Atwood-Family of FIVE: Making Baby's Food-Cereal

When I first thought about making my baby's food, I thought for sure I could make everything except cereal. That would be too hard-after all commercial baby cereal is in flake form and is instant cereal when mixed with a liquid. I couldn't copy that at home. It is true that I can't duplicate that product, but you can indeed make your child's cereal and it isn't hard at all. There are a few tips/rules to follow though:

-Usually baby's first food is rice cereal; with homemade baby cereal, typically you use brown rice. Brown rice is too hard for baby to digest before 6 months so most babies who eat homemade baby food start with a mild fruit or veggie like bananas or sweet potatoes.

-You can, however, give your baby home made oatmeal and/or barley cereal before 6 months. I, personally would still recommend waiting til closer to 6 months though because you are probably using whole, unrefined grains.

-To make baby cereal, you simply take the uncooked grain and process it in your food processor until it forms a powder. The easiest grain is oatmeal. Within 30 seconds it is powder form. Barely and rice, because they are so tough, take longer. In the past, it has taken me up to 10 minutes of processing before my rice is powder form.

-Rice and barley are very loud when you process them! So loud you can't hear conversation. I recommend putting your grain in the processor and moving it to another room altogether while you are grinding it.

-Once it is ground, there are various measurements to cook and prepare it. In general it is 1 part cereal to 3-4 parts water. It is cooked for about 10 minutes. Cooking about 1/4 cup of raw, powdered (processed) cereal in one cup of water yields enough cooked cereal for 3-4 days, depending on your eater.

-Finally, it's best to cook up only enough cereal to feed your baby over 3-4 days because cooked cereal doesn't freeze well. Serve up your baby some cereal then store the rest (uneaten) in the fridge til the next meal time.