HOW TO FEED BABY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 December 1938, Page 10

HOW TO FEED BABY

FROM 12 MONTHS TO 15 MONTHS. By the time baby is 15 months old he is able to eat heartily and take a good proportion of solid food, and his humanised milk may be discontinued altogether. Gradually the Karilac and Kariol is lessened, according to the instructions of the Plunket nurse. Karil, the emulsion for older children, may be given as an adjunct to the diet if thought necessary. The quantity of milk to drink is decreased from 240 z to 20oz, diluted with soz of boiled water. Solid, Tough, Dry, or Hard Bread. — Crusts and oven-dried bread or crisp toasted bread and stale bread can be given with a little butter or dripping. Don’t butter toast when hot. Use white bread at first, gradually introducing wholemeal. Cereal jellies should be continued. Gradually mix in some unstrained porridge with the strained jelly. As time goes on less and less, needs to be strained, till at 18 months all is unstrained. Broths. —Fish broth, chicken broth, bone or mutton broth, made with pearl barley or rice and sliced vegetables. Vegetables. • — Spinach, cauliflower, carrot, turnip, marrow, and floury potato (cooked in its skin), rubbed through h fine sieve and served warm with a little butter or meat gravy without fat. Puddings.—Pulp of baked apple or - stewed prunes, introducing fresh apricot and peach pulp. Milk jelly, junket, orange or lemon jelly, wellcooked ground rice and semolina. As soon as the baby has four or more teeth he should be taught to chew, and raw ripe apple should be given under careful supervision. He may be taught by having a little scraped on his teeth or grated fine and fed with a spoon. Continue giving the juice of some raw fruit or vegetable daily. Eggs.—During this period introduce coddled egg. Half a yolk may be given two or three times a week at the mid-day meal, a little white being added gradually. Get the baby accustomed to a dry evening meal —that is, a meal without any mushy food. The child’s capacity to chew naturally will guide the mother in this matter. If baby is educated to chew hard foods, such as crusts and oven-dried bread, from the ninth month onwards, at this period he should be able to take a large proportion of his food in the hard, dry form. “Pap feeding” is unnatural for the child who has teeth. Suggested Menu For a Day. Early morning drink—6oz to Boz of scalded and diluted milk. Breakfast (8 to 8.30 a.m.). —Twicebaked bread or crisp toast and butter, two or three fingers; porridge (oatmeal or wheatmeal, partly strained), six to eight tablespoonfuls, with 2oz of scalded top milk over it; drink of milk mixture; piece of raw, ripe apple. Dinner (12 to 12.30 p.m.).—Twicebaked bread, one to two fingers; sieved vegetables, three to four tablespoonfuls (spinach, cauliflower, carrot, silver beet, potato, etc., as convenient or in season); butter, half a teaspoonful; spoonfuls, with one to two tablespoonfuls of top milk; drink of milk mixture if junket not given; piece of raw, ripe apple. Tea (5 p.m.).—Baked crusts, with butter, honey, or marmite, two to three fingers; milk "jelly or oat or wheatmeal jelly. Note. —The early morning drink may be discontinued as soon as the child takes sufficient milk with the three main meals. A drink of water or fruit or vegetable juice may be substituted, breakfast being made the first meal of the day.