Can I Give My Baby Blackberries?

Once your baby starts eating solid foods, it can be a bit intimidating to figure out what foods they can eat that are healthy for them.

Your pediatrician will have some tips for you, but you probably have questions about specific foods that you don’t get a chance to ask during every checkup.

Blackberries are a fruit that is high in vitamin C, fiber, and antioxidants and they are healthy for an adult to eat, but what about your baby?

Make sure that your baby is old enough

Nutritionists recommend not feeding berries to your baby until they are 4 to 6 months old. Generally, people are unlikely to have a blackberry allergy so it is unlikely that your baby will have a bad reaction to them.

Pediatricians recommend that you hold off on giving your baby blackberries if they have moderate to severe eczema or if they have been diagnosed with other food allergies.

Berries can be a choking hazard

Berries can be a choking hazard if they are not chewed properly. Your baby is still learning to chew properly. Until they master chewing and have a good amount of teeth, all berries and grapes should be cut in half to reduce the choking risk.

Although blackberries have larger seeds than most other berries the seeds themselves do not pose a hazard (but don’t be alarmed if you see seeds in their diaper, that just means they passed through their digestive system just fine).

A good way to introduce blackberries is to puree them and strain the seeds out. A berry-flavored baby-friendly smoothie is a way to introduce many of the nutrients berries have to offer for a baby that isn’t quite ready for chewing the fruit.

The fruit is a great introduction to solid foods

Fruit is some of the best solid food to introduce to your baby’s diet. Also, is naturally sweet and most fruit is soft enough for your baby to chew before all of their teeth come in.

Fruit is high in vitamins and nutrients. Because it doesn’t need to be cooked before it is eaten, these nutrients are not broken down or destroyed by the cooking process as they can be in cooked veggies.

Great fruit options to introduce around four months

There are a lot of great fruits that are superfoods that can provide a convenient source of vitamins and nutrients.

Most parents give their baby bananas as one of their first solid food because bananas are very soft and easy to chew, but your options for soft and easily chewable fruit is not limited to bananas. Other great options include mangoes and avocado.

Bananas are a good source of vitamins C and B6 as well as potassium. Mangoes are easy to mash up and mix with yogurt or vegetables and contain A, B6, and C, as well as potassium and fiber.

Avocados are a well-known superfood that is rich in vitamin C, vitamin K and foliate. Avocado mashed up is creamy and easy to digest and will probably be a hit with your baby.

Add more fruit as your baby gets older

You can expand your options of fruit as your baby gets a little older. At six months you can introduce apples. You’ve heard that an apple a day keeps the doctor away, and the adage is not wrong.

Apples are rich in vitamin C and can help to stave off iron deficiency. Iron deficiency is a real risk in toddlers as they begin to wean and are no longer getting iron from breast milk.

Cantaloupe is an option you might not have thought of introducing but it can be added to your baby’s diet at nine months.

Cantaloupes are great finger foods for babies learning to feed themselves and on top of nutrients and vitamins also has high water content and can help to keep your baby well hydrated at an age that it might be hard to get them to drink enough.

Prunes aren’t just for grandma

Prunes, which are just dried plums, will help your baby’s digestion. A common issue that babies face is constipation, so a natural alternative to harsh laxatives is a great choice. Dried plums can help with digestion issues that cause constipation.

Keeping prunes in your baby’s regular diet can help to prevent digestion issues, but they can also be introduced as a way to treat them as they come up.

While dried prunes might be hard for your baby to chew, you can rehydrate them in a little warm water. Just be careful not to boil them and risk losing some of the nutrients you’re looking for.

There’s always more to try

You can keep adding new fruit to your baby’s diet as they get older. Introducing new food to your baby’s diet is important to meet their nutritional needs and to help develop their palette (you’ll thank yourself later when you’re trying to get your little one to try new foods as they grow up).

Citrus fruits are something you should hold off on until your baby’s first birthday, but they are very nutritious and fun to eat for your toddler.

Conclusion

Blackberries are one of the first solid foods that you can introduce to your baby’s diet, but like any small finger food, it is important to reduce choking risks by cutting them into smaller pieces.

Blackberries in particular can get very large so you may need to cut them into more than two pieces. For a baby that hasn’t gotten very good at chewing just yet, consider other ways to introduce blackberries into their diet like smoothies or a puree.

Every baby’s tastes will be different, but berries are a sweet and nutritious option that is likely to appeal to even a picky eater.