Baby’s flavour journey begins in the womb surrounded by your amniotic fluid. Breastfeed if possible to continue the flavour journey through your breast milk.
Flavor training starts before baby needs solids for nutrition. A ‘taste’, 1/2 teaspoon, is all that is required, after a milk feed.
Offer single vegetables where possible, especially in the first few months of flavor training. Avoid hiding ‘unliked’ foods in ‘liked’ foods.
If baby doesn’t like it the first time offer again and again. It can take up to 10 times before acceptance. Don’t be put off by funny faces baby is just getting used to something new. Continue to offer again and again, throughout infancy, toddlerhood and the preschool years
Be a positive role model at all ages and stages, show baby just how delicious those veggies are. Avoid allowing your own likes or dislikes, wants and expectations get in the way.
Disclaimer: The information provided is the opinion of Good Feeding, it has not been evaluated by healthcare professionals, and is for educational purposes only. Before starting any new foods or feeding practices, please consult your baby's healthcare professional.
People around the globe are facing uncertainty to a degree not felt within most of our lifetimes. No one knows what the state of the world or their lives will be one year from now. From job loss to the loss of family, friends, or personal health, it’s hard not to feel stressed.
Becoming a new parent has always been a period of heightened emotions and uncertainty. During the Covid-19 crisis, parents-to-be and new parents face unique challenges, increasing feelings of uncertainty and worry.
Your parenting style is the way that you interact with baby every day. It forms an emotional climate that will shape baby’s attitudes, behaviours and beliefs. It includes all your behaviours and actions (both intentional and unintentional) and the choices you make now, will have a lasting impact.
We know the first 1000 days, from conception through to the age of two, is a time of tremendous growth and development, especially when it comes to the brain.
Your parenting style, or ‘parenting practice’ refers to your behaviors or actions - intentional or unintentional - that influence your children’s attitudes, behaviors or beliefs.
As parents, we all want to do what's best for our babies, infants, and children. So, it can be more than a little concerning with the news that our family's youngest members could be at risk from the very thing meant to nurture us all – food.
4 months of age signals the start of an exciting window of opportunity, that if taken advantage of has the ability to not only transform your parenting journey (and family mealtimes) going forward, but more importantly, your child’s health and wellness potentials for life. 4 months marks the important opportunity to start ‘Flavour Training’!
In the medical community, there's a clear consensus on when infants should begin complementary feeding: at 6 months old. But despite the AAP, ACOG, AAFP and WHO recommendations being very clear about this timeline, parents often start much earlier.
The primary reason that official guidelines push for this 6 month mark is that very early introduction of complementary foods has been shown to reduce breastfeeding's overall duration. The medical community also holds concerns that introducing solids prior to the age of 6 months could increase the risk of choking and aspiration, lead to diarrhea and poor gut health and contribute to the onset of certain chronic diseases later in life, including diabetes and celiac disease.
So why is there so much confusion over this?
Starting solids poses such a challenge because we’re not only trying to sort through all of the available information and opinions on the topic, but also fit a brand new feeding and food preparation routine into our already busy lives. And, in the hustle to get this done, we often forget the most important element of introducing our children to food: Helping them foster a healthy relationship with food for life.