Publishers Group West: Baby-Led Weaning by Gill Rapley

The benefits are great

— Independent

[Baby-led weaning] makes life so much easier.

— The Times

It sounds like common sense: after all, would you want to be strapped into a high chair and force-fed spoon after spoon of bland vegetables? It's surely much more exciting to be able to exercise a bit of control over your diet.

— The Guardian

I see many happy children, who chose their own food independently and eat at their own pace.

— Stefan Kleintjes, pediatric dietitian

Sharing food with Mirah has turned out to be one of the great joys of parenting. Watching her respond to the pleasures of ripe tomatoes, curried rice noodles, and all kinds of meats and vegetables has made mealtime a much more enjoyable experience for all three of us. We can tell she is learning through all of her senses about how various substances respond to being crumbled or dropped or mushed. She seems to really like that she is eating the same foods as we are, and since we are generally sharing the same meal, I am more likely to make us all something healthy.

— Aimee Pohl, Babble.com

It's been wonderful, and very funny, watching her discover food, her great concentration in navigating new textures and exploring new tastes& One of our favourite things about BLW is its emphasis on families eating together.

— Nicola Kent, The Guardian

You just hand them the food in a suitably-sized piece and if they like it they eat it and if they don't they won't& That's the essence of Baby Led Weaning. No purees, no ice cube trays, no food processor, no potato masher… just you and your child, eating food that you enjoy with you and your family& My baby is nearly seven months old and& ADORED feeding herself while her parents ate their own meals. I can't even begin to tell you how pleasant it is to eat in a restaurant with your Baby Led Weaning child chomping on a piece of bread and butter or a chunk of cucumber from your salad beside you.

— Aitch, founder of Babyledweaning.com

The thing I really love about baby led weaning is that my son can actively participate in family meals& I love that I don't have to cook 2 different meals, I simply have to adjust our family meal to ensure it's suitable for him& We're having a blast watching our little men truly learn to enjoy and appreciate food in all of its glory. And it's SO much easier than purees!

— NaturalParentingTips.com

As a child psychiatrist, I have worked on a team for children with feeding difficulties& One of the main things I would recommend to these families is giving the child control, and allowing them to have small successes to build on rather than pushing food on them and ending up in a battle& I believe strongly in baby led play (again, something I would teach at work) and baby led routines rather than routines being forced on babies to suit parents' lifestyles (as suggested by at least one popular parenting book). So this intuitively makes sense to me.

— Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist (psychiatristparent.wordpress.com)