INFANT DIET

It is better to exclusively breast feed babies till the age of 6 months, when not possible, may follow the following diet after 4 months
(recommended by my Peadiatrician; please check with your Peadiatrician)

I recommend using Pigeon Home Baby Food Maker, when weaning babies. It is made of Polypropylene, microwave safe and you can easily sterilise before each use. It comes with different attachments to 1. grate, 2.grind, 3.squeeze and 4. strain baby food.




4th Month
Mid morning :
Fruit juice ~ideally Sweet Lime (Mosambi) (Sathukudi) (Bathayi)
start with giving 1:3 ratio juice and water for 2 days, 2:2 ratio juice and water next two days and gradually reduce the water content as baby gets accustomed to the taste.

* Tip - I use the strainer under the squeezer to get rid of the rind
* add only boiled and cooled drinking water to the juice
* do NOT add sugar to the juice
* utmost care should be taken while preparing the juice ~else baby may get diarrhoea

Mid afternoon:
Mashed fruit puree ~ Apples / Pears /Hill banana
may give 1/2 apple, 1/2 pear or 1 small hill banana at this age

For Apple/ Pear, remove the skin, core, deseed and cut into small pieces. pressure cook the fruit till it becomes very soft. you can mash the pressure cooked fruit. The texture should look like a fine puree.

* Hill banana is different from regular banana. It is said that this can resist cold.

*do NOT mix the fruits
* start with one fruit and give it atleast for a week before starting another.
* notify your doctor if baby develops any allergy

continue BF / formula per baby's demand


5th Month

Morning:
Raagi porridge: To make 3 ounces of ragi porridge, take 30 gms of ragi powder in 2 ounces of water. Mix the powder in water . There should be no lumps. Heat the contents on the stove stirring continuously till a glutinous paste is formed. Also the color gradually changes to dark brown as shown below.



Add an ounce of BM/Formula to this paste. you can feed this to baby with spoon.
* do NOT add sugar to the porridge

To make ragi powder:
soak ragi until it sprouts. Dry the sprouts in sun / dry roast on stove or microwave. grind the dried sprouts into fine powder and store in a clean air tight container.

Mid morning: continue juice
Mid afternoon: continue fruit
continue BF / formula per baby's demand


6th Month
Morning: continue ragi porridge
Mid morning: continue juice
Afternoon: Khichdi
To make khichdi, take 4tbsp of rice, 2 tbsp of moong dal, 2 tbsp of carrot pieces, 2tbsp of cut beans, 2tbsp of cut potato, a few green pea pods in a bowl. Add 3 times the volume water. pressure cook for 5 whistles. Khichdi will become very soft. Grind this khichdi to make fine paste and feed the baby.

* Start with around 2 ounces
*do NOT add salt. Babies under 12 months need only less than 1gm of sodium/day. Their kidneys are fragile and cannot process high sodium content; baby's taste palate is not developed yet, so what we think as not tasty may be very good for them!

continue BF / formula per baby's demand

7th Month
Morning: continue ragi porridge
Mid morning: continue juice
Afternoon: continue Khichdi
Mid afternoon: continue fruit
late evening : Stage 1 Cerelac wheat

continue BF / formula per baby's demand