If there is anything that our modern culture gets totally wrong, it’s how to feed babies and properly introduce solid foods. Pediatricians, dieticians, and other “experts” are quick to recommend that the perfect first food for babies at about the age of 4-6 months is rice cereal.
Not only is this advice completely misguided, it is also extremely harmful to the long term health of the child. Such advice contributes greatly to the epidemic of fat toddlers and the growing childhood obesity crisis.
Rice cereal is not a healthy first food for babies
Rice cereal is an extremely high glycemic food. This means that it spikes the blood sugar rapidly. It also contains ample amounts of double sugar (disaccharide) molecules, which are extremely hard for an immature digestive system to digest. The small intestine of a baby mostly produces only one carbohydrate enzyme, lactase, for digestion of the lactose in milk. It produces little to no amylase, the enzyme needed for grain digestion.
Interestingly, avoidance of allergies is one of the reasons cited by pediatricians for using rice cereal as the first food! While rice may be gluten free, it is by no means disaccharide free. Thus, it can contribute to the development of allergies and other autoimmune disorders just the same as a gluten containing cereal such as wheat or spelt. This is why going “gluten free” does not solve digestive ailments in the majority of children with autoimmune issues linked to grain allergies.
This approach may reduce symptoms somewhat, but it does not solve the problem entirely. The disaccharide molecule is still present in high amounts in gluten free grains. A similarly hard to digest starch molecule is present in grain substitutes such as potato flour, arrowroot, bean flours, etc.
Rice Cereal Now, Weight Issues Later?
Why then, is rice cereal so very popular as a first food to feed babies? One reason is that it is so readily accepted by the baby (who wouldn’t like a food that spikes the blood sugar? It is a bit of a “high” after all) and it fills them up like a lead brick leading to longer and more frequent periods of sleeping and more passive behavior in general. Be aware that there are still some misinformed doctors that advise mothers of babies that do not sleep well to introduce rice cereal as early as 3 months old – sometimes right into the baby bottle if the tongue thrust reflex hasn’t yet disappeared preventing the baby from taking food off a spoon! This is a recipe for childhood weight problems if I’ve ever heard one.
If your baby zonks out right after eating on a frequent basis, this is a major clue that what the child has just eaten was not easily digested (this goes for breastfeeding too .. a poor diet that is not digested well by the breastfeeding Mother will result in toxins in her breastmilk which will have an opiate like effect on the child).
Dr. McBride’s book mentioned above discusses this huge issue of toxins from undigested food and gut pathogens in the breastmilk as well. The same goes for adults, by the way. If you get sleepy after eating, it’s because what you just ate isn’t getting handled very well by your gut. The body is basically compensating for the brick in your stomach by putting you to sleep so that a sufficient amount of energy can be diverted to digestion.
Even Health Canada recognizes the dangers of cereal as a first food for babies and recommends against it.
So What is the Right First Food for Babies?
A baby’s digestive system is much better equipped to handle fats and proteins than carbohydrates. For this reason, a wonderful first food for babies is a soft boiled egg yolk from a pastured hen. Take care to only use the yolk and not the egg white which contains difficult to digest proteins. For my own children, I started giving a taste of a soft boiled egg yolk from my own plate starting at about 4-6 months old. Just a taste! If the child is completely uninterested, then try again in a week or two.
If the child likes the little taste that you put on her tongue or lip, then give her two tastes the next day and three tastes the next day, gradually building up to the entire egg yolk. Never force the child to eat. Remember that egg yolk is an extremely rich food and force feeding any rich food can cause the child to vomit.
Benefits of Egg Yolk for Babies
Egg yolk from pastured chickens contain ample amounts of omega-3 fatty acids and natural cholesterol which are critical to a child’s mental development and may be lacking in breastmilk depending on the quality of the mother’s diet. Children who receive sufficient omega 3 fats in their diet tend to speak clearly and understand verbal direction from the parents at a very early age.
I just went back and looked at my children’s baby books and all 3 of them (even the boys) spoke short sentences by 15-17 months of age. First words (Mama or Dada) occurred around 7 months. While these sentences were very simple (“Get that”, “Don’t want that”, “More of this”) I have no doubt that getting ample omega-3 fats from their diet played a big part in their ease of communicating at an early age. The pronunciation was clear enough to be understood even by those outside the family too.
