Superfoods: For Babies and Children

Great Book for Info & Recipes
This book is full of beautiful full page pictures, simply laid out recipes (full of nutrients and colorful food) and the whole beginning includes information about various vitamins & minerals (and how they effect your body), as well as a simple guideline on when to include milk, protein, and fish into a babies diet. I really like the menu suggestions and meal planners. They are nice GUIDES to go by (by no means substitute the guide for your pediatricians recommendations).

A lot of the other negative reviews seem to misunderstand that this was not written by an American author and that is should not be used to replace a pediatricians recommendation. British mothers (and their doctors) feed red meat, fish, diary (and other US allergy-scare foods) to babies at a much younger age. You have to keep this in mind when you read the recipes. If you feel you don't want to feed pureed braised beef to a baby just past 6 month old, then... don't. That doesn't make the recipe less tasty or less worth knowing when you finally do think your baby is old enough. Don't like that she uses cow's milk in a few recipes for babies before 1 year? Then substitute! I rarely prepare a recipe from a cookbook for adults without altering something to my needs or tastes. She also plainly states in the beginning that a baby between 1 & 5 should be consuming about 20 oz of milk/dairy daily to get the recommended calcium, vitamin & minerals. That's like a small glass of milk, a serving of yogurt, and a piece of cheese. She is not insisting that you force feed a 6 month old a bottle of cow's milk. Lets not go crazy people.

What I really don't understand about all the allergy talk in the negative comments, is that she covers allergies in the back of the book. I wish people wouldn't read 3 pages and then comment about a book's worth. At least finish the whole book before posting negative comments. She even goes into soy-based non-dairy product replacements and vegetarian diets. She also talks about slowing entering food into your babies diet and what to look for if there is a food allergy present.

What I like best about the book is that all the recipes are similar to what my husband and I eat already. We don't eat fast food, and the only "chicken nugget" that enters the house is home-made by me and includes white chicken meat, panko bread crumbs, flour, and is fried in organic vegetable oil. No frozen fast food here. If we eat fries they are red skin potatoes tossed in olive oil and baked. I was so excited to see these kinds of recipes (including fruit smoothies, ice pops, and even a cute shepherd's pie recipe - so British!).

Since I already make meals in advance and freeze them, can my own vegetables, and make home-made mixes ahead of time, I can easily see these recipes making it into my weekly routine. I don't see myself "running to the grocery store every day for more ingredients" for food for my baby/toddler. If you already shop for fresh food, you won't need to make any special trips.

I don't plan on feeding my children convenience foods because, well frankly, I don't like them. I don't like feeling sick and greasy after eating them, so I don't plan on having them available to my children at a young age. This book helps to reinforce those thoughts and ideas. Now I KNOW I can create awesome meals for them because I have a nice cookbook and guide to refer to.

Great mommy help!
This book is great! I wanted to make my son's baby food instead of buying it at the store and this book helped me out so much in the actual selection of the food and how to make it. I use it all the time.

Only for Super-Moms
I bought 3 of Annabel's books before my son was born, because I was going to be a "super-mommy" who NEVER fed my child canned or jarred baby foods, and he was only going to eat fresh foods so he could be sooooo very healthy. Anyway, flash forward 18 months, and I have finally started to make some of her recipes. This is so ridiculous! First of all, if you're a working mother - forget about it. I'm fortunate enough to stay home with my son, and have been since he was born, and I still don't have the time needed to mess with this. You are essentially preparing 2 meals if you want to eat anything yourself. The food is tasteful enough for a toddler, but much too bland for adults. The recipes are also incomplete at times. For example, there is a chicken and corn fritter recipe that lists 1 large onion peeled, and then you are to sautee it in olive oil. That's it. It doesn't instruct you to dice, slice, or quarter the onion, and then there's no instruction as to what to do with it! These recipes call for a lot of fresh ingredients, which I'm a fan of, but seriously, I don't want to run to the store every couple of days with my son in tow - so you have to make a lot of things ahead of time and freeze it. This would be fine if I had the time to do it. My son is at the age where he doesn't stay entertained on his own for very long, so I have to play a lot. I don't have time to cook. Finally, there is a section for "picky eaters" which is exactly what my son is. It is his absolute refusal to eat anything but grapes, chicken nuggets, french fries and rice that has led me to try these recipes - finally - and he took one bite of one of the recipes and immediately spit it out and threw it on the floor. All that time and effort immediately wasted!! Maybe my son is one in a million who will refuse these foods, but I don't think so. To sum up, these books just are not worth it.

Love This Book
I am a first time mom and began feeding my baby girl rice cereal when she was about 2 1/2 months old. After she was good with cereal, I began to move on to other solid 'store bought' baby food (applesauce, peas, etc) but, I never really liked the idea of not knowing exactly how a jar of baby food could last on the shelf for several years. I had toyed with the idea of making my baby food at home but thought I lacked the time and tools to do so. Boy was I wrong.

I have been using this book for about 2 months now. I am in love with the recipes, ideas, and nutrition information provided within it's pages. This book provides great ideas on how to get started with making your own baby food, and the recipes are easy to follow with simple ingredients. The author gives you a list of suggested kitchen tools you may need or will find helpful while preparing the food (some basics are a baby food mill or electric food mixer, a few pots and pans, serving bowls, and baby spoons) I find it easiest with a food processor as I double or sometimes even triple the recipes and freeze the extra servings. This makes it less time consuming as I do all of the baby food cooking on one day for an entire month or two. The colorful pages and illustrations give you a good idea on how things should turn out. I love cookbooks with color pictures as it lets you know if you are cooking the meals properly. I have worked my way through the 6-9 month section, and I am now working on the 9-12 month section. I also enjoy knowing exactly what my little one is getting in each meal (i.e. no preservatives or other additives to 'maintain color' or 'keep freshness').

So far, my little girl has no complaints. She has eaten every meal I have cooked out of this book, and she eats them heartily.

Note: this author is from England and some of her explanations, ingredients, tools, etc are in British lingo. If you don't know what she is talking about, just do a quick search on the internet to find out what she is talking about. You will find that you know exactly what the item is; they just have a different word for it in England.

I would highly recommend this book to any new and/or seasoned baby food maker.

disappointed and confused
The book has lots of recipies that aren't very practical to me. I also found some inconcisistencies with her reccomendations for not giving infants certain foods like wheat - and then having a recipie for an infant that included pasta (ie, wheat).

After just looking through the book, I don't plan to use it at all.