Introducing solids to your child can be overwhelming, especially if it’s your first baby! Assuming you can convince your little one to eat the new foods in the first place, there are always concerns with allergies, not to mention various choking hazards. Plus, depending on who you talk to, when to start introducing certain foods and the order you choose to do it in, can be super controversial!

See our post on why iron is important for babies, particularly around nine months.

Iron deficiency is particularly common in children with weight concerns. These children eat as much iron as anyone else, but the low-grade inflammation in their body prevents them from absorbing and using the iron. The solution is healing the inflammation rather than supplementing.

The most common recommended first food in North America is iron-fortified rice cereal. Initially this may seem logical. Babies naturally need more iron than they receive from breast milk at around age six months. However, iron-fortified processed foods are a relatively modern invention and begs the question of giving your child a fortified food rather than a food that naturally contains iron and other nutrients.

You could also deduce that the increasing need for nutrients like iron at around six months could direct to what first foods should be. If a baby is going to need a certain nutrient at a certain time that is not supplied by breast milk, it would make sense that there would be a built-in way for baby to get this nutrient that is not reliant on modern fortified foods. This is how children have thrived for millennia.

There are many important reasons for the iron need at this age and a natural way that babies get it.

First, many pathogenic bacteria (including E. coli) need iron to survive. The missing iron may be a way of protecting baby from these bacteria as they start eating solids.

Also, at age 4-6 months babies, start wanting to spend more time on the ground on their bellies in preparation for crawling. In a non-sterile world, this puts babies in contact with dirt on a daily basis. Dirt is a natural source of iron and zinc!

A baby does have a dietary need for more minerals and the focus should be on giving them foods that naturally contain these nutrients without the need for fortified and artificial nutrients. Rice is not naturally a source of these nutrients and possibly not intended to be a first food for baby!

Most starchy foods may not be the best choice as first foods for a baby because at age 4-6 months, babies do not produce sufficient amounts of an enzyme called amylase which is used to break down most carbohydrates. This means that starchy foods like rice can be irritating to baby’s digestive system and lead to discomfort in some babies. These foods are more likely to sit and begin to decompose in the gut, which may increase the likelihood of allergies to this particular food.

In addition, habituating a baby to the taste of sweet foods first would make it difficult to introduce less sugary foods like the sour and bitter flavors in vegetables.

There is also a longstanding misconception that your baby will sleep better with rice cereal. It might fill their stomach, but it is filling them with a nutrient-void food like product.

Consult your healthcare professional before supplementing with iron, especially non-food sources!

Babies have their own taste preferences, opinions, and growing levels of independence. Not every baby will tolerate the same tastes and textures, and even if they do, they may do it at different paces. There are, of course, many ideas of what makes a correct ‘first food’ as there are so many options. A good place to start is with nutrient-dense and non-starchy whole foods that have a low chance of causing an allergic response and let your baby be as independent as possible when eating.

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