Complementary food
After 4 months of life, breastfeeding alone does not meet the needs of the baby’s growth and development, so parents need to add foods other than dairy products to the baby, and these gradually added foods are called complementary foods. The most commonly added foods are cereals, egg yolk, orange juice, fruit puree, meat puree and vegetable puree.
When to start adding complementary foods?
Breast milk is the best nutrition for babies, it can completely meet the growth and development needs of babies until 4 months old. Usually, when babies are 1-3 months old, they only need to drink a small amount of vegetable water and juice to supplement certain vitamins without any complementary food, in fact, many babies are unable to adapt to adding complementary food too early. Some mothers are worried about the lack of breast milk affecting the baby’s development, hoping to give the baby more nutrition, prematurely add supplementary food to the baby, which often backfires and is not good for the baby’s health. The premature consumption of complementary foods such as rice flour can lead to insufficient protein intake and affect physical growth and brain development. Some mothers feel that they have enough breast milk to feed their babies, and delay adding complementary foods. In fact, after 4 months of age, the amount of iron in breast milk is getting less and less and needs to be supplemented from complementary foods. Some parents feel that adding complementary foods is too much trouble, especially when the baby is just starting to learn to make a mess, parents simply put rice flour, milk paste into bottles for the baby to drink, or simply postpone adding complementary foods. Learning to eat complementary foods is a new experiment for babies, not only to get more nutrition, stimulate dental and oral development, training chewing and swallowing functions, but also the starting point for babies to move up a new growth ladder. Generally from 4-6 months onwards you can add complementary foods to your baby. Mixed-fed or artificially fed babies can add complementary foods after 4 months, while exclusively breastfed babies are later, but the growth and development of each baby is different, and individual differences, so the time to add complementary foods can not be generalized.
Parents can judge whether to start adding complementary foods by the following points.
Weight: The weight needs to reach twice the weight at birth, at least 6 kg.
Not enough to eat: for example, the baby was able to sleep until dawn overnight, but now he often cries in the middle of the night or sleeps for shorter and shorter periods of time; the number of breastfeeding increases to 8-10 times a day or feeding formula 1000 ml, but the baby is still in a hungry state, crying and wanting to eat after a while. The best time to start adding complementary foods is when your baby has an accelerated growth period around 6 months.
Development: The baby can control the head and upper body, can sit holding or leaning, the chest can hold up, the head can stand up, the baby can show that he wants to eat or not by turning his head, leaning forward, leaning back, etc., so that force-feeding will not happen.
Behavior: If others are eating next to the baby, the baby will be interested and may come to grab the spoon and chopsticks. If the baby puts his or her hand or toy in the mouth, this indicates that the baby is interested in eating.
Tongue-sticking reflex: Many parents find that when they first feed their baby complementary food, the baby often spits out what they have just fed into their mouth, thinking that the baby does not like to eat. In fact, the baby’s tongue out is an instinctive self-protection, called the “tongue out reflex”, indicating that feeding complementary foods is not yet time. The tongue out reflex usually disappears around 4 months of age. If you insist on feeding before it disappears, you will not only frustrate the parents, but also make your baby feel unhappy, which is not conducive to the development of good eating habits.
Eating: If when parents scoop up food and put it in the baby’s mouth, the baby will try to lick it into the mouth and swallow it, and the baby smiles and looks happy and delicious, it means that the baby is interested in eating. If the baby spits out the food, turns his head away or pushes away the parent’s hand, it means that the baby does not want to eat and does not want to eat. Parents must not force it and try again every few days.
What are the types of complementary foods?
1, according to the production process classification.
According to the production process, complementary foods can be divided into homemade complementary foods and commercial complementary foods.
Homemade complementary food: usually refers to the use of home-provided rice, vegetables, fruits or other highly nutritious food as raw materials, the use of family practice, grinding, cooking, their own modulation of soup, porridge, puree for infants to eat, digestible and absorbable, to provide infants with the required nutrition of supplementary baby food.
Commercial complementary food: refers to the modern advanced technology and equipment, scientific collocation, batch research and development, production, and special addition of a variety of scarce nutrients required for the healthy development and growth of babies, sold in major supermarkets, baby stores and other auxiliary nutritional food for infants.