At 6 Months of Age
At about 6 months of age, grate a bit of raw, grassfed beef or chicken liver into the warm egg yolk for baby to eat. This mimics the traditional practice of African mothers who would chew raw liver and then give small amounts to their babies as a first food.
Make sure that the raw liver is frozen for a minimum of 14 days as recommended by the USDA to eliminate any risk of parasites. Mashed banana is also a wonderful carbohydrate to add around this time. Banana digests very easily due to the copious amounts of amylase present. When the enzyme is present in the food, there is no need for baby’s small intestine to produce it herself.
If you can’t source quality raw liver in your area, desiccated liver powder can be used instead.
At Age 10 Months
At the age of 10 months or so, add pureed meats, fruits and vegetables. Introduce one at a time to reduce any chance of a reaction. Best also to avoid high starch veggies like potatoes and sweet potato. These veggies contain very complex starch molecules. They are much more difficult to digest for baby than non-starchy vegetables. Take the time to make your babyfood at home with organic ingredients, and mash the veggies withgrassfed butter.
It is worth the effort! Organic jarred baby food is not only overpriced. It is microwaved, watered down and contains no healthy fats to facilitate absorption.
Consumption of veggies with a bit of healthy fat like butter increases mineral absorption tremendously! You can freeze your homemade baby food in ice cube trays. A quick thaw in a small sauce pan (not the microwave!) makes for a fast and nutritious meal.
Soups made with homemade broth rank as one of the most nutritious foods for babies at this age. The gelatin in the homemade broth is protective against any intestinal bugs. It facilitates digestion too so that baby absorbs as many nutrients as possible.
When Should Grains be Introduced?
It’s a good idea to delay introduction of grain based foods and starchy vegetables for as long as possible. Grains are the hardest foods to digest of all.
Some experts advise that a child pass his/her second birthday before eating these foods. Whatever you decide, it is wise to forgo them until well after the first birthday. Even then, the grains should be properly prepared. This means they are either sprouted, sour leavened or soaked to ensure maximum digestibility. This careful preparation breaks down some of the hard to digest starches, gluten and anti-nutrients such as phytic acid.
It will take every ounce of your will power to keep the grain based foods out of your child’s mouth until well after her first birthday. In fact, the longer you can delay, the better. Teething biscuits, cheerios, crackers, and bread are all favorite foods for moms to feed as soon as the child can sit up in a high chair and grab from a plate. The first thing most parents give a baby at a restaurant is bread from the bread basket.
Babies may love it, but don’t do it!
Resist the temptation to use these foods as a pacifier. Commit to offering only truly nourishing fare at such a young age. The time will come soon enough when your child will have more control over his/her food choices. Wisely use this time of complete control to make sure every calorie baby eats is nutrient dense and easily digested!
Skip the Fruit Juice!
On a final note, whatever you do, skip the fruit juice! Fruit juice from the store, even if organic, is just sugar water. All the nutrition, enzymes and probiotics has been pasteurized away. It just spikes the blood sugar and increase the risk of obesity.
Juice also kills a child’s appetite for hours, even a day or two. Many a Mom has told me that when she took away the fruit juice, within a few days, a picky eater suddenly started eating!
The one exception would be freshly pressed juice diluted with some filtered water. Fresh fruit juice is full of enzymes and nutrition and would be an acceptable drink for baby on occasion. This is acceptable after age 10 months or so.
Still unsure where to start? This video on how to prepare the best first food for baby can help too!
Contact your WAPF Chapter Leader and he/she should have a list for you of local egg producers.
westonaprice.org
Beautiful post. I've been trying to find organic, pasture eggs for so long, but without success. There is always corn and/or soybean included – even at the Farmers Markets. Any recommendations for L.A./Ca?
I meant to add that, as far as baby-led solids go, in addition to not pureeing anything (if baby can't eat it in a simply fork-mashed version of its regular form, that tells me he's not ready yet), I also will not spoon-feed anything.
I'll put it on a spoon and let him put it in his mouth and decide how much he wants to chew and/or swallow, but I do not "feed" it, and do not under any circumstances play the airplane game. 🙂
I love this post, and agree with the vast majority of it – but I have to say something about the baby-feeding style.
I think that biology shows us clearly that babies are meant to get only mother's milk for most of the first year, and mostly mother's milk for most of the second year. The patterns of most babies naturally raised & naturally fed show this – I could talk forever about it.
