Sardines: How to Offer Sardines Safely to Babies

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Katie Ferraro (32s):

So when you think about Sardines, they're actually the perfect shape and size for baby led weaning. Like right out of the can you literally, if you do not like making fish from scratch, like me, I am the laziest home cook in the world. I love Sardines. Okay? They are incredibly affordable. You can find them without added salt by packed in oil or in water. They're the exact size that works for baby lead weaning. Not to mention they're packed with so much nutrition and you're knocking off one of the top nine allergenic foods when you do it. Like this is a win all around. Hey there, I'm Katie Ferraro, registered dietitian, college nutrition professor and mom of seven specializing in baby led weaning. Here on the baby led weaning with Katie Ferraro podcast.

Katie Ferraro (1m 15s):

I help you strip out all of the noise and nonsense about feeding, giving you the confidence and knowledge You need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby led weaning. Babies love Sardines. Stick with me here. I know a lot of parents, adults are like Sardines. Really? Ugh, I get it. A lot of adults hear the word and they immediately scrunch their nose up, But they think, Ugh, gross. But I promise you this, if you are not already a sardine fan personally, like you do not like eating fish out of a tin by the end of the short little training you might be, or at least you're gonna feel really confident because you're gonna be like, this is the easiest and probably one of the most nutritious foods that I can offer to my baby.

Katie Ferraro (1m 58s):

Because while Sardines may not be a food that you regularly eat as an adult, they're actually an amazing food for babies from a nutritional standpoint, a developmental standpoint, a texture standpoint. And they're one of the top nine allergenic foods that we wanna offer early and often to help reduce the risk of food allergy down the road. So hang tight. I'm gonna walk you through what Sardines are, why they're such a great food for baby, how you pick the right type of sardine for your baby, and then how you can safely offer Sardines when your baby is starting solid foods. Now I like to start each of these mini training episodes with a baby led weaning tip of the day. And today's tip is you wanna offer your baby fish early and often.

Katie Ferraro (2m 42s):

Now why? Well fish and Sardines are our type of fish is we're gonna get to in a second, but fish is one of the top nine allergenic foods. So those are the nine foods that account for about 90% of food allergy and newer research updated guidelines, they all point to this earlier introduction of the potentially allergenic foods that helps slow the risk of food allergy down the road. So you wanna do that fish early and often and Sardines, I'm sorry, but it is like the super easiest shortcut way to safely offer your baby fish. Now, quick story. I rerecord these episodes every couple of years and the Sardines episode, 500 episodes on the podcast.

Katie Ferraro (3m 23s):

But for whatever reason, Sardines is one of the top 10 most downloaded episodes. And there was a very large prominent podcast. Other people host a James Beard award-winning podcast and they did an episode of On Baby led weaning. And I listened to this podcast regularly and when I saw it show up in my feed, I was like, oh my God, they're gonna bash baby led weaning. And then it started with them mentioning my name and clipping an episode from my podcast. They were kind of snaring on my podcast like, oh, she has 300 episodes. By the way, I had 500 episodes. They didn't even see all of them, But they clipped the Sardines episode. And then they were talking about how Sardines are such an awesome food for babies. And they did end up bashing, baby led winging. They actually ended up loving on it Anyway, so whew, people love the Sardines ones.

Katie Ferraro (4m 5s):

But hang tight to the end here 'cause I'm gonna make you a lover of Sardines and I'm gonna give you some ideas on how to make Sardines safe for your baby. 'cause if you're like me, you're kind of lazy in the kitchen and you're not inclined to be like cooking fish from scratch every day in your own home kitchen. So before we dive in, one more quick story. I have seven kids, four of them are quadruples. I cheated as my mom said, you totally cheated. I have a set of twins and a set of quadruplets and a singleton. So I have seven kids, but I only have to have three birthday parties. How lucky is that? When my quadruplets were starting solid foods, I was just learning about baby led weaning myself. I had struggled a ton with spoonfeeding, our oldest child, the whole baby led weaning thing was brand new to us. And I'll be honest, my mom was not totally sold on the idea, but at the time she was helping me a ton with all these babies.

Katie Ferraro (4m 46s):

She's also a dietitian. She raised six kids. I'm the oldest. She was very much in the camp of like, I spoonfed all of you guys And you turned out fine. So what's the big deal? Why can't these babies eat purees? So picture this, my quadruplets are about six months old adjusted age. We're having dinner one night and on their plates like we were doing like some new foods, I had some beets and some Sardines. I vividly remember this, probably some sort of like other starch food too. I don't know. Later in that evening I overheard my mom on the phone with one of her other dietitian friends and she was bragging. She was saying like, oh, you wouldn't believe it baby Claire's eating beets and baby Dylan's over there eating sardines right off the plate. Like it's totally normal and they're using their hands. And that was the moment that I knew that like seeing really is believing.

