Baby weaning - making your own food

This week I began to wean my youngest on food that I have prepared myself. 

I've opted to prepare the food myself as I feel it has a number of advantages that out-weigh any cons I can come up with.  By preparing the babies food :-

• I know where the food has come from
• I know what is in the food
• I save money as jars of food are very expensive
• I can feed the baby the same food I prepare for the rest of the family instead of preparing something separately (provided I make some simple alterations such as avoiding stock cubes which are high in salt)
• I do not have to worry about disposing of glass jars, pouches etc that ready made food comes in (this also saves me money as I have to pay to have my bin emptied each time it is full, or I have to make a trip to the bottle bank to dispose of glass which costs fuel)

At the moment I am going through the process of introducing food to the baby by giving first tastes of the various vegetables and fruit that I use to cook with.  I'll give tastes of these fruits and vegetables on their own initially so that he can get used to the different tastes and I can make sure he isn't allergic to anything.  Later on I will give him mixes of foods, depending on what the family is eating.

For anyone interested in preparing their own food for baby I recommend Annabel Karmel's website for information on weaning and recipes.