But the problem with this is the mother's diet, as you mentioned. I followed my children's cues, and they nursed exclusively for at least 9mo, and still nursed for most of their nutrition until 18mo, and weaned on their own at around 2.5yr.
But their cavities – OH!!! Each one was worse, till my fourth child's four front teeth wore to the gumline before I could stop it – and he was eating no sugar, grains, or fruit. It was MY sugar-laden diet that deprived him.
Still – the children's cues and instincts are clear. They want and need to be nursed, w/o solid foods, for a very long time. The answer is clearly to nourish the *mother*. And I strongly believe that a well nourished mother need not and SHOULD NOT offer solids to her baby before at least 7-8 months.
Yes, a 6 month old grabs food and shoves it in his mouth – just as he does with forks, glasses, sticks, paper, and for one of mine, a picture of the Pope! This doesn't mean he wants to eat.
My answer is to let him chew on non-edible things, b/c that always makes him happy and proves he just wawnts to chew (not swallow), then between 7-9 months, offer something small & nutrient-dense. I never puree anything, in my opinion, his ability to eat it indicates his readiness to eat it.
(Now, if a smaller child wasn't happy with chewing on a spoon, ever, would it be fine to offer a bit of egg yolk earlier and see what he does with it? Sure. But I wouldn't recommend *encouraging* him to eat it if he wasn't interested at four months old. Yikes.)
So grassfed liver or pastured egg yolk or fermented cod liver oil is our first food offered, but much later than you recommend, and never pushed or even "encouraged," but if the child swallows it and asks for more, I let him. And if not, I might see if he wants it 3 or 4 weeks later. I had one child who chewed on things for half an hour, but refused to swallow anything until he was 12 months old.
I believe that the best solution is to follow the child's lead AND nourish the mother, so that the benefits of baby-led solids, natural weaning, AND nutrient-dense foods for both baby and mother are all realized. This includes the natural child spacing of 2.5-3.5 years that WAP observed in the societies he researched.
In the case where the mother is poorly nourished and won't or can't improve her diet quickly enough, I would probably encourage your techniques at 6 months, and introduce solids more regularly, encouraging more of them, even while continuing to try to increase maternal nutrient intake so that solids need not be so important so early.
Some good info, thought I'd add a bit of my experience so far. My son never drank juice until around 2 he was completely happy with just water, so I'd say just start with water and don't focus on juice at all if you can help it.
Also with my daughter I decided to forgo pureed foods and also wanted to nurse her as long as she was happy with just nursing and didn't want to "force" her eating solids…I am not in any rush to wean her and mom's milk actually DOES have everything they need…your milk changes to suit their needs, and even if mom doesn't eat a "perfect" diet her milk will be fine, it will just take more of a toll on mom's body. I'd like to see the research that states that mom's milk is not sufficient for her baby past 6 months..I have yet to see conclusive evidence of this…other than the standard "knowledge" that pediatricians pass off as science/fact (just like the rice cereal info you talked about). Also mom's milk has the perfect amount of nutrients plus their liquid fulfillment as well so a breastfed baby rarely should need fluids other than breast milk even up to a year…the water (and purees) is only taking the PLACE OF breast milk in their body, not adding to it…because they will drink less and less, and eventually will wean…and study after study shows that babies should be drinking mom's milk AT LEAST for a year minimum but 2+ is even more beneficial for them.
My daughter is 11 months and just eating a few bites of things that we eat, in normal form, no purees and blending/mashing etc…I had (and still do at 4 yrs old) a hard time getting my son to transition from purees to normal foods. Baby may want to eat more often, but sometimes it's just for a quick drink in between longer meals…and if she's in a growth spurt she might fuss a bit if she's wanting more, you just keep nursing her and your supply will jump the next day or two. Also continuing to feed at night is important for exclusive nursing as that is a huge portion of their intake as well, so if you aren't nursing at night it would be hard to maintain an exclusively breastfed baby past 6 months, unless you nurse 8-10 times a day. Since 6 months we've been nursing about 4-5 times during the day and 2-3 times at night, during growth spurts sometimes and extra feed in the day and 1-2 at night. and to add, my son was always tiny, my daughter is a chunky thing, and neither are ever sick, no ei's or colds or flu. 🙂
Rachel J…did your friend vaccinate her child? One of the common ingredients in vaccines is egg and egg embryos, and that is injected into the blood stream so it's very possibly that could have played a roll in her allergy to egg. We don't vaccinate so I have no problem giving my little ones eggs, yolks specifically.
