Homemade Babyfood Tutorial, Part Three

Once your baby is used to the new tastes of foods, he or she may be ready for more texture and thickness. At this point, try making foods in different ways - baking, sauteing, etc. Here I cubed a couple of sweet potatoes then baked them on a cookie sheet until they were able to be fork-mashed.

Once the food is slightly cooled, use a pastry blender or a mix 'n chop to mash. Then freeze the food as you did the purees.

For some reason my mashed foods were harder to remove from the ice cube trays. In this case, I would grab a 9x13 baking dish and fill it about an inch full with warm tap water. Set the trays in the water to loosen the cubes.

Here are a few suggestions on foods that are easy to mash:

• avocado - no need to cook first...avocado turns brown very quickly in the freezer. If this bothers you, just mash a bit as you go instead of making it ahead of time.
• banana - same as the avocado - mash as you go
• sweet potato
• butternut squash
• acorn squash
• pumpkin
• fingerling or new potatoes