Rice Cereal

I thought about not writing this post because I honestly don't want to offend anyone. But if I can't blog about what's on my mind then what's the point, right? So if you are a baby-rice-cereal-feeding-lover then please feel free to a) skip this post or b) accept my apologies as we are about to disagree.

Ironically, I talked to two of my close friends today about rice cereal. For one reason or the other, they were both going to start giving it to their baby. After my initial mini-anxiety-attack ended, I went into comforting-wild-research mode. What can I say, the subject fascinates me and I just have such a hard time with the state of food and nutrition in the American culture. It amazes me that doctors actually recommend rice cereal to infants. Do people (not obsessed with nutrition) know the difference between brown and white rice? Probably not. I certainly didn't until I started going to school for this stuff. The most common super market brand of rice cereal is straight up white rice. No nutritional value whatsoever. And, even though it may not say sugar on the label, it has to do with the glycemic value and how your body metabolizes the rice. That said, people seem to believe rice cereal is the correct "first food" for an infant and it seems I am in the minority for not agreeing. The reality is most pediatricians recommend rice cereal so I've decided to share a bit of my research and then I am not going to think about it anymore (unless, of course, someone reading this decides they want their baby to be one of my clients).

Below is one recipe I found for a make-your-own. I am sure there are plenty of others available. I don't think this one is better than another, I am just trying to make it easy for some of you out there in cyberspace.

HOME MADE RICE CEREAL

3 cups of organic, brown rice, cooked according to package directions (stay away from anything "enriched" as it's possible that may contain gluten).
12 ounces breast milk, water, or infant formula

Directions
Place the COOKED brown rice in a blender with the breast milk/water/formula. Puree until completely smooth – you cannot make this cereal too smooth. Pour the cereal into ice trays, cover and freeze overnight. Once frozen, pop the cubes out of the trays, place in a freezer bag or container, labeled with the date and return to the freezer. Lasts up to two months.

To serve
Defrost the cubes, and add breast milk or formula to develop a smooth consistency. For babies just starting solids, thin the cereal to a semi-liquid consistency. Warm the cereal, if desired. You can also change the flavor of the cereal by adding fruit or veggie baby food, once your baby has started to eat those foods.

For those of you using commercial brands, try to find a product without any added sugar (since the rice itself is metabolized as sugar you don't want any extra if you can avoid it). I checked the labels of a couple brands of "healthy" rice cereals and even they had glucose syrup solids. According to the Sugar Association, this is just a fancy term for corn syrup (another fancy term for SUGAR).

So that's it. I'm done. I'm off to spend more time agonizing about the state of food. This time it is school lunches. Don't even get me started on that.