are making your own complementary foods, mix meat with vegetable puree (for better absorption). Just add the meat to the puree little by little, gradually increasing the dose.

Rabbit, lamb, turkey are ideal for preparing complementary foods. Veal, pork, chicken are introduced after a year. At 10 months, the child can be offered meatballs, and after a year - steam cutlets. Meat broths are not used in the diet of children, they contain harmful substances boiled down from meat. Before cooking, the meat must be separated from the bones, the finished dish is not poured with the remaining meat broth, and when cooking the soup, the meat broth is half diluted with water - or the finished mashed meat is added to the vegetable soup.

Method of self-preparation of complementary foods: meat passed twice through a meat grinder is steamed until tender, or already cooked meat is passed through a meat grinder (blender, mini-combine). Minced meat is rubbed through a strainer (or blender). The steam method of self-preparation of complementary foods from meat: water is added to raw minced meat (the more water, the more tender), spread in a deep bowl and put it in another bowl with boiling water. Cover with a lid, cook for 10-15 minutes. Non-steam method: the meat is boiled for 20 minutes, then the broth is drained, poured with hot water again - and cooked until tender. In no case do not salt the meat puree - there are plenty of salts in the meat.

Meat contains a lot of coarse fibers, it is impossible to turn it into an easily digestible dish at home. And in stores it is difficult to find meat for the first feeding. It can be said that meat is not the best product for preparing complementary foods.

MAKE YOUR OWN FOOD: FISH

Boil the fillet in a small amount of water for 15-20 minutes, cool, pass through a meat grinder, and then grind with a blender. For self-preparation of complementary foods, it is necessary to buy only fillets of low-fat varieties of fish (hake, cod, pollock). It is better to thaw in salt water to reduce the loss of minerals during defrosting. The fillet is not recommended to be completely defrosted. Slightly thawed fish is washed in cold water and subjected to heat treatment, which, unlike meat, should not be too long. Put the fish only in boiling water, after which the fire is immediately reduced.

WE PREPARE FOOD OURSELVES: SOUR-DAIRY DISHES

Homemade kefir
Methods for making kefir for feeding yourself:
yogurt. We add the starter to a liter of warm milk, close the jar with a tight lid, wrap it in a terry towel and send it to a warm place (for example, to the bathroom - it is always warm there) for 6-10 hours. When a kefir clot forms, we send the jar to the refrigerator for a few more hours.

2. Boil half a liter of milk, cool to 35 - 36 degrees (so that you can easily hold your finger in the milk) and add 5 - 6 tablespoons of old kefir to it. Stir, wrap the bottle in a blanket and leave for 5 - 6 hours in a warm place, and then keep a few hours in the refrigerator. If instead of old kefir you add yogurt to milk, the taste of the drink will be slightly different. If there was no old curdled milk or kefir at home, you can use a piece of black bread as a starter.

Home-made cottage cheese
Ways of self-preparation of cottage cheese for complementary foods:
1. Kefir cottage cheese (fermented milk) is easier to digest and assimilate. To prepare it, pour kefir into an enameled saucepan (mug) and put on the smallest fire. When a clot forms on top, fold it onto a sterile gauze to drain the serum.

2. Calcined cottage cheese is prepared by adding a solution of calcium chloride to cold pasteurized or boiled milk; it is sold in pharmacies. The amount of calcium chloride in all recipes is different, there is this: to get 100 g of cottage cheese for 600 ml of milk, put 1.5 teaspoons of calcium chloride. Another recipe: bring milk to a boil and remove from heat. When it cools down a little, add calcium chloride dissolved in a small amount of boiled water with continuous stirring, cool the curdled milk, strain through gauze, let the whey drain. Per liter of milk - 1 tablespoon of calcium chloride. The famous pediatrician Natalya Rashidovna Vasilyeva recommends the following recipe: for 1 liter of cold raw milk, 1 ampoule (10 ml.) of 10% calcium chloride - pour in - boil - cool - strain through a sieve or cheesecloth - calcined cottage cheese is ready.
There is an opinion that such cottage cheese is not very suitable for self-preparation of complementary foods, in fact, this recipe came to us from veterinary medicine, calcium chloride cottage cheese is given to baby animals. At the very least, calcined cottage cheese should not be given every day. It can be noticeably bitter in taste, and its consistency is not suitable for the first complementary foods. Try it - form your own opinion.

