[~ Lucy's Mum ~]

So, I would be grateful if you would share your lunch and dinner meals for your baby/toddler with me.

DD (11 months) is happy to eat either chunky/mashed spoon fed foods or finger food. With finger food I just worry she doesn't eat enough and I find she'll have a chomp, spit it out and throw it on the floor, especially the vegies .

TIA

[Tesseract]

Even the more conservative advice suggests that babies should be on "family foods" by 12 months. That means eating what you're eating. Do you eat healthy fresh foods? If so then just give them to your DD. Sit down and eat with her, food is a social thing.

If you feed your DD what you are eating, yes this will naturally mean more self feeding and finger foods. With the taking a big bite and spitting it out, she needs to do that, it's part of the learning process. Once she does it enough times she will learn to take an appropriate sized bite, just leave her to it. Throwing it on the floor is normal too, just pop a splash mat under her chair so you can retrive it (not too quickly though, or it'll become a mummy-fetching game!). She may eat a little less with finger food but she'll soon get the hang of it. Babies are very good at regulating their intake.
Healthy children will not starve themselves.

We did self feeding only from 6 months, but even for babies on purees DD's childcare does not feed the children once they are 12 months. They just sit them at the table, give them a bowl and a spoon, and let them at it. Most use their hands initially which is fine, mess is to be expected while they're learning.

Does she use a spoon herself? We gave DD a spoon at 11 months but she didn't start using it until about 13 months, again it required practise.

Some easy to handle foods that we love include:
-Frittata filled with vegies
-Hummos sandwich with a side of tomato wedges and cucubmer sticks
-Chickpea salad (chickpeas are fun to pick up)
-Falafel balls
-Roasted sticks of zucchini, sweet potato, pumpkin etc
-Stir fry with strips of meat and finger-shaped vegies
-Risotto (great for learning to use a spoon because it sticks to the spoon)
-Big pasta (rigatoni for example) with meatballs
-A roast! Strips of meat and roast vegies are very easy to self feed
-Prawn curry with rice (DD's current favourtie dish, the rice is messy but they love practicing the pincer grip and also using a spoon)

Have fun!

[~ Lucy's Mum ~]

Thanks Tessaract, you've given me some great ideas. She can't get enough of pasta and I'll be sure to give her more of the meals we are having, we generally eat pretty fresh and healthy.

I'm not worried about mess and didn't realise that spitting it out and putting it back in etc, is a natural part of the process and I'm happy to go with it .

I give her a spoon to play with but she hasn't grasped the concept yet.