Weaning with vegetables first

Why is weaning with vegetables important?

Babies are naturally more receptive to sweet tastes initially, so parents may find it easier to focus on fruits at the start of weaning – but this means they're missing out on a wide variety of foods that form a balanced diet.

Clinical studies have shown us that the key to helping your baby love veg for life is to introduce different single veggie flavours early in weaning, without making them sweeter by mixing with fruit. They might pull a face at first, but it’s well worth persevering! After a while your baby will happily eat all kinds of vegetables, and you’ll have helped establish a healthy eating habit that can last a lifetime. 

How do I help my baby learn to love veg?

When you start weaning, you might decide to start with baby rice to get your baby used to eating from a spoon, then move on to single veggie flavours. You may have been planning to try fruits like apple or banana first, but actually getting in early with veg like carrots and cauliflower is more likely to help your little one learn to love veggies for life. Remember, veggies can be mixed with baby rice as well.

START-VARY-REPEAT

1) START - with a single veggie.
2) VARY - with different single veggies.
3) REPEAT - with the same veggie flavours in exciting new combinations. It can take around 8-10 goes before they learn to love it, but they should do eventually. Just take it slowly and don’t give up!

What about fruit?

Even though we recommend starting weaning with vegetables, fruit is an important part of your baby’s weaning diet and, once weaning is established, should be offered to your baby as part of their mixed weaning diet. However we recommend keeping savoury vegetable tastes and fruit separate, rather than mixing them together.