3. Boil milk, cool to body temperature. Add the starter, previously loosened in a small amount of the same milk. This is for its even distribution. Put in a warm place for a day or two. At the same time, it is better to interfere with it, disturb it several times during fermentation. Then - heat in a water bath, and not just putting the pan on the fire. The more heat, the more the casein coagulates. If you heat it on fire, then it can curl up into such nasty-hard lumps, that is, it will be very dry and hard cottage cheese. And for tender cottage cheese, you need to warm it up very carefully, in a water bath. Then - cool and discard: put gauze on a colander, pour the previous semi-finished product there, wait until the whey drains, and then collect the ends of the gauze from above and start twisting to squeeze out the whey. For greater density, you can then put this bag in a colander, pressing down on top with a plank with a load.

4. Get the lowest fat milk available. Pour it into a large bowl or saucepan. Squeeze lemon juice into milk (for each liter of milk - from half to a whole lemon). You can also use ready-made purchased lemon juice or diluted citric acid. Pour boiling water from the kettle into a saucepan with milk and lemon juice. Boiling water should be about the same or even a little more than milk. Stir calmly and watch with interest how the milk curdles before your eyes, the whey begins to become transparent. Do not wait until the milk clots become dense. This will give your curd an unwanted graininess. Catch tender clots with a spoon with holes and put them in another bowl. A little more serum may stand out, you drain it. All.

5. 4 cups sour milk, 2 cups fresh milk. Boil fresh milk and pour into a vessel with sour milk. Mix thoroughly and leave to cool. After the mixture has cooled, pour it into a sieve and strain through a fine sieve.

WE PREPARE COMPLETE FOOD OURSELVES: STORAGE

Knowledgeable people say in a voice: ready-made vegetable (meat and vegetable) purees do not need to be stored. These are dishes with a broken structure, ideally they are cooked strictly at one time. At home, it is impossible to provide shock freezing - useful substances are inevitably lost. It is necessary to freeze whole (cut) vegetables and fruits, and then mash them. Vegetables are stored at a temperature of - 6 ° C - a week, at - 12 ° C - 1 month, at - 18 ° C - 3 months.

However, sometimes there is a need to freeze meat or vegetable puree. One easy way is to fill the ice cube tray and put it in the freezer. Do not freeze hot or warm food, it needs to be chilled first. Once food is frozen, immediately place it in an individual plastic bag. Don't forget to mark and date when you did it. In this form, mashed potatoes can be stored for 3-4 weeks at a temperature not higher than -18. Never refreeze food.

It is not recommended to freeze cottage cheese at home, as such freezing is slow, which significantly disrupts the protein structure, and worsens the taste and other qualities of the product. As an exception, this can only be done in freezers with two and three stars on the lid or in freezers with a temperature of - 18 °; store cottage cheese in such conditions should be no more than two weeks.

How to reheat frozen food: Transfer to a suitable container and place in a pot of boiling water, stirring occasionally. You can also use microwave heating. Food should be well heated, in no case warm. Do not reheat food more than once: leftover food should be discarded.

How to freeze baby food - Encyclopedia Baby food

Knowing how to freeze baby food, you can cook and store whole batches of homemade food for a child, because this is a real find for busy parents.

Table of Contents:

There are several ways to freeze baby food - they all work equally well - but may take up different amounts of freezer space.

…make homemade baby food and then refrigerate it as quickly as possible to prevent bacterial growth. Any food left at room temperature for more than two hours is not safe for a child to consume and should be thrown away.

To cool cooked food quickly, you can try putting it in a shallow container - you can even dip the container in a pot of cold water to help speed up the process.

Thoroughly clean the ice mold and the spoon that will be used in filling each section. An ice tray with a resealable lid is ideal as it protects food from frostbite or picking up any odors from the freezer. If there is no mold with a lid, you can cover with food-safe plastic wrap. Some people use foil, although we don't recommend it as some of the foil will remain in the food!

Place the filled ice tray in the freezer, and - once completely frozen - place them in ZIP bags that take up less space in the freezer.

This method produces small portions of baby food that are ideally sized - typically around 30 grams or so. One cube per meal may be enough for a child to start with, but as they grow, you may need to increase the number of cubes at a time or increase the ice cube tray.

You can also make many different flavors of baby food by mixing and matching different fruit and vegetable cubes, for example, the combination of apple puree cube with carrot puree cube, delicious!

Some ice cube trays are specifically made for baby food and do not contain potentially hazardous chemicals - but a regular ice cube tray can be used, or a silicone mold may be advised, or even stainless steel trays, although the regular plastic version will work if there is confidence in the quality of the workmanship.

Same as method 1, since the process of freezing baby food is the same, only silicone cupcake molds are used instead of an ice mold! Their flexibility makes it easy to remove food portions - plus, of course, their use is beneficial when the baby starts to eat more baby food!

If no suitable freezer containers are available for baby food, baking paper can be used (although a little more freezer space will be needed initially).