Classification of complementary foods by traits.
According to different traits, complementary foods can be divided into three categories: liquid foods, pureed foods and solid foods.
Liquid food: mainly refers to juice, vegetable water and other drinkable food.
Pureed food: can be divided into two categories: one is industrialized pureed food, including rice flour and bottled pureed food; the second is home-made pureed food.
Solid foods: foods that are more molded than pureed foods, but more delicate and soft than adult solid foods. Depending on the source, baby foods are divided into two categories: foods of plant origin and foods of animal origin. Plant-derived foods include cereals, such as rice and noodles, vegetables and fruits; animal-derived foods include meat, poultry and milk, eggs, etc.
The 8 principles of complementary food additions Go Top
1.From one to many
Do not add several kinds of complementary foods to your baby at one time, it is easy to cause adverse reactions. Start adding only the same, if the baby does not have adverse reactions within 3-5 days, normal bowel movements, you can let your baby try another kind.
2.From liquid to solid
Add complementary foods in the order of liquid food – semi-liquid food – solid food. If you add solid or semi-solid food to your baby at the beginning, your baby’s stomach and intestines will not be able to afford it and it will be difficult to digest, which will lead to diarrhea.
3, the amount from less to more
You can feed your baby only one or two spoons at the beginning, then to four or five spoons, then to a small half bowl. At the beginning of the complementary food, feed once a day, if the baby does not appear to resist the reaction, can slowly increase the number of times.
4, should not eat liquid food for a long time
If you give your baby fluid or pureed food for a long time, it will make your baby miss the critical period of chewing ability development. Chewing sensitive period generally occurs around 6 months, from this time onwards should provide opportunities for babies to learn to chew.
5, supplemental food can not replace milk
Some mothers think that since their babies can already eat complementary foods, it is wrong to start reducing their babies’ intake of breast milk or other dairy products from the age of 6 months. At this time the baby should still be breast milk or milk as the main food, complementary food can only be used as a supplementary food, otherwise it will affect his healthy growth.
6.Stop when you encounter discomfort
When adding complementary foods to the baby, if the baby has allergies, diarrhea or stool with more mucus and other conditions, to immediately stop feeding complementary foods to the baby, to be restored to normal and then start (allergic food can not be added).
7, do not additive
Add as little or no salt and sugar to complementary foods as possible, so as not to develop the baby’s bad habits of salt or sugar addiction. It is not advisable to add MSG and artificial colors to avoid increasing the burden on the baby’s kidneys and damaging kidney function.
8, maintain a pleasant eating atmosphere
Choose to feed your baby when he or she is in a happy and awake mood, when your baby says he or she does not want to eat, do not take forced means. Adding complementary foods to your baby is not only to supplement nutrition, but also to cultivate healthy eating habits and manners, and to promote the normal development of your baby’s sense of taste, if your baby is psychologically frustrated when receiving complementary foods, it will bring him many negative effects.
Tips to make your baby love complementary food
1.Demonstrate how to chew food
Some babies are not used to chewing and will use their tongues to push food out, so parents should show their babies how to chew food and swallow it at this time. You can slow down and try a few more times to give him more opportunities to learn.
2, do not feed too much or too fast
Feed your baby according to the amount of food he/she eats, not too fast, and let your child rest after feeding, don’t have strenuous activities, and don’t feed immediately.
3.Taste a variety of new flavors
A varied diet can stimulate your baby’s appetite. Add new ingredients to your baby’s original favorite foods, and increase the portion size and variety from small to large. Gradually increase the variety of complementary foods, so that babies do not picky eating habits. If your baby hates a certain food, parents should change the way they cook it. When your child is teething and likes to bite chewy food, you may want to change the fruit puree to fruit slices at this time. Food should also pay attention to color matching to stimulate the baby’s appetite, but the taste should not be too strong.
4, pay attention to the baby’s independent heart
After half a year old, babies gradually have an independent mind, will want to eat on their own, parents can encourage their children to eat with their own spoons, can also cook easy to hold the food to meet the child’s desire, so that he feels that eating is a “sense of accomplishment”, appetite will also be more vigorous.
5, 10 minutes before the meal first preview
If a child who is playing is suddenly