What is baby rice cereal made of? How is baby rice cereal made?

Baby rice cereal is food that many mothers prepare for their babies, but mothers are always worried about buying it outside, so making it by themselves is also one of the options. So what is baby rice cereal made of, and what are the steps in the production process?

What is baby rice cereal made of?

Infant rice cereal is a supplementary food for infants to meet their nutritional needs and during the weaning period. It is a supplementary food for infants made from rice as the main raw material, with optional ingredients such as white sugar, vegetables, fruits, eggs, meat, and added with minerals such as calcium, phosphorus, iron, and vitamins.

Infant rice cereal is relatively purer, more scientific, and closer to adult food. With the improvement of modern scientific technology, the nutritional elements of most infant rice cereals are becoming more comprehensive and richer. For example, in addition to conventional elements such as calcium, phosphorus, iron, iodine, and zinc, vitamins A, D, E, vitamin C, B vitamins, and folic acid and pantothenic acid unique to breast milk are also added. In order to meet the nutritional needs of infants at different stages and maintain a comprehensive and balanced nutrition for infants, feeding infant rice cereal is usually divided into three stages according to international practice: 4-24 months, 6-24 months, and 8-24 months.

How to Make Baby Rice Cereal

In order to ensure the food safety of the baby, many mothers want to make baby rice noodles by themselves. There are only four steps to make homemade baby rice noodles, which are selecting rice, grinding rice, frying rice noodles and making rice noodles. To make baby rice noodles, the rice needs to be finely ground. You can use a grinder or a food processor with a grinding function to grind it. This makes it very easy to make baby rice noodles. If you can't finish the rice noodles after grinding, you can put them in a bag and seal them for storage.

The specific steps for making homemade baby rice cereal are as follows:

1. Select rice: Choose the best rice, wash it clean, dry the washed brown rice, and carefully pick out the impurities inside.

2. Prepare auxiliary materials: In addition to rice, we can also add some other auxiliary materials to increase the nutrition of rice noodles, such as walnuts for brain nourishment, coix seed rice for kidney nourishment, yam and chicken gizzard for digestion, black beans for blood nourishment, lotus seeds for heat clearing. These can be ground into powder and put in rice noodles.

3. Grind into powder after frying: First, put the prepared rice into the pot and fry it on medium heat for 3 minutes, then pour it out; then put the prepared auxiliary materials into the pot and fry it on medium heat for 3 minutes, then turn off the heat. Pour the rice into the pot and stir well, and grind the powder after it cools down. Parents, please note that the powder of baby rice cereal should be ground at least three times, because the more times it is ground, the finer it is, and the more convenient it is for babies to eat.

4. Storage: After the rice noodles are cooled, if they are not eaten immediately, pack them in a clean food-grade ziplock bag so that they can be taken out at any time and placed in a cool place to prevent moisture. Note that you should not make too much rice noodles each time. If they are not stored properly or for too long, they are prone to insects.

Reminder: Homemade rice noodles may be safer, but the baby rice noodles sold outside contain various nutrients, and their nutritional value is close to that of breast milk. The disadvantage of homemade rice noodles is that their nutritional value is not high, so the addition of auxiliary ingredients is very necessary.

How to eat baby rice cereal

1. Use the measuring spoon of milk powder to take out an appropriate amount of rice flour (the amount depends on the child). The ratio of water to flour should be at least 5 to 1.

2. Pour into a small pot (an iron ladle will also work), then add an appropriate amount of cold/warm water, do not use boiling water.

3. Then place it on the gas stove and adjust the gas to low heat.

4. Then use chopsticks to stir the pot repeatedly until you smell the aroma of the rice paste.

5. Of course, you can also add some other complementary foods, such as: vegetable foam/juice, meat foam/soup, tomato juice, etc. When adding these things, use less water at the beginning, and then pour the juice into it when stirring halfway, and then stir until you smell the aroma of rice paste.

Note: The rice cereal should not be too thick at the beginning, but should be diluted, and then gradually transition to thick rice cereal. When feeding your baby rice cereal, start with 1-2 spoons each time and gradually increase to 3-4 spoons. It is more appropriate to feed twice a day.

How to make baby food rice cereal

Rice flour complementary food method 1:

1. Soak the rice for more than 2 hours, take it out and put it into a blender.

2. Add any kind of vegetables or fruits (such as cooked corn kernels) into the blender and blend into a paste.

3. Pour appropriate amount of water into a milk pan, stir with a spoon while heating, and cook until it becomes a thick paste.

Note: You can add sweet potatoes, pumpkins, carrots, green vegetables, etc. according to your baby's taste and mix them together. For older babies, you can also add shrimp meat, etc. This kind of homemade rice noodles is fresh, nutritious and easy to make.

Rice flour complementary food method 2:

1. Grind three pounds of rice into powder. It is best to add some calcium tablets to the rice and grind them into powder together, so that the baby will not lack calcium.