Simply spoon the cooked baby puree onto the baking sheet to form small mounds (though note that this will not work if the puree is too thin). We cover the baking paper with cling film, freeze, and then mix the servings of food into bags, as before.

Another good way to freeze homemade baby food is to divide the puree into freezer glass jars and place them in the freezer.

However, please note that you should never freeze baby food in glass jars unless the jar manufacturer has specifically stated that freezing is safe and possible.

Jars that are freezer safe must be properly labeled and distinguished from other tins (including commercial baby food tins) that are not strong enough to withstand the expansion of food that occurs during the freezing process.

This means that the jar may burst or, even worse, there may be small micro-cracks that cannot be seen with the eyes, but which will allow tiny pieces of glass to get into the baby's food.

Probably the most popular way to freeze homemade baby food is to use freezer trays or jars for baby food, there are so many options to choose from!

Manufacturers, recognizing the growing trend of parents to freeze baby puree, offer special forms for baby food that make life easier, well, because there is a lid! What's more, these molds are free of potentially harmful chemicals, which is something some plastic trays for general consumption are guilty of.

Most types of baby food - especially puree - freeze perfectly. Sometimes you will have to experiment with texture, since the freezing process itself consists in the fact that the water in the product expands when it freezes, destroying the cell walls. This is especially noticeable when the whole food is frozen, for example a frozen banana will be very soft when thawed.

- Do not puree too thin before freezing. Keep in mind that many foods become watery when thawed (especially fruits and vegetables), adding extra liquid before freezing will then add too much cereal to thicken!

- Herbs and spices tend to lose their flavor in the freezer. If a baby food recipe calls for them, it is best to add them after after the food is defrosted, just before heating.

- Baked foods - like homemade nuggets or fish fingers - are best frozen when almost cooked but not fully done. This is because the structure of the food when frozen and thawed can behave negatively.

— When freezing yoghurt, remember that it may be too thin when defrosted. Sometimes stirring it well is enough to solve this problem - but in some cases, the resulting yogurt is too thin to eat with a spoon, so such yogurt can be used in a smoothie!

- A good result is obtained from freezing rice and oatmeal, which is good if the morning is like a nightmare and there is no time to organize a full breakfast. Only cereals should not be made too thin before they are frozen .

- Many fruits - especially apples and pears - can look very brown when frozen and thawed. This discoloration is a natural and harmless result of the fruit being exposed to air, but if it's a concern, mixing lemon juice and fruit puree before freezing can solve the problem. Please note that citrus fruits can cause an allergic reaction in babies, so you can use it with a changed color!

- If you want to make your own stock of vegetable or meat broth, which is convenient, you just need to prepare a large batch at a time and freeze. It's worth trying freezing in ice cube trays or baby food trays, as discussed above - then the ideal size of small portions will be in the freezer to use as needed.

- If baby food has been frostbitten, fortunately food safety is not affected - just thaw and then cut or spoon away the affected areas.

The safest and easiest way to defrost baby food is to put it in the refrigerator overnight before feeding. Frozen baby food cubes take 8-12 hours to thaw in most refrigerators. Thawed baby food should be used within 24 hours.

Never, ever refreeze defrosted baby food as this creates a risk of food poisoning for the baby.

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On our site Encyclopedia Baby Food there is useful information on the nutrition of your children, which is useful for everyone, and we update the site "Encyclopedia Baby Food" constantly and try to search and write only excellent, verified and necessary information for you and your children.

Disclaimer No. 1: It must be understood that the author of the articles on the Baby Food Encyclopedia website is not a medical staff, “I am not a doctor.” The information I share is based on my own experience. My goal is not to teach you how to eat or feed your child, but to talk about how we did it, what new things I learned or read. This expands the picture of Baby Food knowledge, gives you a glimpse of the whole process so you can decide if you like it or not.

Disclaimer No. 2 : However, the above does not replace visiting a pediatrician. Before you start complementary foods, you need to get his professional opinion on the best way to introduce new foods for your baby. I also draw your attention to the fact that you need to look at the original date of the published articles, because some of the "best practices" may have changed. Always check with your child's pediatrician about complementary foods and their health.

Disclaimer #3: Keep in mind that every family is unique, every situation is also completely unique. There are no universal solutions. Only you can find what works best for you. Certain goals require certain sacrifices and priorities - not everyone wants to make those choices, and that's GREAT! Just know what you want to achieve, and be ready to get to work, putting the best of your strength!

Disclaimer No. 4: On the Encyclopedia Baby Food website, photos from books on baby food with attribution are used to better understand the information (Article 1274, paragraph 1, part four of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation). Literature on baby food is found in the public domain on the Internet.

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