From the onset, I wanted and planned to prepare homemade baby food for Yui. It’s healthier and you can be rest assured there are no dubious additives. Also, a lot of the powdered baby food here are mixtures of two or more vegetables and fruits. I wanted to feed Yui one type at a time to make sure she’s not allergic to a certain food hence homemade is the way to go.
I figure vegetables and fruits would be fairly easy to prepare. You can just either steam or bake them then mash them or purée using a blender. The rice though was a puzzle for me. Do I cook it first before mashing/putting on the blender or have it milled first before cooking? If the latter, do I mill it myself (buy a rice miller or blender with milling blade) or have it milled somewhere (but where?)? So I compromised and told myself to have it instant with the rice cereal.
Rice cereal and wheat bread cereal. Tried it with milk but Yui doesn’t like it. She preferred water on her cereal. Very Japanese palate. 🙂 I tasted these by the way and they really taste just like rice and bread. Very simple taste. 
I wanted Yui to try brown rice but I couldn’t find one here. So I had it imported, through a friend. I wanted Gerber but apparently powdered Gerber is not anymore available in the Philippines. Did Yui like it? She did! Yui also has a Filipino palate, thankfully. 
Segue: notice that the Japanese boxes say for 5 months whilst the Cerelac one says for 6 months. Read the label and saw that Philippine paediatricians recommend breastmilk feeding wholly for six months. Of course it’s the same here. However it’s recommended to start at around 4 to 6 months just for training the baby to get the hang of eating and not really for nutrition. Nutrition is still wholly dependent on breast milk or formula. When we had the required four months check up at the government health clinic, we also had a seminar on feeding solids for baby as midwives/doctors believe we would be starting solids in a few weeks or so. Plus, starting solids when Yui is 5 months works for me since Yui will hopefully start daycare come April. I want to be the one feeding Yui’s first foods and not her daycare nurse.
Whew, quite a long segue. Anyways.
I talked with my Japanese friend last Friday however and she was able to personally mash her baby’s rice cereal. It can be done! Will definitely try it when Yui’s boxes of cereals have all been consumed. So, having had done with rice cereal, wheat bread cereal and brown rice cereal, it’s time for Yui to be on vegetables and fruits.
First on the menu, sweet potatoes. Sweet potatoes steaming. 
I also bought a blender specially designed for making baby food. (The steamer was also the smallest one we could find). 
But sweet potatoes, once cooked, is really soft hence mashing it using this is enough. Mashing took just a couple of minutes or so. 
Sweet potato is really dry once it cools down. Hence I added cooled down boiled water to achieve consistency that’s similar to cereal. 
Did our baby like it? Sure bet! We had a very very eager eater straining on her straps to get closer to the spoon. She absolutely loved it.
This being the first time, I only prepared one batch. Will try next time to make more and store the rest.
Sure it’s more troublesome what with more dishes to be washed and the steamer to boot. But seeing Yui eagerly take a spoonful (and sometimes even complaining when it took too long for me to give her another spoonful), it sure is worth all the effort. That, and the fact that you know you’re feeding your baby only the healthy stuff.
