Katie Ferraro (1s):

So you're making your baby-led weaning foods like you showed they're soft little on the longer side, but then they turn out really slippery. Well, you can roll some of those slippery slices of food in ingredients that not only attraction, but also iron. And here are five ingredient hacks that can make it happen. Hey, there I'm Katie Ferraro, registered dietician, college nutrition professor, and mom of seven specializing in baby-led weaning here on the baby-led weaning made easy podcast. I help you strip out all of the noise and nonsense about feeding, feeding you with the competence and knowledge you need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby-led weaning.

Katie Ferraro (41s):

Well, Hey there, welcome back. Today, we're talking about slippery foods and how you can make slippery foods easier for your baby to pick up, but then also add some iron. So I've got five ingredient hacks for you today for making this a lot simpler for your baby to pick up, especially early on in baby-led weaning before they have that pincer grasp, it can be challenging for babies to get some of those bigger pieces of food. We can make their life a little bit easier and add some iron with these five ingredient ideas. Now I love this topic and whenever I share about making the slippery foods easier to pick up, people are always like, oh wow, that's a great idea. But do you have to do that for like every slippery food? And the answer is no part of learning how to eat involves a little bit of frustration, right?

Katie Ferraro (1m 24s):

Learning any new tasks can be frustrating. And sometimes we see our babies struggling and we want to dive in and do everything we can to help make that experience easier. You certainly could make the experience easier by rolling some of the slippery foods in some of these ingredients, if you wanted to, but please know that you don't have to, your baby will eventually have to learn how to pick up slippery foods on their own. This is kind of helpful, especially early on when you're doing foods, like let's say baked apples. So raw apples are certainly a choking hazard for baby and we don't serve those, but I like to peel and core and then poach apples in a little bit of water and add some cinnamon or some nutmeg, but they get really slippery. So food like an, a cooked apple slice or avocado slices, or even if you're doing Spears of banana, they can sometimes be really tricky to pick up.

Katie Ferraro (2m 11s):

These are ideas of foods that you might want to try rolling in a higher iron food. Now why a higher iron food? Well, a lot of the fruits and vegetables that we start out with, those are great. They are good for nutrition and texture and taste experiences. But please remember that fruits and vegetables do not contain iron. And we want to be introducing iron along with all of the foods that our baby is trying starting at around the six month mark, because it's at about six months of age when the iron stores that baby got from the tail end of pregnancy from mom, those start to dissipate. So we want to make sure that the weaning foods that we're offering do contain iron because eventually we'll be weaning baby off of breast milk or formula, which is where they've been getting all of their iron from up until six months.

Katie Ferraro (2m 51s):

The next six months is kind of a practice period. So get in the habit of offering high iron foods. So here's the five ingredients that I like to roll. Some of those slippery foods in the one is wheat germ. Now there's some of these items that you might be like, oh, I don't even have wheat germ. You might have it. If you bake, you might've bought it for some random recipe. If you've got it on hand, check out the label. Wheat germ is a pretty nutritious component of foods. It's the inside of the wheat kernel. So it's where a lot of where the fat is. It's where a lot of the minerals are. It's also where the iron is, which is a mineral. So we're generally looking for, when I say iron food, about one milligram of iron per serving wheat germ, depending upon what brand you're buying one or two tablespoons is a serving.

Katie Ferraro (3m 31s):

Your baby might not eat that whole serving, but it's certainly higher in iron than some other ingredient foods out there. So check out wheat germ as something that you could potentially roll the baby's food in another one is iron fortified, rice cereal powder also do this with formula powder. I've done that as well, but of course like ounce for ounce formula is way more expensive than rice cereal. So I don't think you need to go and buy rice cereal, but if you had it on hand, maybe you started with white rice cereal, which was iron fortified. You don't need to do that, but if you have it, you could certainly use it by incorporating it into other recipes or by rolling those slippery foods in some rice cereal powder or any other iron-fortified cereal powder for that matter, you could even crush up sometimes to take the bottom of the adult cereal.

Katie Ferraro (4m 13s):

If it's low in sodium with no added sugar. And it's a highlight iron-fortified cereal, just crush up the bottom of the cereal bag and roll some of the baby's food in that as well. Well, just a way not to waste the tail end of the cereal bag and use it for your baby. A third ingredient idea for rolling slippery foods in is panko. Now panko is Japanese-style breadcrumbs. Traditional breadcrumbs are commercial breadcrumbs that you might buy, or even if you make your own bread comes, they tend to be really high in sodium. Most commercial bread is quite high in sodium and too high. Hi for babies, but panko, the Japanese-style breadcrumbs. They can be whole grain. If you buy whole grain versions, you can just buy it. The white version one want as well. They tend to be fortified with iron. So you have iron in there with way less salt than you would see in regular breadcrumbs got panko as the third option.

Katie Ferraro (4m 58s):

Another one is flaxseed meal. So it's kind of random to, you might have some of it on hand. I don't like flax seeds. The actual seeds can be a little bit challenging for babies to eat. Plus they're not as nutritious as the ground up flax when you put it into a meal. So kind of more of the powder, which you can buy as a baking ingredient. The flax seeds, Neil is quite nutritious in the sense that it has some omega-3 fatty acids, but it also contains a significant amount of iron. So check out flax seed meal as another option. And then the last food that I like to use is wheat bran wheat bran is again, kind of another random ingredient that you might have in your pantry. You might not. It's just where's the wheat germ was the inside of the wheat kernel. The wheat brand is the outside.

Katie Ferraro (5m 39s):

That's where the fiber is located, but there's also some iron in there as well. Again, it kind of tends to be, it looks like a little bit like sawdust. So it's more of a powdery item, which when you roll the apple slices or the avocado slice or whatever, they're slippery food, you're saying serving it, kindness sticks to it. So it gives the baby a little bit attraction, but then you're also adding that iron. So real quick, the five ingredient hacks that I recommended today for making slippery foods easier to pick up wheat, germ formula powder, panko flaxseed meal, and wheat bran. Well, I hope you guys enjoyed that episode short and sweet go in your pantry. You probably have other foods that have one milligram of iron that you're like, Hm, I could roll some slippery foods in that almond flour is another one that comes to mind.

Katie Ferraro (6m 21s):

There's probably additional things in your pantry that would work as well. Again, we're looking for about one milligram of iron something. That's not going to be a choking hazard, something that's going to add some traction and some iron. And again, you don't have to do it. Your baby will eventually learn how to pick up slippery foods, but it's kind of a fun way to add a new food into your baby's repertoire. As you're starting solids, if you want ideas about other foods, your babies can safely eat. I have a free online workshop I teach every week called baby-led weaning for beginners. I don't teach you a bunch of other random feeding tips and tricks inside of that workshop. I also give everyone on the workshop, a copy of my hundred first foods list. Pretty sure wheat germ is on there or wheat brand one or the other. Regardless if you want to the list of a hundred first foods to help push your baby's palette, come join the baby-led weaning for beginners workshop.

Katie Ferraro (7m 6s):

You can sign up on the show notes for this episode, which I'll link to at blwpodcast.com/95. You can sign up for this week's workshop times there. Maybe I'll see you on the workshop. I do a Q and A after too. So if you like have any questions about baby-led weaning, if you've been listening to the podcast and you're like, I'm wondering about this or that, I actually make a point to answer every question on the workshop. And I would love to answer your questions. If you've got a burning baby-led weaning question that we haven't answered here on the podcast or in the workshop again, you could sign up for this week's workshop times at blwpodcast.com/95. Thanks for listening guys. Bye now.