Why we chose to do Baby-Led Weaning
Before our friends started having kids, the only “baby food” I knew of was pureès. Sure they had upgraded from cups to pouches, but it was blended food for babies nonetheless. As more of our friends started having kids I began to hear about “baby-led weaning” (BLW) which is maybe a misleading term but essentially means letting your baby lead the way in feeding themselves – with whole foods, no purees at all.
Some people are very strict about baby-led weaning – there can be no pureès “or the baby will be confused about when/how to chew” (which makes no sense to me) and some people can’t bear to try it – the “gagging vs choking videos” out there to prepare you can be a bit terrifying to watch….so we chose to go for the middle ground, or “combination baby-led weaning.”
So what does that mean?
Essentially, we try and give her whole foods (softened and cooked) as much as possible but we aren’t above a pureè when traveling or even when she needs some extra veggies. I bought a lot of pureès initially so we would have backups in case we chickened-out, but we started slow and Galia never had gagging issues so we avoided that panic. Some of the first foods we tried were slices of avocado, cooked sweet potato, and banana. These are all foods that mush easily between your fingers and babies can bite and mash with their gums. Once we got comfortable with those, we added scrambled eggs, cooked zucchini, and all of the main allergens, and really after that, everything took off.
I logged the first 100 foods Galia ate within the first 2 months of eating – and that includes deconstructed pork tacos, bites of my osso bucco, shredded chicken, shrimp, crab, several types of fish, 5 different types of melon (including her first food which was a Galia Melon), and 5 different types of squash!
Why?
We chose to try baby-led weaning because we didn’t want to worry about bringing pureès with us everywhere we go. We wanted her to be able to just eat what we are eating (within reason) and hopefully develop her own love for a variety of foods. So far, it’s working. If we are at a restaurant, we always feed her a little bit (or a lot) of whatever we have. It’s fun to watch Galia explore and react to all the new textures and flavors. Between bites, she is usually cheering with both hands in the air.
Our Approach
While some parents do long strips of food so the baby can pick them up, we tend to do shredded or small bites because Galia has the tendency to shove everything in her mouth at once. It can get a bit messy when you let babies do everything themselves and you may find that they aren’t even eating very much. In this sense we also have found a middle ground. We will feed her with the spoon but we also let her take the spoon from us and feed herself. Similarly, we will put pieces of food on her tray but then keep some back to feed her when she looks like she is just playing with her food. It varies day to day what Galia is willing or wants to do!
From a safety perspective you want to make sure you are never giving babies anything round (or rounded) that could get stuck and you always want to cut food into strips or pieces. I definitely recommend watching some BLW videos before starting your own journey, just so you have an idea of what it could look like or what gagging vs choking is. There are also several FB groups you can join that give ideas for meals or can answer various questions. I would definitely recommend a combination FB page over a strict baby-led weaning page.
We are less than two months away from Galia having her first cake….for her first birthday, and I am pretty sure our little eater is going to be ALL over that!
Xx
Kali