Katie Ferraro (5m 28s):

So when it comes to baby led weaning, if you're listening to this and your partner or or your own parents or your in-laws are skeptical about baby led weaning or about foods like Sardines, just know like once they see your baby confidently feeding themselves real food, they are gonna come around And you do Sardines a couple of times with your baby, they're gonna absolutely love it. Bring the Sardines out. Next time grandma comes around, she will be bragging about your baby and how wonderful they are at eating foods too. So let's start with the basics. What are Sardines? Sardines are a type of small soft bone fish. Most of us are not catching our Sardines ourselves, right? We're probably gonna buy them canned, okay?

Katie Ferraro (6m 8s):

Yes, Sardines are totally safe for babies. The skin is safe for the babies to eat. The bones are safe to eat. It's provided that they're very, very soft. You can just smush 'em through your fingers to make sure there's no really hard parts there. Obviously we don't offer any hard crunchy or crispy parts of food to babies, but you feel through that sardine and that thing is gonna go right through your fingers. Okay? The food's gonna pass what we call the squish test. Meaning if you squeeze it between your forefinger and your thumb and there's some give there, then that food is soft enough to offer your baby. From a mercury standpoint, Sardines are actually a low risk fish. And because Sardines are small and they're lower on the food chain, they contain very little mercury. In fact, Sardines are listed as a best choice fish in the FDA and the EPAs guidance for pregnant women, young children and families on seafood intake.

Katie Ferraro (6m 54s):

So from a safety standpoint, Sardines are like absolutely a green light food. Now why would you want to feed Sardines to your baby? So there's several reasons why I personally love Sardines as a wonderful finger food for baby lead weaning. Number one, very nutrition powerhouse. So Sardines are a fatty fish. It means they contain Omega-3 fatty acids and those Omega-3 fatty acids are essential for your baby's brain growth and their brain development. Okay, your baby's got this still developing brain and while they're getting a lot of fat from breast milk or formula, when we start introducing complimentary foods, we wanna have some good fats in there too. You've heard fish food sometimes called brain food.

Katie Ferraro (7m 35s):

It's those Omega-3 fatty acids in there that are doing it. Sardines are also a good source of iron, okay? There's about two milligrams of iron and a three ounce tin. Now obviously most babies, especially when they're starting out, aren't gonna eat the whole thing, but anytime you see one milligram of iron on the label of a food, that's an iron food and that's a pretty decent source of iron. So two milligrams is pretty high in iron, okay? And we wanna include iron in the weaning diet because at around the six months mark, your baby starts to lose some of the iron stores that they got from mom at the tail end of pregnancy. So we want to have those good fats in there to help with the brain development, and we wanna have some iron in that weaning diet to help make up for the iron stores that may starting to lose that they got at the end of pregnancy.

Katie Ferraro (8m 18s):

So what do Sardines do? They provide us both with the Omega-3 fatty acids and with some iron. There's also some calcium in there because you're eating those soft edible bones of another organism. You got some potassium in there and one of the most overlooked nutrients is vitamin D. Okay? There's not a lot of foods that are naturally occurring sources of vitamin D, but fish oils are, maybe you've heard of people like drinking cod liver oil for vitamin D, you do not need to do that. Okay? Your baby may be taking vitamin D drops. Got a whole training on vitamin D drops for babies. I'm gonna link to that in the description of this episode. So you can check that out if you have more questions about vitamin D. But vitamin D basically helps the body absorb calcium. Okay? It's outside of fortified foods. Not a lot of naturally high in vitamin D foods, but Sardines are one of them.

Katie Ferraro (9m 1s):

So nutrition check number two, allergen introduction. I already mentioned it, but fish is one of the top nine allergenic foods. Sardines are an easy, accessible, cheap way to safely introduce a fish protein to your baby. And remember that early and repeated exposure to allergenic foods when you do it safely. That's an important part of starting solid foods. Canned fish or tinned fish, as some people like to call it, makes that process so much easier. Hey, we're gonna take a quick break, but I'll be right back.

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Katie Ferraro (10m 9s):

So we've got the nutrition standpoint. Heck yeah, we've got the allergen introduction. Number three, I love Sardines because of the taste and texture exposure. So your baby's going through what I like to call the honeymoon feeding phase. Generally from six months of age up through like the earlier part of the toddler years, they've got that all important feeding window open when they're gonna be so much more open to new tastes and textures and they're gonna try everything. Like the quadruplets when they were eating Sardines and beets. You, you try to give Sardines and beets to a 2-year-old who's never tried those foods not gonna happen. Okay? The more variety and the more exposure to different textures and different flavors and types of foods, you can get your baby during that all important flavor window, the more likely they are to become confident independent eaters later on.

Katie Ferraro (10m 53s):

So babies, you know, they don't have the food biases that we do. They don't say, oh, Sardines are gross. We just say that because we have been conditioned to think for whatever reason, depending upon your food culture that maybe Sardines aren't your most preferred food. Okay? Babies, they're totally neutral. And I know lots of families that love sardine toast. My own personal family, we did a really cool video with of my twins about revisiting some of their favorite foods when they were five or four and they turned their nose up at sardine. So like it's built in somewhere, but you know what? They still eat other types of fish and guess what? We did the fish early and often and they're not allergic to fish. So anyway, how do you buy Sardines? Most grocery stores have a very tuna heavy canned fish aisle, okay? And maybe like one Or two sardine options.

