Make your own homemade, healthy baby food for pennies!

Hi there! Here's this week's thrifty, healthy food tip...

Baby food is expensive, and the organic, no preservatives added sort is even MORE expensive! Why buy little jars of food for upwards of $10 per pound... and that's for the cheap stuff... when you can feed your baby the very same foods the rest of the family is eating for a tiny fraction of that!?

It's easy. All you need is dinner, some liquid to add for the correct consistency (broth, juice, breast milk, water, etc) and a blender or food processor! Those little mini blender containers you can get, like these pictured, are pretty handy, but you can also just use the regular blender jar, a mini, "bullet" type blender, stick blender, or food processor.

 Make sure that your blending container is clean before you start. You may want to run boiling water through it, just to be on the safe side.

All meats should be fully cooked, so if the steaks are rare, give baby's portions some extra time on the grill (or even in the microwave, if you must). You can put all the dishes in together, or, better still, to introduce your baby early on to varied tastes, blend them separately.

Blend the food to the consistency appropriate for your baby's stage of development, and, presto chango, baby food for pennies, and you have complete control over what goes into it!

This works for cereals and grains, meats, veggies, fruits, casseroles, quiche.. Pretty much anything! (I don't recommend salad! LOL)

I always made extra and froze it in ice cube trays to use later, when I didn't want to cook, but wanted the kids to have a healthy, home cooked meal. You can make different sized "cubes", depending on how much your baby tends to eat at one sitting. 20-30 seconds will heat up a full "cube" from a standard ice tray. Less than that if you're just thawing (like for fruits).