Browne Jennifer Shay - Baby nosh: plant-based, gluten-free goodness for babys food sensitivities

For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Good Books, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or . Good Books is an imprint of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., a Delaware corporation. Visit our website at www.goodbooks.com. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file. Cover design by Laura Klynstra Cover photo by Wild Honey Art House Print ISBN: 978-1-68099-121-5 Ebook ISBN: 978-1-68099-132-1 Printed in China Acknowledgments Many amazing thanks to Abigail Gehring from Skyhorse Publishing for letting us write about a topic we bothered her a lot about. (Just for the record, were not sorry.) Also thanks to all of our pint-size models (and their very trusting parents): Ariya, Avery, Dominic, Grace, Kellan, Mila, Otis, and Xsenia.

Sometimes you all cooperated, and sometimes you did not. It was the times you didnt that were the most fun. (Ariyawere talking about you .) Lastly, a general thanks to strong coffee (even when its decaf, we swear it makes life better) and yummy wine, the official beverages of parents everywhere . Dedication For all those amazing moms, dads, and caregivers out there who search for ways to make childhood happy, healthy, and full of unconditional, do-anything-in-the-whole-wide-world-for-you love. For our babies, who will always be babies, even when theyre forty. For all the great daddies of the world.

Also for chia seeds. Honestly, we dont know what wed do without you. Table of Contents Foreword L ets face it: parenting has gotten a lot harder. The rise in childhood diseasesincluding severe food allergies and food sensitivitiesis just one part of what makes our jobs more difficult now than when our grandmothers were raising children. This is not the fault of parents. Our world is simply more complex and polluted than ever before.

Out of the thousands of chemicals that have made their way into our daily lives, fewer than 200 have been tested for basic human health and safety. So, while your great-grandmother didnt likely have a degree in chemistry, she didnt need it to decipher a food label, navigate a sensitive childs food allergies, or feel empowered to make a truly healthy meal for her family. In an attempt for simplicity, many parents reach for store-bought solutions. Baby food is a perfect example. What Baby Nosh does so well is show parents that there is another way. Every mother already knows that its not simple to stand in the aisle of the grocery store trying to decipher food labels and price tags and determine what food is the least likely to harm your child, deplete your pocket book, and not end up in the compost heap (or on the floor).

The recipes and information in this book make it easy for any parent to give making their own baby food a try. It only takes testing one simple recipe to see that its a lot faster to make up some Whipped Avocado or make a Mango Teether than it is to drive to the grocery store to buy a more expensive and less healthy alternative. Once you start, you wont want to stop. Soon, you will be turning regularly to the recipes for natural remedies, where you will help calm upset bellies with Soothing Lavender Water or support your own body with Mamas Lactation Cookies. Even if you do everything right as a parent, things dont always go the way we expect. I ate organic, avoided grains, sugar, and processed foods, and still my children have food sensitivities.

What we can do, however, is give our children the best chance to heal and thrive given the world we live in and who they are. Healthy eating is the foundation of this best chance, and thats the ultimate power in this book: the reminder that you as the parent are smart enough to make these decisions for your child. To help you get started, Baby Nosh gives you the tools you need: from information on the most important foods to buy organic, the most common allergens, and lots of recipes to make healthy, delicious options. After reading this book, all thats needed is a dash of your own creative energy. Manda Aufochs Gillespie, author of Green Mama: Giving Your Child a Healthy Start and a Greener Future Jens Introduction I f youve ever dealt with a baby with food sensitivities (and Im guessing you have since you picked up this book), you know that having to play the guessing game as to which foods might be the offenders is exhausting. A miserable baby equals miserable parents equals a miserable home.

Between the two of us, Tanya and I have seven children and over a dozen years experience dealing with food sensitivities. Weve battled everything from gluten to dairy to meats to artificial colors to sugar to preservatives. The idea for this book was born while we were shooting images for The Good Living Guide to Medicinal Tea . Tanyas sweet little boy Otis, then nine months or so, was hungry and needed to be fed. (Just for the record, Tanya also has a dog named Milo, and I strongly feel that everyone who reads this book should be privy to that information.) I offered to take over this task so Tanya could take photographs of flowers and herbs, and she agreed, handing me some sort of homemade concoction. (At her physicians suggestion, Tanya had recently tried reintroducing gluten to little Otiss diet, the consequence being an hour and a half of sleep within a thirty-six hour period.) Never one to skip eating something that looks interesting, I tasted it and was surprisedand not in the way that made me want to spit it into the sink. (At her physicians suggestion, Tanya had recently tried reintroducing gluten to little Otiss diet, the consequence being an hour and a half of sleep within a thirty-six hour period.) Never one to skip eating something that looks interesting, I tasted it and was surprisedand not in the way that made me want to spit it into the sink.

Good surprised. Like, I would have eaten it for breakfast myself! Everyone whos ever fed a child jarred baby food with the image of the smiling tot on the label knows that kid cant really be eating the food, because lets face it: most pre-packaged baby food is pretty gross. But this food was different... it was food . Turns out, it was a homemade mixture of oats, beets, raspberries, hemp hearts, and chia seeds. And Otis was loving it.

So why do we bother buying all that store-bought crap? Its essentially dead food, anyway. Its been boiled, strained, sealed, and shelved for months before your precious little person begrudgingly chokes it down. Theres no nutritional value left at this point. What are we thinking? Would we want to eat it? Nope.