When to Start Finger Foods? - Infant Care (up to 18 months old) Message Board

mlieteau · 04-26-2007, 12:48 PM

I have 9 month old twins, one has just cut his two bottom teeth and the other has two just below the gum line.

They are both doing well with pureed baby foods (Stage 2), cereal, etc. They also do mashed banana, avocado and egg yolk.

When do we introduce finger foods? My thinking was they had to have teeth in, right?

Which ones are good to start?

THANKS!

MissChicopea · 04-26-2007, 05:48 PM

When they start grabbing for them lol. My general rule of thumb is to make the items small enough that if they happened to be swallowed whole by accident, they would just pass rather than getting stuck.

neshee · 04-27-2007, 08:31 AM

cheerios are always a good starting point. They are healthy and small, and starchy (so if swallowed whole, they will melt quickly---and they have a hole, so they can't choke). Basically anything small, Gerber and Beechnut have similar finger foods that are designed for infants. Small bits of banana and bologna are good too. Once they get used to the softer, easier stuff you can gradually move to harder stuff that they really have to chew. Good luck, it sounds like you are on the right track!

bap104 · 04-28-2007, 03:17 PM

I am in the same boat with my 8 month old. He started finger foods/table foods a few weeks ago and I am having a hard time figuring out food to give him. Things he likes are cheese, basically string cheese ( I break it up into small pieces). Any frozen fruit , I let them thaw for a day or so to get them real soft but I still break them into tiny pieces. I have tried eggless waffles, wheat toast, those puff things from gerber, noodles, basically anything soft that I can break into pieces. Good luck.