Ideas on how to get LO to eat veggies

[hass2001]

So Sam is developing quite a food preference for anything non-veggie. Veggies used to be her favorite over fruits. Are there some good mixes out there that you use to get your LO to take more veggies?

Side note: we started yogurt yesterday (Yo baby) and she is absolutely mad for the stuff.

[TrudyCampbell]

Will she eat veggies when mixed with fruit? I'd probably mix with fruit and then slowly add less and less fruit in until she's just eating the veggie.

[hass2001]

Probably, I just don't know what to mix with what! I've heard peas and pears but I haven't actually tried it. Anything go with green beans or carrots?

[Deleted]

Trudy has a good idea. Also, I've found my kids will eat almost anything if it tastes good. That sounds obvious, but a lot of baby food is so bland and tasteless. If you add some spices and flavour like "adult food" then it's so much more palatable. The recipe tamb posted below with the meat is a good example. They just want to eat what we're eating.
Have you looked at www.wholesomebabyfood.com ?

There are some good ideas for meals there, involving lots of veggies.
I think you just need to find some good combos where it's not JUST veggies. Maybe Sam's ready for some meat and other things? like beans, chickpeas, spices.?

[TrudyCampbell]

I mix apple with lots of veggies. Some I have in my freezer right now are carrot/apple and peas/spinach/apple. I've also randomly mixed pear with things because she loves pears.

[ruby412]

The Plum pouches mix carrot with apple and green beans with pear (and greek yogurt). Good luck - I think mixing is a good idea.

[mscatra]

Do you do any non-purees? Maggie has decided she needs texture with her food, so I've been mixing her pureed veggie cubes with a small amount of tubetini pasta for lunch. The cooked tubetini is tiny so I just mix it all together and spoon it in.

eta: Carrot and tubetini is her favorite. I call it Mag-aroni and "Cheese"
etaa: The box says tubetini, but the internets don't agree on what that is. Mine is a small ring, like the smallest size Spaghetti-O.

[devotchka]

I use the website that starbound mentioned for ideas as well as just looking at how plum mixes veggies as well as other baby food companies, and I make that at home. Spinach, pear + peas is one of Max's favorite plum pouches. I used to only give him homemade purees but then my friend gave us 2 boxes of this flavor and he loves it. I've tasted it and its not bad. Keep trying to introduce bitter and non-sweet tastes in general. I had to try several times to get Max to like carrots for some reason, he didn't at first. I think it's important to get them to taste individual veggies though. They say it sometimes takes 10+ times for a baby or child to like a flavor so keep trying! Don't give up on the veggies

[eav2c]

I'd mix them with stuff. Like, applesauce or pears with whatever fruit you want. Or, whatever her "favorite" fruit is.

[charlielove]

I pretty much do any weird combo. Charlotte loves everything, but Claire was picky about veggies too. I would mix acorn squash w/ apple or pear, sweet potato w/ apple, peas and pears, etc. Also, have you tried giving her actual pieces of veggies at all? She may like that too.

[vthokie]

A's favorites are sweeter veggies. She LOVES beets, butternut squash, and sweet potato. I mix pears with a bunch of stuff. I usually just grab a few cubes of stuff and throw them together. I've also found that she doesn't like purees much anymore unless they're pouches, because she drinks them like it's a straw. She will only eat her favorites like a puree. I also mix her purees with pastina. She's a big fan. But, I've started just chopping up what we're eating into really small pieces.

[monkeybabe]

Zoe mostly likes her veggies raw (takes after her mama), so I give her green beans to snack on during the day. She seems to prefer all her veggies raw.

[devotchka]

Yeah - I also second the cutting up veggies and giving as finger food, if the baby can do the pincer grasp (or at least do the fist grasp) right now. I just steamed some carrots, going to cut them up into little finger sized cubes tomorrow and give them to max. He loves eating cheerios like this so hopefully he will be into the veggies too.

[creamsiclechica]

I like the mixing, and/or giving in pieces she can eat. I tried sweeter veggies like acorn squash or sweet potatoes baked and cut into pieces first, and she loved that. But I mix a lot too. I mix apples and pears like above, but I've mixed prunes and apricots with veggies too, because they're pretty heavy sweet, and the veggies cut down the sweet factor, but still make it palatable to her.