2. Add cornstarch to appropriate amount of cold water and stir evenly. Remember to stir when pouring rice flour into the small pot, otherwise it will easily clump, until it becomes a paste. Or you can mix it with cold boiled water first and then steam it in water, stirring constantly when it is almost cooked and thickened. The steaming method will not easily cause internal heat.

3. Add other foods to make a nutritious meal. Water can also be replaced with vegetable soup, such as carrot soup. When the baby has teeth, add minced meat, egg yolk, spinach, small carrot cubes, etc. to the rice noodles. You can change the taste for your baby every day.

Rice flour complementary food method three:

1. Take 50-60 grams of rice, wash it with water, and soak it for one to two hours. Try to pick up a grain of rice, and if you can break it with your fingernail, you can grind it.

2. Pour out some of the water, but leave some water so that grinding will be much easier. Grind the rice into rice paste, and the rice grains become fine powder, thick enough to drip from the porcelain pestle.

3. Scoop out half of the rice slurry, add three times the amount of water, and heat it in a pot. Stir constantly during the heating process. When the rice slurry is almost cooked and becomes a rice paste, add an egg yolk.

4. Stir well and cover the pot for a while until the rice noodles and egg yolks are fully cooked. You can also add squeezed vegetable juice or carrot juice.

Note: The rice milk ground once can be divided into two meals for the baby. The remaining half of the rice milk can be added with water and kept in the refrigerator for one day.

Misunderstandings to avoid when eating rice cereal for babies

Misunderstanding 1: Using boiling water to rinse rice noodles

Many people think that rice noodles need to be boiled in water to dissolve better, and then cooled before feeding to babies. Many people also do the same when mixing milk powder. However, rice noodles contain a variety of nutrients, such as whey protein, vitamins, etc. When exposed to high-temperature boiling water, the molecular structure will be destroyed, thus greatly reducing the nutritional value of rice noodles. In addition, mineral water is also not allowed.

The correct way is to boil the water, let it cool for a while, wait until it reaches 60-70 degrees, then pour it into the rice noodles and mix evenly.

Misconception 2: Using vegetable soup or juice to make rice noodles

I often see many baby recipes that suggest mothers to add vegetable juice or fruit juice to rice noodles for their babies. Many mothers may also think that rice noodles with water have no taste, and adding some fruit juice or vegetable juice is both tasty and healthy. In fact, fruit juice or vegetable juice is not suitable for babies, because the main component of fruit juice is sugar, and it is best for babies not to consume too much sugar. Vegetable juice is not particularly recommended. What we want is the nutrients and vitamins in vegetables. These nutrients are destroyed a lot during the heating process, and they lose their original meaning.

Correct way to do it: The packaging of rice noodles you buy will generally recommend that you mix it with water or milk, so don’t use anything else. If you want your baby to eat some vegetables and fruits while eating rice noodles, vegetable or fruit puree would be more suitable for your baby.

Myth 3: Adding salt or sugar will make it taste better

Mothers who have tasted rice noodles know that rice noodles have a very light taste, neither sweet nor salty. But babies don't like to eat them without taste! Babies like sweet food, so some parents try to add some sugar to it; others secretly add some salt to it, thinking that eating salt in advance will give them strength.

Correct approach: Babies under 1 year old do not need any seasoning, especially salt. Salt will increase the burden on the baby's kidneys, and excessive intake may even cause organ damage. Excessive intake of sugar can also cause obesity in children.

Myth 4: Feeding rice cereal with a bottle

Some mothers think that when they first add rice cereal to their babies, they can make it thinner and use a bottle with a large-hole nipple to let the baby eat by himself. In fact, this is wrong! The purpose of complementary food is to let the baby gradually progress from drinking milk to the way of eating like adults. When feeding babies with rice cereal from a bottle, the baby will directly inhale the rice cereal into his mouth and swallow it directly. The whole process is simple and crude, and the baby's feeding pattern has not been changed or improved at all.

Correct method: When feeding rice cereal to your baby, use a small spoon to feed slowly, put a small amount of rice cereal behind the baby's tongue, let the baby feel the taste of the food and the feeling of putting it in the mouth. Let the baby learn to eat, learn to chew and swallow food with the movement of the tongue and mouth. It is best to use a soft silicone spoon when feeding rice cereal~

Myth 5: Taking rice noodles as a staple food

Some mothers think that rice noodles added to babies are the same as rice for adults and can be used as staple food, so they gradually reduce breast milk or formula feeding and increase the amount and frequency of rice noodles for babies. This is wrong. Rice noodles as a complementary food, as the name suggests, is a supplementary food. The nutrition that babies need most still comes from the protein in breast milk and formula milk.

Correct approach: Babies under 1 year old should still have breast milk or formula milk as the staple food, with rice cereal and other complementary foods as supplements.