A little food update - Tabitha is now 7 months and 2 weeks old.  She has been eating solids for a little over 6 weeks.  According to some 'baby weaning' books, which advocate only introducing one new food every 7 - 10 days (yep, even seemingly innocuous foods like carrot!), Tabitha should have tried MAYBE six foods.  If we were following these old fashioned books, she probably would have tried Rice Cereal; carrot; pumpkin; pear; apple; banana and maybe something exotic like pureed apricot.  Tee hee!  It really makes me laugh out loud to think about that!

With baby led weaning / baby led solids (BLW / BLS), the baby simply eats regular family food, and feeds herself, instead of being spoon-fed.  I don't want to bore everyone to tears by explaining the concept every time I mention it, so I will say "read the book" if you are interested in more information - it is available at most libraries, or online for around $15.  There is also loads of decent information on the internet.  I will, of course, still be posting loads about BLW, but I don't want to keep explaining the basics over and over.

Thanks to BLW, Tabitha has had the pleasure of trying a lot of foods in her short time as a food-eater.  We've given her all sorts of things, including egg, peanut butter and nut products, dairy, wheat and berries.  So far, the only things she seems to be intolerant of (or mildly allergic to) are eggs that is not fully cooked (as found in Carbonara and mayonnaise), and tomato and eggplant (part of the same family).  The egg, tomato and eggplant have each given her a mild contact rash around her mouth, though she has not seemed at all bothered by this.

I have updated the list of foods that Tabitha has eaten so far, over the past 6 or so weeks.  I have probably left lots out - but even so, you can get an idea of the wide range of tastes and textures that a BLW baby is exposed to when they are first discovering food, over a traditionally puree-fed baby.  Of course, BLW means that the babies get to touch and feel their food, examining it up close in its whole form, rather than having a puree popped straight into their mouth.

1. Bread - pita, sourdough, rye, bagel
2. Bread dipped in all sorts of sauces from our plates
3. Rice cakes
4. Vegimite
5. Peanut Butter
6. Taramasalata
7. Cheese - Onetik Ossau-Iraty, Comte, Cheddar.
8. Peach
9. Spicy marinated chicken rib
10. Apricot
11. Banana
12. Green beans
13. Tuna sashimi
14. Avocado
15. Steak
16. Lamb cutlets
17. White fish
18. Capsicum
19. Gingerbread
20. Nectarine
21. Roast pumpkin
22. Brocolli
23. Brocollini
24. Raspberry
25. Cucumber
26. Cauliflower 
27. Steamed carrot
28. Edamame (soy bean pods)
29. Roast potatoes in duck fat
30. Asparagus
31. Spinach and feta golzeme
32. Carbonara
33. Baba Ganoush dip
34. Veggie burger
35. Strawberry
36. Zucchini
37. Eggplant
38. Snowpeas
39. Tomatoes (in a sauce from a bowl of mussels, with onions, garlic etc.)
40. Some homemade cakes, like date loaf, carrot cake, banana cake.
41. Chocolate ice cream (a taste)
42. Frozen blended pure fruit (strawberry and banana)
43. Teriyaki salmon
44. Rice
45. Sushi - little nori rolls with prawn, tuna and avocado
46. Some new sauces, such as a saffron butter sauce on some steamed veggies
47. Plain organic full cream yoghurt
48. Porridge (with dates, banana, cocoanut and a little organic cows' milk)
49. Sardines
50. Crayfish
51. Prawns
52. Chicken in various guises
53. Challah toast
54. Stewed apple
55. Jam
56. Almond spread and ABC nut spread
57. Watermellon
58. Cantaloupe
59. Almond croissant
60. Salt and Pepper Squid with Vietnamese lime and chili dressing
61. Rabbit and Porcini terrine
62. Tempura vegetables
63. Gyoza
64. Har Gow dumplings
65. Falafel
66. Satay chicken
67. Pasta with pesto

Her fine motor coordination has improved immensely, and she can now manipulate fairly small pieces of food into her mouth.  She will often pick up a piece of toast or rice cake, examine it carefully, and then turn it around so that it is 'topping side down', meaning she gets maximum flavour!  Clever baby.  

Tabitha's favourite foods so far seem to be:  avocado; sardines; capsicum; brocollini; and, unsurprisingly, sweet things like ice cream and cake (which she's only had the odd taste of, but never knocks back!)

We haven't avoided offering her spicy or strongly flavoured foods - because she is feeding herself, she can easily decide not to eat something.  She hasn't shown a preference for the classic 'bland flavours' recommended for babies (she completely turns her nose up at things like steamed carrot, boiled potatoes, steamed pumpkin) and seems to really enjoy stronger flavours like mild spices, sardines in oil, gyoza, pesto and natural yoghurt.

Experts point out that breastfed babies are exposed to lots of new tastes every day through their milk, so are generally more adventurous eaters in the early days.  But all babies, regardless, are exposed to some variety of tastes via the amniotic fluid in their days as a fetus.