When Will began eating solids, he wasn’t particularly thrilled with them. He’d eat, but for the most part, there weren’t any moments with us digging desperately at the bottom of a jar for more to put in his eager little mouth.
Until my Mother came along. The voodoo she played over those bowls of mashed fruit and cereal worked wonders. We were amazed at how she got Will to eat… and eat… and eat.
Was it a special angle in her spoon delivery? A certain consistency of cereal? A just-right temperature that was the key? No. Her secret was sugar. She was lacing his food with sugar.
When given the option this weekend to give Kate her first cereal, Mom declined because I vetoed the addition of sugar in her first meal. She didn’t want to feed her something that “tasted like paste.” So Kate’s first meal was postponed until Sunday. I mixed up some cereal with breastmilk and was ready to go… and paused. Did it really taste like paste? In the past, I’ve tasted formula, pureed peas, and yes, even breastmilk. So I tasted Kate’s first cereal. 
It was sweet, just as breastmilk is sweet. Maybe it would taste like paste if made with water or formula but with breastmilk it definitely does not need sugar. Kate loved it. The hardest part was keeping her from thrusting the spoon too far in her mouth as she grabbed at it. Kate has officially started solids! Without sugar!
shokufeh | 01-Nov-06 at 9:41 am | Permalink
I think that, even without sugar, grandmothers have some special power that bewitches the wee ones, making them do whatever grandmother wishes. At least that seems to be the case in our house.
I’ve been lurking here a while, and figured I’d comment, in honor of NaBloPoMo.
Holly | 01-Nov-06 at 1:25 pm | Permalink
Aloha Shokufeh! Welcome home.
I agree; Grandmas hold a special power. I grew up with three Grandmas around me and can definitely attest to this from experience. And I’m quite sure that they put sugar on everything I ate.