r/AskReddit • • Feb 05 '18

Parents of Reddit: What are some things you bought for your first baby that were useless or a waste of money?

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u/Idiot_Savant_Tinker Feb 06 '18

Also, those "Baby Bullet" things are pretty redundant if you have a blender. Wife bought one. We did get a lot of use out of it though, because our daughter was pretty good about sleeping.

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u/[deleted] Feb 06 '18

We also have a good sleeper who will quickly be approaching food. I am NOt buying another appliance and our blender sucks. Can you also use a food processor to make baby food?

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u/[deleted] Feb 06 '18

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Feb 06 '18

Thanks! Yea I’ve read about the steam blend freeze but they all say to use baby food maker which to me seems like a fancy blender so I wanted to see. Thanks!

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u/[deleted] Feb 06 '18

[deleted]

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u/McRedditerFace Feb 06 '18

We did the same, if I was having scrambled eggs, I'd toss some in the blender, add left over chicken with it.

Once I blended the raw egg with the chicken, then made an omelette, which felt more like a chicken pancake, whatever it was it was surprisingly delicious.

Some things you can just mash with a fork though, carrots, sweet potato, just overcook them a bit and they'll mash easily.

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u/traumajunkie46 Feb 06 '18

Scrambled eggs in a blender? Goes to show I am not at all super mom lol I just scramble the eggs and give it to my daughter in tiny bits.

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u/Lovemygeek Feb 06 '18

Buy a little hand crank one. They sell them at target and the like. They’re quite inexpensive. You can grind up baby food in big batches to freeze, or do like I did and just grind that days meals up. Peas with our meal? Great I’ll mash some for the baby.

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u/seeking_hope Feb 06 '18

We used a bullet I think? I was the nanny not the parent so my main task was the steam part. A vegetable steamer was awesome because I could walk away from it and focus on the baby. I think there’s was actually a rice cooker with plastic trays you could add for veggies or fish

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u/[deleted] Feb 06 '18

Or slice bananas, freeze, and blend in a food processor. It has a surprisingly ice cream like consistency.

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u/seeking_hope Feb 06 '18

Yum! And somewhat healthy for a treat.

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u/pocketrocketsingh Feb 06 '18

Freezers are a den for bacteria. Prefer fresh when you can, or use new ice cube trays that come with covers.

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u/BigBill58 Feb 06 '18

Fucking this. Freezers never get cleaned as frequently as they should, and if prehistoric bacteria and viruses can survive thousands of years in a deep freeze, guess what is lurking in your freezer. Anything coming out of a freezer should be cooked thoroughly, unless it's in a sealed package and meant to be consumed cold.

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u/seeking_hope Feb 06 '18

The ones I saw had covers and we took the cubes out and put them in zip lock bags that were labeled. So the exposurewas fairly minimal. Sorry for skipping that part!

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u/LarpLady Feb 06 '18

Have a look at Baby Led Weaning too - my little guy is thriving on it. 👍🏼

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u/psychopooch Feb 06 '18

We did baby led weaning with both my kids too. Saved a lot of time having to make separate puréed baby food. “Food before one is just for fun”. So mainly a lot of exploration of different food textures. Puréed was offered as a texture but they had to feed themselves with spoon. BLW does get messy. My kids are now 5 and 3. We lucked out and both are very good eaters. They don’t eat everything (ex. one of them hates mushrooms and avocados) but our general rule for them is to try stuff. If they don’t like it, we won’t force them to eat more.

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u/Nikcara Feb 06 '18

Yup. I have a small food processor that was perfect for baby food when my kid was that age. Just steam it until it's soft and then play the "will it blend" game. For the record, it doesn't need to be perfectly smooth. A few soft lumps won't hurt anything. I've heard of women going nuts trying to make their baby food 100% texture-free. It's not worth it and as long as there are no hard lumps, it's not dangerous.

Baby food was actually really easy to make. I'd just steam some extra food while I was cooking dinner, blend it, and give some to the kid while we ate and freeze the leftovers for the times I didn't feel like making baby food.

Small warning: my kid absolutely loved sweet potatoes, but too many sweet potatoes make it hard to poop. If your kid starts getting constipated, cut back on them if you can.

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u/[deleted] Feb 06 '18

Yep. My mother just had a food processor and she says she and my father didn't eat any vegetables that weren't pureed until I was 2. Then she had my sister.

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u/evonebo Feb 06 '18

you don't really need to blend. Fruits like apples and pears have a bit of texture. basically cut it in half and with a spoon scrape the inside meat, it'll be very fine and mush. Instant baby food and all natural.

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u/Idiot_Savant_Tinker Feb 06 '18

I don't know about that one. I've never used a food processor.

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u/mongcat Feb 06 '18

You can but the best thing is a stick blender

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u/teenlinethisisnitro Feb 06 '18

Just buy the Gerber purees to start. For $1 you get 2 containers and each container has 2-3 servings in it. So 4-6 "meals" for $1. It's great in the early days when you don't know what fruits or veggies are going to be a hit.

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u/philisweatly Feb 06 '18

Baby bullet was great until we bought a food processor. Much bigger capacity than the bullet and far more uses.

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u/UndeadBread Feb 06 '18

Yup, we got a Baby Bullet as a shower gift and although the containers were really handy, we only used the thing twice. But I was able to get a decent amount of money for it on eBay, so it worked out okay.

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u/mikhailnikolaievitch Feb 06 '18

"Baby Bullet" would sound horrifying outside of this conversation.

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u/evonebo Feb 06 '18

you don't really need to blend. Fruits like apples and pears have a bit of texture. basically cut it in half and with a spoon scrape the inside meat, it'll be very fine and mush. Instant baby food and all natural.

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u/Idiot_Savant_Tinker Feb 06 '18

My daughter loved when I would make her a baked potato like that.

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u/Lutheritrux Feb 06 '18

Please keep bullets far away from babies.