Vegetarian Babies

[joshysmummy]

Hi All,
Im a vegetarian, and so far is my nearly 10 month old baby.
To get iron in my diet i supplement the meat with Soy products! & some Tofu! Atm, im just giving Joshy Tofu with his dinner as im not too sure about soy yet. Ive been trying to read up on the best thing to give him at this age but ive been reading lots of mixed reports that im becoming a bit confused so im just wondering if there are any other mums with vege bubs out there and how they have gone about it.
I also need to prove to DH family that a vege lifestyle for bub is fine.
Help!

[Pandora]

I have a great book called 'vegetarian pregnancy & baby book', by Amanda Grant. Its a UK book but from 2005 so failry up to date. It has a lot of inof about foods and a lot of recipes for mums and for babies, ordered by age group.

There are topics like foods to introduce at 10-12 months, foods to avoid at 10-12 months etc. Its quite good.

[krysalyss]

Hi there,
There are lots of good reasons to be veggie but you really need to get some good advice. I strongly recommend seeing a dietician.
The best foods for iron are green leafy vegetables. Make sure you consume veggies with vit c (eg red capsicum) at the same time to maximise absorption.
Also did you know that tofu is soy? From your post it seemed like you thought they were different things. Soy is fine in boys in normal quantities. You definitely wouldnt use a soy supplement or similar though.
You also need to look into B12 if you are not giving him dairy. A B12 deficiency is very dangerous and generally comes from meat, dairy and egg. For a strict vegetarian you would get it from seaweed, mushrooms, soy milk fortified with B12, marmite and supplements.
Also is your bub bf or ff? If he is bf make sure you are eating properly or taking a supplement. If he is ff he would get most nutrients in that.
As I said, definitely look into a dietician as you need to make sure your bubs diet is balanced.