6 avocado-based baby food combinations your baby will love

Avocados are a go-to first baby food for a reason. They contain 20 vitamins and minerals, including folate (remember that from prenatal vitamins?), potassium (even more than bananas!), iron, zinc, and vitamins A, C, E, and K, plus several variants of vitamin B. In addition, avocados are packed with protein, fiber, and healthy fats without any cholesterol or sodium and very low saturated fat. Babies need fats to keep growing, and avocados are one of the fattiest plant foods, and most of that fat comes from oleic acid, a major component of olive oil.

Conveniently, they’re also soft and easy for babies to gum and swallow, and they’re easy for you to mash with a fork or puree in a food processor. Avocados are also easily combined with other healthy foods for simple baby foods.

So, which avocado baby foods should you make at home? Here are six simple recipe ideas for your little one to enjoy.

Avocado fruit puree

Puree avocado in a food processor or small blender with a sweet fruit, and your baby will goggle it up. Here are some fruits that make a good combination with avocado:

• Banana
• Apple
• Pear
• Kiwi
• Pineapple
• Strawberry

With these purees, as with any baby food purees, you can add in water, breastmilk, or formula to change the consistency. Avocados are rather firm and will make a whipped consistency, but if you add liquid, they will thin out. The thinner the consistency, the easier the puree is for a baby to swallow.

There is no need to cook avocados, but with harder fruits like apples, you may want to steam them first before pureeing.

The amounts of each ingredient are up to you. You can add one whole avocado in with half an apple of steamed slices with a little water, or you could throw in one to 10 strawberries, depending on what you find your baby prefers. Will it be 10%, 50%, or 90% avocado? Your choice!

Avocado vegetable puree

Go green! These vegetables make nutritious and delicious combo purees with avocado:

• Peas
• Broccoli
• Kale
• Spinach
• Asparagus

As with fruit purees, add liquid as desired.

Coated avocado slices

If you’ve ever tried serving your baby raw avocado, you know it’s very slippery. If you cut the avocado into slices for your baby to grasp and feed themself, you can coat the slices in a breadcrumb mixture made of crumbled baby crackers, puffs, or wafers. This will make it much easier to grasp without slipping and makes nice use of the dust at the bottom of the puffs container.

Avocado banana smoothie

Of course, you can DIY any smoothie recipe, but here are a few avocado combos great for babies:

• Avocado, banana, spinach, and yogurt
• Avocado, banana, blueberries, and baby oatmeal
• Avocado, banana, mango, and peach
• Avocado, banana, and strawberries

You get the idea. You can mix and match all you want. Pop it all in the blend with your choice of liquid (water, breastmilk, or formula) and you’re done! You can add flax seeds or chia seeds into any of these recipes for extra nutrition or maple syrup for extra sweetness.

Avocado blueberry muffins

If you’re ready to go more complex, go all out by baking avocados into muffins using this recipe. You’ll get 36 mini muffins that store in a Tupperware on the counter for a week. This one is best for older babies who can chew beyond purees.

Avocado egg puree

For this nutrition powerhouse meal, add a hard-boiled egg (never serve raw or undercooked egg to a baby) to a half of an avocado with a tablespoon of water (or breastmilk or formula) and blend. For even better consistency, take out only the hard-boiled yolk to puree and set the hard-boiled whites aside for another recipe.

Feeding a baby raw, mashed avocado is certainly a good introductory food, but with these combinations, you’ll be deepening the flavors and increasing the nutrition, all while helping to avoid a picky eater by giving a diversity of tastes in each meal. An avocado can freeze for up to a month before losing its nutritional value and taste, so store the extra puree in ice cube trays and defrost as needed.

Since avocados can turn brown so quickly, freeze them right away if you’re not going to serve it immediately. And don’t forget to sneak yourself a taste while you’re cooking, too!

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