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We did mostly baby led weaning with my older one. Regardless of the food I gave her, I would only put one or two pieces at a time in front of her to prevent stuffing too much in her mouth at once. I remember favorites being sweet potato wedges, Spears of butternut squash, avodcado pieces... (btw all things she refuses to eat now at 5). Shredded cheese was good (there are some brands that have really big chunky shreds that are easier to pick up). Ripe pears slices. Toast fingers. And Greek yogurt is nice and thick for when she can start using a spoon, and filling.

But the biggest thing was limiting how much she had on her plate:tray at a time.

You can make veggie fritter style pancakes, examples would be grated carrot and cheese, corn and cheese, etc. You can also mix purées veggies or purées fruits into a pancake batter that can be made with or without eggs, milk, etc depending on where you are with introduction of those or if she eats them. Then I cut those into fairly small squares and let them self feed with a small amount given to them at a time. I just cut everything pretty small or into strips, which isn’t necessarily blw, but if you’re not comfortable with kids gagging or if you know they jam a lot in their mouth then it’s a better option to me. It’s more important to me that my kids get food into their tummies versus true blw.

Other options medium tofu or soft in chunks or strips (very easy to eat and safe choking wise), you can spread hummus on crackers or mum mums, roll mashed potato into little balls. I also like to mix in puréed veggies with rice or quinoa so they can eat it easier and it has texture for kids who don’t like totally smooth stuff. My kids also loved avocado, just spoon feeding them or in slices and steamed broccoli in small pieces.

My college roomie is a registered dietitian and has super deataiked and easy meal ideas and recipes for baby led weaning on her instagram @kidfriendly.meals. My older teo did traditional purées but my 3rd likes to chew and is not really fans so her instagram is super helpful.

Pasta cooked in chicken broth is great finger food and feels a little more substantial then mum-mums. When we went through face stuffing phases I would have to give small amounts at a time. I gave my kids all kinds of table food... soft chicken, cooked veggies cut in squares, crusty bread, apples, cheese, peas, banana, sweet potato in cubes...

My kiddo I s the same age. He loves berries (frozen ones are mushier), any kind of roasted veggies, peas, Bamba, avocado toast, and grapefruit.

Their gag reflex is supposed to be so strong that they will cough and or throw it up before true choking. So I have heard anyway. And witnessed at a daycare that actually did true blw and scared the crap out of me when the lady was giving the kids big pieces of fruit and food. I have also had a few incidents, maybe two, that made me worried that we were entering choking and my kid ended up vomitting instead right before I went into panic mode. It happened very quickly, but a few minutes later we were all fine and carried on.

If you give her a sweet potato wedge and she shoves the whole thing in then just leave it and it should be fine, is what I think anyway. For sure it’s a risk. I think the only way to avoid is to provide small pieces of food and give her only a small amount or a few pieces at a time, the benefit of that is less wasted food, added safety, and allows her and you to practice more communication for asking for more. And then increase amounts when you think and see she is choosing to be more careful. Did T ever choke? I haven’t had a choking incident, but have fished foods out of my kids’ mouths with the hooked finger when I thought what they ate or how much they ate might be a bad idea. And my kid who shovels food in does great with the huge shovelled in amounts and too big pieces of a rolled up wrap (I still cut toast into either tiny squares or toast fingers) but tends to gag and cough or vomit up tinier pieces of food or food in an odd shape/ too dry like a piece of a nut or stuff like that. My second has limited teeth to use. I say “that’s too much” on a daily basis and hope for the best. But obviously that’s not an ideal place to start with a kid as young as yours.

As for info for people not on board, I’d just find some articles online that are a bit more scholarly. I can’t recommend any specifically, but I do remember reading a few online when I was first introduced to the concept a few years before I had my own children. And I still have to tell my mother that it’s okay when she sees me feeding my kids certain stuff. If I act confident she lets it go, but she has been around the block with a bunch of her own kids and grandkids and is still nervous.

@Mrs. Turtle: my kids are the same for not letting me spoon feed and then fine with her. Ha! I just let whoever else is watching my kids, rarely anyone else, but still, I let them do whatever because I know I’ll do whatever I choose to do most of the time for them so I don’t sweat it.

A friend’s kid has been shovelling food in from 11 months-now 21 months and doesn’t seem to be slowing down. I have to cut food small to slow him down, but even then this kid will just jam handfuls of quartered grapes in his mouth...

Hopefully you’ll have more luck with N. you can always try and if it’s not for you then go back to what works. No harm done. Either way the food goes in!

@Mrs. Turtle: so my kid is obsessed with this basting brush. He wants to chew it all of the time. When he stuffs his face too full I hand him the brush while singing "chew, chew, chew your food. You can chew your food". He then starts spitting out the footto get the brush.

My husband and daycare were really resistant. I would leave them with silicone mesh feeders. Daycare got over it when they saw R crush an entire plate of finger food at a holiday party. Their rule is that other than Bamba, everything else has
to be smaller than a cheerio. So I send tiny pieces to school. Maybe you can give them easy foods (blackberries and peas) to start?

Solids with DS1 were a bit rough like you mentioned with stuffing too much food in his mouth. We had 3 episodes close to/actually choking that are still burned in my mind. DW had to grab him and hit him on the back and he puked and it was horrible. So I get your apprehension and also your DW and others. I’m nervous to do solids with DS2 and he’s just 4 months old! I was all about the BLW but we had to do small bits of food for quite a while and bowls of oatmeal like consistency stuff that he could lick off his hands or attempt using a spoon. It was just too scary once we had a couple episodes. All the above mentioned foods we had good success with but we had to cut into small pieces and give only 2 or 3 at a time and do a chew chew chew song for quite a while. Maybe you could start each feeding time with something your kid really likes and easily eats so they aren’t so frantic hungry and then move onto other things that require a bit more concentration and hopefully less stuffing of the face. Something to take the edge off so to say.