Katie Ferraro (11m 35s):

So when you're buying Sardines for your baby, here's what you wanna look for. No Added Salt, okay? Or the lowest sodium version that you can find. So you want a short ingredient list packed in water, packed in oil oil's, great for babies, the extra fat is fine. Remember that fat is helping with their still developing brain. Even Sardines though, with No Added Salt are still gonna contain some sodium, okay? Because that's naturally occurring in fish. So all seafood is rich in minerals and sodium is a mineral. So sometimes you'll be like, whoa, wait a minute. That's a lot of salt. But if there's not sodium or salt in the ingredient list, then you can rest assured that the sodium or salt you're seeing on the nutrition facts panel is naturally occurring. So like general rule of thumb for guidelines, I look for products when I'm gonna offer a food to my baby.

Katie Ferraro (12m 18s):

If it comes in a package, I'm looking for a hundred milligrams of sodium or less per serving. It's sometimes hard to find with Sardines, And you know what Sardines are sometimes food and I want the baby to be getting the fish protein, but you're not gonna find it at less than a hundred milligrams of sodium. So eh, let the baby have it just for the lowest sodium version that you can find. Some brands will also sell skinless boneless Sardines, okay? While the skin and the bones are in most cases totally safe to eat, those can be a nice option. If you're like more comfortable starting there. How do you serve Sardines safely? This part is refreshingly simple. You open the can you take a few Sardines out, you put them directly in your baby suction bowl or their mat.

Katie Ferraro (12m 58s):

Sardines come naturally in soft strips, which are the perfect size for baby led weaning. They're about the size of your adult pinky finger, which is exactly what we want. So your baby can use that palmer or their whole hand grasp to rake and scoop that sardine up and pop it into their cute little baby mouth. Okay? So your baby can pick the Sardines up and feed it to themselves. That's the crux of baby lead weaning. If you want, you can also mash Sardines up and spread it onto low sodium toast or crackers. But again, I don't do hard crunchy or crispy foods for early eaters. So just stick to the actual Sardines if you're doing this for the first time. So, okay, you can mix the Sardines into other soft foods that your baby's already tried. If you want to, you can use them to moisten drier foods because the fat in the Sardines help to reduce the choking risk of other foods that might be kind of on the dry side.

Katie Ferraro (13m 46s):

'cause Sardines are a fatty fish, they're already moist and they're soft. So it makes them a great protein option when your baby is starting solid foods. Now if you're just listening to this and you're like, whoa, I never realized my baby could eat Sardines, I do have a list of a hundred foods your baby can eat before they turn one. And if you go to the bottom of that list is where the potentially allergenic section of the list is, and Sardines are on there along with a number of other types of fish and a number of types of shellfish. 'cause fish and shellfish are two separate categories when it comes to introducing the allergenic foods. If you don't yet have a copy of my original a hundred First Foods list, I want you to get it. I want you to print it out and put it on your refrigerator so you can knock off all the foods, the hundred foods I want your baby to eat before they turn one.

Katie Ferraro (14m 29s):

This is such a fun challenge, and I promise you it will give you so much confidence in your baby's ability to eat food confidently. 'cause you're gonna be like, my baby loves food because they've had a 100 different foods. If you wanna grab that a 100 First Foods list, I give it away to everybody for free on my online workshop called BABY-LED WEANING FOR BEGINNERS. This is a one hour free online video workshop. It is the best place to start. If you're just starting out trying to learn about starting solid foods, BABY-LED WEANING FOR BEGINNERS, you can sign up at baby led weaning.co/workshop or click the link in the description below. That's where you get the 100 First Foods list. And once you have it, if you're looking to make all the foods on the 100 FIRST FOODS list And you want the step-by-step instructions on what recipes and all the meal plans and the videos and the instructions on how to make the 100 First Foods safe for your baby, My program Baby-led weaning with Katie Ferraro has everything you need inside of that program.

Katie Ferraro (15m 23s):

You'll find my 100 First Foods Daily Meal Plan. I literally wrote out 20 weeks of written meal plans for you with step-by-step instructions, videos, and recipes that show you exactly which food to make and how to serve it for your baby's age and stage. You can save $50 when you sign up for the program using the code BLWPOD50. Just head to baby-led weaning.co/program. Again, that code is BLWPOD50 to save $50. So Sardines might not be the most popular adult food in your life, but for babies, they're a nutritional powerhouse. They're a great easy allergen to introduce. It's just an easy win all around when your baby is starting solid foods. So give them a try.

Katie Ferraro (16m 3s):

You might be surprised. I love to see all your videos and your pictures of your baby wolfen down Sardines. Thank you as always for listening and watching. A special thank you to our partners at AirWave Media. If you like podcasts that feature food and science and using your brain, check out some of the podcasts at AirWave Media. We're online@bwpodcast.com. I'll put all the show notes for today's episode@blwpodcast.com/85. Thank you so much for listening and watching, and I'll see you next time. Bye.

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