The Baby-Led Weaning Cookbook: 130 Recipes That Will Help Your Baby Learn to Eat Solid Foods - and That the Whole Family Will Enjoy [Paperback]

Gill Rapley (Author), Tracey Murkett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 3, 2012

Forget baby purées and spoon-feeding—there’s an easier, more natural way to introduce your little one to solid foods. By about six months, when babies can sit up unassisted, grab things, and munch on them, they are ready to join the family at the kitchen table and discover real, solid food for themselves.

Baby-led weaning sets the stage for healthy eating habits in the years ahead by helping babies learn to feed themselves, to gauge appetite, and to love a variety of nutritious foods. Now, with The Baby-Led Weaning Cookbook, cooking family meals that your little one can share will be a cinch. Gill Rapley and Tracey Murkett—coauthors of Baby-Led Weaning, the book that started the movement—collect 130 recipes perfectly suited for baby-led weaning, as well as:

• Straightforward advice on which foods to start with
• Essential at-a-glance information on nutrition and food safety
• Healthy ideas for quick snacks, delicious desserts, and meals for the whole family
• Anecdotes and quotes from parents who follow baby-led weaning
• Tips on minimizing the mess, keeping food the right size for little hands, and more!

The Baby-Led Weaning Cookbook will give you the recipes and the confidence to create exciting, enjoyable mealtimes that encourage little ones to develop at their own pace.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“This engaging resource features lots of recipes to encourage baby independence during weaning and should match the popularity of the previous guide.”
—Library Journal

About the Author

Gill Rapley, the pioneering champion of baby-led weaning, worked as a public health nurse for over twenty years and has also been a midwife, lactation consultant, and voluntary breastfeeding counselor. She is currently pursuing a PhD in infant feeding.

Tracey Murkett is a voluntary mother-to-mother breastfeeding helper and coauthor with Gill Rapley of Baby-Led Weaning and The Baby-Led Weaning Cookbook.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: The Experiment (April 3, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 161519049X
• ISBN-13: 978-1615190492
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (41 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,647 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #5 in Books > Cookbooks, Food & Wine > Special Diet > Whole Foods

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

68 of 71 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Everything the Original Baby Led Weaning Book Should've Been March 17, 2011

By Megan Romer

Format:Hardcover

I was already well into the BLW process when we bought this book, but as an avid BLW evangelist, I had to have it anyway, for the lending library, at the very least.

I wish I could take my original BLW book back and get just this one instead. The first several chapters are, in essence, a re-hashing of the original BLW book, but explained in a much simpler way, laid out more nicely, and with visual aids (charts, graphs, and -- of course -- completely adorable pictures of babies). It does offer some nice bullet-pointed lists absent from the original book that are tremendously useful -- things like "What to Expect," "Keeping Mealtimes Safe," "Common Allergens," and the like, as well as charts of relevant feeding skills by age. Also, this book offers nice long lists of actual suggestions of a variety of first and second foods, which the original book did not.

Truthfully, it just looks nicer and reads more easily than the original book.

As for the recipe section, I think it's quite useful. I'm a fairly good cook and menu planner, and part of the point of going the BLW route was so that the baby could quickly transition to eating basically what we (the adults) were eating. However, I know that I found myself befuddled after having the baby in how to suddenly cook as a Mom. In the old days, I could spend all afternoon preparing complex and leisurely meals... the transition to quick, one-pot cookery was not a graceful (or particularly tasty) one for me, and trying to develop meals based on how quickly I could eat them with only one free hand was tricky, to say the least. It took me several months to really find my rhythm in the kitchen again, and I suspect this cookbook might've helped. Simple, nutritious, cross-cultural recipes that are written lightly, as loose frameworks and templates so the cook can tweak as needed... it's a simple, inspiration-stirring bunch of dishes.

The recipes are not ethnocentric -- Thai, Japanese, Moroccan, British, American, French, and Italian recipes are all represented. As, for us, part of the appeal of BLW was raising a child who enjoyed a wide variety of flavors and ingredients, it's great to see that inclusiveness represented.

I appreciated the book's quiet support of long-term breastfeeding, though formula-feeding parents need not fear... the book's language and message is applicable to anyone who fed their baby on cue from the beginning, regardless of whether they were on the breast or the bottle.

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Get this instead of the original baby led weaning book March 19, 2011

By Kristin

Format:Hardcover

If you are considering purchasing the original baby-led weaning book, don't. After reading it, I told people it was useful but too long - it could be condensed into a pamphlet. Well, the beginning of this book is just that. It's a great summary of the first book and all you need for baby-led weaning.

I was at first disappointed in the recipes. For breakfast, they have recipes for oatmeal and french toast. Do those really require recipes? But as I read more, I was pleased to see so many different cultures represented. So far we've tried the oatmeal fingers (equal parts milk or water with oats, microwaved, and cut into spears), the bubble and squeak (for St. Patty's Day), and the Japanese Rice Balls (stuffed with cucumber and avocado).

As a vegetarian, I wish it had more veggie friendly main dishes, but there is a small section. I also have some concerns about some of the ingredients like soy, milk, and eggs. These are all foods I have read in other resources to avoid, but they're used over and over in these recipes. I have chosen to wait on these foods for my little guy, so will also have to wait on many of the recipes.

Overall a good book that gave me many ideas for what to cook that we can all enjoy.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Buy this instead of the BLW book! March 27, 2012

By Kate W

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

After borrowing the original "Baby Led Weaning" book and the previous edition of the cookbook from the library, I can confidently say that this cookbook is better and more useful than the BLW book. The first 40 pages of the cookbook cover thoroughly why baby led weaning is a good idea and basic tips. Really, any more than that (as in the BLW book) gets repetitive and dull. Then this cookbook has over 100 pages of recipes.

I like the recipes. The authors are British, and the recipes reflect a broad variety of tastes. Tonight we had "Fish Cakes" (pg 111) for dinner, which my husband declared to be surprisingly good for coming from a baby cookbook. My eight month old had a blast. I like that the recipes are written for "1 adult and 1 baby" or "2 adults and 1 baby" to be convenient for small families. I'm sure larger families could just double the recipes. The book is also pleasingly designed overall, but it would have been nice to have pictures of the food.

Just so you know, I'm not a baby led weaning die hard. My daughter eats jarred baby food at daycare, but we are trying baby led weaning at home for dinners and weekends. This book has helped me have more confidence about what and how I feed my daughter. I highly recommend it!