With Elijah I did BLS and he just had whatever we were having... yes including steak... I have photos of him at 8 months old with a big chunk of steak and him just sucking/gumming it to bits! He LOVED it so much. Pasta, I just started using spiral pasta so it was easier for him to hold in his hand and pick it up. They learn so fast to just eat what we do and I had so many less problems with him gagging or anything like that than I did with Oskar who I did the whole "puree, lumpy" etc with.