When your baby has proven that he is indeed ready to begin solid foods, which should you introduce first? A good rule of thumb is to begin with iron-fortified rice cereal – just a couple of teaspoons to start with, thickened with four to five teaspoons of prepared formula or breast milk (you can use water to thin the cereal, but by using formula or breast milk, you’re adding a taste that baby is already familiar with, which may help him to accept the cereal more readily). Or you can use the commercially prepared kind that’s pre-mixed; all you have to do it put it into a dish. Rice cereal is recommended to start with because it’s rare for babies to have an allergy or intolerance to it.
Before your baby’s first cereal feeding, you’ll want to gather a few things: a soft, rubber- or plastic-tipped spoon that won’t hurt his gums, a bib (most definitely!), and a camera to catch that priceless “what’s this?” expression. Nurse or bottle-feed your baby first, then offer the cereal, just a little bit on the tip of the spoon. Be prepared, because Baby will probably frown and spit so much at first that it looks as though you’ve just fed him the nastiest food in the world. But those reactions really have little to do with the taste alone; it’s also the unfamiliarity of the new texture and consistency, and of the new movements his mouth is being forced to make. It doesn’t mean that he doesn’t like it. Once he gets the hang of this eating thing, he’ll be doing it with gusto.