Unfortunately my parents didn’t offer many spicy foods to me when I was young. In my late twenties I got bored with food and thought that foods were just meant to get us through the day. I was fed a cultural norm. Meat, veggies, potato and that’s about it.
Even our granparents thought baby colic was because mom ate too many spicy foods. Grandma questioned our ethics when she found out mom was going to eat what the other adults were at dinner time thinking she’s make baby upset come breastfeeding time. It was pretty comical to see her try to sooth baby Holden by rocking him. From his body language it was pretty clear that he was over stimulated – rather than under-stimulated and so the rocking to sooth his “colic” from having fed him “spicy breast milk” was just because he was worked up. Trying to explain this to her was a bit of a nightmare, but taking our son to a quieter place on his own did the trick. Was the lesson learned? Either way, it probably doesn’t matter.
This brings me to other baby myths. Spicy foods! My son loves them. We use copious amounts of spice in our house now that we understand the power it has to make meals interesting if not just tolerable. Garlic, cajun, jerk spice, chilli beans, jalapenos, curry, lemon spice, cinnamon, and on and on sure make meals more interesting! As it turns out, spice is a highly cultural thing. Babies all across the world eat much varied diets from ours and don’t suffer colic any more so than we do. So as a rule, just introduce spice as you would any other foods, one at a time, just to make sure your baby isn’t allergic.
Try to mix things up and introduce other cultural foods. Try humous, another one of my boy’s favourites. How about baba ghanoush? Never tried it, but I certainly would. Why not, life is short, why make it boring! I always took the stance that including more varied foods into my wife’s diet as she breast fed would help my son grow accustomed to varied foods later on. This would, in turn, avoid issues we might have with having him accept our meals. I certainly didn’t want to have to prepare special meals for my son just because he was a picky eater.
When you do decide to give it a try, have milk ready and keep an open mind. Yeah your baby might get a bit red in the face, but this is normal! Comical too! Just remember that it’s not cruel and your baby is free to quit at anytime he wants. Start off with just a bit (or even milder versions) and let your baby ask for more – mine does!
For more information about introducing spicy foods read this article: “Experts seek to debunk baby food myths – Little evidence supports ‘any particular way of doing things’
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9646449/.