Homemade Baby Food

Since the day my daughter started eating baby food, I have made it all myself. I have bought a few of the jar foods and I'm not interested. They're stinky, have weird ingredients, taste nothing like the actual food, have a very limited selection, and can get expensive. I have been surprised at how easy it is to make my own baby food! And how much money I'm sure I've saved.

I prepare most of her foods by steaming them. I cook frozen peas in the microwave. I simply mash avocados and bananas with a fork.

When she first started food I would puree everything in the blender with a little bit of the cooking water so it was super smooth. I cooked in large batches and froze it all in ice cube tray to make nice individual servings. Now that she's transitioning to chunkier food I use a food mill. It still breaks the food up into small pieces, but they aren't super smooth.

Before I tell you how I make my butternut squash let me show you a couple of my favorite gadgets for making baby food at home:

• Vegetable Steamer:

I absolutely love my vegetable steamer! I really like the free standing ones because you don't have to use your oven or stove and you can cook different items without dirtying up different dishes. I can load the thing with whatever I want, turn the 1 hour timer on, and leave it. It's great! 

I have this one from Rival

• A Blender

I used my Blender when we were in the super smooth phase of baby food. I don't see the need to buy one of those made for baby blenders. An ordinary blender works great plus it seems to hold a lot more if you cook in large batches like I did.

I have this one by Cuisinart. I was lucky to find a refurbished one for $29 from Big Lots on Black Friday!

• A Food Mill

I have been using my food mill a lot now that my baby is older and needing chunkier food. The only downside to a food mill is they seem to be made small so you can only mill one serving at a time. They still work great though and very easy to put together and mill up some food real quick. They are also really cheap and easy for travel because they're so small.

I use this one from Target. I have an older version of it.

Here is how I do butternut squash. They had the cutest baby butternut squashes at my local supermarket on sale this week so I grabbed a couple to cook up for Jada. She loves her squash.

First peel the squash with a vegetable peeler. Don't worry about the very top or bottom.

Next slice the top and bottom off of the squash and slice it in half.

You will see the inside has seeds and strings. Use a spoon to scoop it clean.

Cut the squash in equal size chunks and add it to your steamer. I add the squash on the bottom and put other vegetables in the top basket since the squash takes the longest to cook.

Into the top basket I added frozen green beans, cauliflower, sweet potatoes, and carrots.

Secure with the lid and turn the timer on for 1 hour.

Once the vegetables have steamed for an hour, you will find they are very soft. I add them into the food mill and mash rinsing in between the different vegetables.

I store the vegetables in containers in the fridge. They will last about 3 days and I will go through them all in that time no problem. I also filled up her Zoli with lunch and dinner for the next day.

Hope you enjoyed! Please comment below if you have any tips or tricks on making homemade baby food! I would love to hear from you.