By Health Promotion Board in collaboration with A/Prof Mary Daniel Lourdes, Head & Senior Consultant, Clinical Services, Department of Child Development, KK Women's and Children's Hospital.

Your baby’s now 10 months old, congratulations! Guess what? He may be ready for food with a bit more bite in it: food that’s not just mashed, but also finely chopped or cut into tiny bite-sized portions.

Your baby’s motor skills are also developing, and he may be getting better at grabbing and holding on to the food you’ve been giving him all this time.

Your baby still needs his milk feeds, and it’s now a good time to try out sippy cups and slowly phase out the bottle. The recommendation is to completely wean your baby off the bottle by month 12.

Related: Baby Bottle Tooth Decay

Is Your Baby Ready for More Textured Food?

Here are some signs your baby is ready to take on “big boy/girl foods”:

  • He moves food around in his mouth with his tongue
  • He is starting to make chewing movements
  • He can eat thicker and coarser purees without problems

 

If your baby is not ready yet, continue to transition him to thicker and coarser textures. Use a fork instead of a processor to mash food, and try giving him some dissolvable or soft finger foods—small morsels of food he can grab and feed himself—like puff cereals or tofu.

Related: Prevent Choking

Recommended Number of Servings (10 months)

A friendly reminder that these numbers are only a recommendation. Let your baby decide how much he wants to eat and don’t force him to finish everything!

Wholegrains Fruit Vegetables Meat and others Milk (breast/formula)
1-2 ½ ½ ½ 500-750ml

At 10 months, your meal schedule for the little one might look like this:

  • Early morning snack: 150ml breast milk/formula
  • Breakfast: 1 slice of wholemeal bread
  • Mid-morning snack: 180ml breast milk/formula
  • Lunch: ¼ to ¾ bowl* of solid food
  • Afternoon snack: 180ml breast milk/formula
  • Dinner:¼ to ¾ bowl* of solid food
  • Evening snack: 180ml breast milk/formula

    • *Rice bowl

 

You might have already started your baby on three solid meals a day. Read on for ideas on what you can feed your 10-month-old infant, and ways you can make mealtime more exciting for both the baby and you.

Related: Healthy Start for Your Baby

More Yummy Ideas for Mummy and Daddy

Tantalise with textures

Your little one is ready for a whole new world of chopped food, so get him excited about the different textures! Prepare your food multiple ways and let your child explore different textures and mouth feel.

For example, chicken can be chopped into small cubes, shredded, added to a stew till it’s soft, or made into patties and cut up. Play around with different preparation methods and let the little one try out lumps, chunks, bits and pieces.

Related: Healthy Home Meals on a Budget

Continue to expand the menu

Encourage your baby to eat a wide variety of food, and to continue exploring different flavours.

Grains: Your little one can now try grains in their original texture—go ahead and let him try well-cooked quinoa, couscous or barley, or potatoes that are cut up into small cubes.

You can also try feeding the little one small wholegrain pasta like macaroni, spiral pasta, shell-shaped pasta, or bee hoon or mee sua that are cut into smaller pieces.

Do make sure these are cooked through and soft, not chewy. Longer or bigger pieces or strands should be cut to size to prevent them from becoming choking hazards.

Fruit and veggies: Mum and dad can now prepare their food and veggies by chopping or cutting them into small pieces. Do make sure your veggies are cooked until they are soft.

Meat/others: Here’s another protein you can add to your baby’s meals—soft, pasteurised cheese, e.g. cottage cheese or shredded cheddar. You can jazz up your child’s mashed potato with some cheese, or mixed cottage cheese into fruit purees for a yummy sweet-savoury treat. Peach or berries work great.

Related: Healthy Cooking

More hacks for snacks

You might have started your baby on finger foods: tiny morsels that your little one can grab and put into his mouth to learn how to feed himself.

Now that he can take in more textures, you can try new snacks in different shapes and sizes, for example:

  • Lightly toasted wholemeal bread cut into strips that your little one can dip into bean or fruit puree.
  • Small pieces of cooked wholegrain pasta (e.g. cut up macaroni or spiral pasta). Make sure they’re well-cooked and soft, not al dente or chewy.
  • Sweet potato “fries” that are steamed, baked, or oven-roasted without oil.
  • Thin wedges of watermelon, with seeds and rind removed.

Let your baby explore the food with his sense of touch and taste—don’t worry if things get a bit messy. Food should be soft and easily mashed between fingers or gums, and range from pea-sized to about the length and size of your baby’s finger.

Prevent choking by sitting baby upright in his high chair and keeping your eyes on him when he eats. Avoid raw and hard veggies, whole fruit (e.g. grapes), nuts or seeds, chunks of meat, or food that gums together (e.g. untoasted white bread).

Related: Healthy Snacks for Kids

Try These Solid Meals!

Breakfast

  • Brown rice cereal with chopped baked peaches and cottage cheese
  • Wholemeal bread with mixed berry puree and mashed bananas

 

Lunch/Dinner

  • Chopped mee sua with chicken cubes and chopped bok choy
  • Roasted potato cubes with flaked cod and shredded pumpkin
  • Chopped macaroni with minced beef and pureed tomato

 

Related: Looking Out for Your Wholegrains

Friendly Reminders for Mum and Dad

10 to 12 months: Mashed, Chopped or Cut

At this stage, the food you feed the little one needs to only be mashed, chopped or cut into small pieces.

Food prep pointers

If you’re making your own baby food, make sure to prepare it without oil. Some great cooking methods are steaming, boiling, baking, or microwaving. Your baby can now eat chunky soups and stews too. No stir-frying or grilling yet for the little one! Remember to skip the sugar, salt and any other seasonings (e.g. soy sauce) when preparing the meals.

Related: Worthy of Heating Up

Be patient

If your baby isn’t interested in a certain food, do not force it. There’s also no need to force your child to finish everything on his plate! Stop feeding him if he rejects the food, and try again during the next meal. Right now, your baby knows best about how much he wants to eat.

Related: Benefits of Vegetables

What makes 1 serving?

Wholegrains

½ bowl of brown rice/rice (100g)
½ bowl of noodles, spaghetti or beehoon (100g)
1 large potato (180g)
2 slices of wholegrain bread (60g)
4 plain wholemeal biscuits

Fruit

1 small apple, orange, pear or mango (130g)
1 wedge pineapple, papaya or watermelon (130g)
1 medium banana
10 grapes or longan (50g)

Vegetable

¾ mug or 1 small rice bowl of cooked vegetables (100g)
¼ plate of vegetables

Meat and others

1 palm-sized piece of fish, lean meat or skinless poultry (90g)
2 small blocks of soft beancurd (170g)
¾ cup or 1 small rice bowl of cooked pulses (e.g. lentils) (120g)
3 eggs (150g)
5 medium prawns