Travel with Homemade Baby Food

On July 19 I blogged about Homemade Baby Food and you might recall from that post that I make homemade baby food for my children. 

Once I had a routine down - steaming fruits and vegetables, blending and freezing them - my job outside the home required me to travel by air to another location.  At the time I was still nursing my firstborn and was unwilling to venture away for an entire week - leaving pumped milk for him and not being available to nurse.  As a result, my husband, baby and I took the trip together.

Having access to only a dorm size fridge with a tiny freezer at our hotel was a problem when trying to travel with frozen blended vegetable and fruit ice cubes.  We packed ice packs into a cooler, packed the frozen food cubes and off we went.  As you can probably imagine, by the time we got to our hotel many of the cubes had already begun to melt...long story short, we ended up pitching much of the food cubes we transported with us because I was fearful of unintentionally giving my child food poisoning.

Thankfully I also brought oatmeal that we could cook with the hot water from the in-room coffee pot and some Gerber yogurt blends that do not require refrigeration until opened.  We survived and since my then 9 month old was also eating finger foods and still nursing 5 times a day - he definitely did not know it was supposed to be any different.

A month ago I was again required to travel by air for a week to the same location.  Knowing how stressful it had been two years prior to travel with frozen food cubes, it was not something I was interested in repeating. 

I reluctantly began considering travelling with organic baby food - even though that felt so contrary to everything I believed about homemade baby food.  I went to several stores to see what organic baby food options existed and found the variety extremely limited with prices that were outrageous (when compared to the pennies I was spending making my own baby food). 

Frustrated I began googling the subject.  To my dismay, any information I found talked about travelling with a cooler, plenty of ice and ensuring access to a freezer upon arrival or just relenting and resorting to commercial baby food.

Just as I was about to give in to my frustration and purchase the commercial organic baby food in my shopping cart, something caught my eye and has forever changed the way I will travel with healthy foods.

Freeze dried peas were right in front of me - as if inviting me to utilize them to make baby food.  Excited to find a possible alternative, I abandon my cart and purchased the package of freeze dried peas.  That evening I re-hydrated the peas by placing them in a bowl and adding water.  After letting them soak for approximately 10 minutes - I placed them in our Magic Bullet and voila - pureed peas!

Once I verified that my baby would eat the previously freeze dried pureed peas, I began searching for freeze dried vegetables to purchase.  North Bay Trading Company had just what I was looking for - a variety of freeze dried vegetables and fruits for purchase in reasonable quantities. 

The freeze dried fruits and vegetables were light and easy to pack into a suitcase and were a breeze to prepare in a hotel room - leaving our most recent travel experience with stress free homemade baby food for my second born!


A couple of notes on selecting dried fruits and vegetables:  There is a difference in Freeze Dried and Dehydrated food.  The best explanation I was able to identify was a paper outlining Dehydrated vs. Freeze Dried.  My personal opinion is that freeze dried is preferable but feel free to choose for yourself.

Letting the dehydrated food soak in water for a longer amount of time seems to be fine.  Additionally freeze dried fruits and vegetables can be used as a snack as is - in its freeze dried format - just be sure to drink plenty of water to make up for the water not consumed with the freeze dried food.