Wow not vaccinating… won’t even go there. SHAME ON YOU!!!
Of course you won’t, dear! That’s because of all the evidence against you! Vaccinations have been linked to so many horrible things, of course you can’t say anything besides “won’t even go there.” I’m sure your also eating a pretty S.A.D. diet, and you blindly follow whatever else the mainstream media/government/medical establishment tells you. Maybe one day you will start asking questions and making decisions for yourself.
not at all. Vaccination is an abomination. I was a victim of this barbaric practice. You are quite simply wrong.
Vaccines are NEVER injected into the blood stream. How do you expect anyone to take you seriously when you can’t even get your facts right? Oh, that’s right because you’re not interested in the facts. If you were you would do the responsible thing and immunise both yourself and your children but it is far easier to believe in conspiracy theories than it is to educate yourself.
I didn't know any better with my first, and she had rice cereal at 4 months — and a ton of allergies. We worked through a period of gluten-free, then grain-free, then GAPS, and now as long as she has sprouted grains and raw dairy she is fine. She is 2. My son had tiny tastes of meat and eggs starting around 6 months, and started to actually "eat" around 8 months. At 10 months now he'll eat just about anything. We really don't offer him grains, though he's occasionally stolen a bite of his sister's sprouted items. Oh well. He didn't get any until 10 months and then it was properly prepared, and I don't "feed" it to him. Mostly he enjoys eggs, guacamole (that's a favorite!), any meat, plain homemade yogurt, and is starting to eat some veggies. He had trouble with fruits/veggies for a long time, too rough for him to digest. Meat/dairy was definitely best (and ironically, he had all kinds of problems with dairy through my milk at birth!).
I tell everyone this sort of thing (I've blogged about it too), but most just think I'm overly cautious and a little crazy, even in the alternative world. Someday….
you might be interest in this report showing the AAP is beginning to realize this Of course it will be a long time before this idea replaces the rice cereal idea in the mainstream minds.
thanks for the article. I was sold on not using rice cereal when I first read this post back in May (I was 5 month pregnant then). Now, our little fellow is 3 1/2 months and as we look toward “solids” I re-read this and also your link to the article. This is also helpful ammo for those in the family that think rice cearal is the absolute only way to go. “you had rice cereal and you’re just fine” ugh!
thanks again!
Good for you Danielle! Your little one will thank you one day for your vigilance on the part of preserving and enhancing his health!
In theory I love the idea of starting off with egg because a pastured egg IS such a wonderful source of nutrient-dense food. However, having a friend who's child has an anaphylactic allergy to egg makes me a little nervous about this suggestion. She exclusively breastfed her child until he showed signs of wanting food (older than 6 months) and offered lots of veggies/meats, none of the typical SAD baby diet foods. This appears to be his only food-related issue. Given the damage done to so many people and by default, their children as well (even if they have taken care to really cut out processed foods, sugar and take other measures to have a healthy pregnancy) by GMO foods, processed and conventional foods, I hesitate to recommend egg as an early food for babies.
I do think that liver is an excellent first choice and I gladly added that to my little one's avocado or chicken.
Thanks for the input, Wendy. I agree that you should never force the child to eat and as long as the baby is happy nursing, no need to mess with that. It is a good idea to give them a taste of the egg yolk, though, to see if they might actually be interested starting around 4-6 months.
I agree with Bambi. As a lactating mom of a almost three year old, I'd say the best food for babies is mommy's milk. There is no need to introduce solids until the child shows interest in solid foods and can sit up on their own. It is recommended that infants are exclusively breastfeed at least for 6 months, but ideally for one year. If your infant is spitting up food that you actively put in their mouths it is because the have not developed the ability to swallow and process foods other than mother's milk and the regurgitating is a natural defense mechanism against the introduction to solid foods too early. There is no evidence to support the need to supplement your infant's diet with anything other than breast milk. If you are worried about the nutritional content of your milk, supplement your own diet with whole foods and that will take care of any problems. Unfortunately, our society and work places don't often support breastfeeding families and exclusively breastfeeding can be an extreme challenge. Contact your local La Leche League or breastfeeding group for support and ideas. While breastfeeding can seem like a hurdle, it really is only for a short duration in regards to your child's life time. It is also much cheaper and less work than feeding and cleaning all of those dishes! However, Sarah's input on the types of food to introduce to your food-curious little one is fantastic!!!