High Potassium Foods

At about 10 months baby can begin finger food and sampling food from the family table. This is an especially crucial time. From this time until about 13 months the baby will try different foods. This is the ideal time to introduce healthy high potassium foods. At 13 months baby becomes more resistant to trying new foods. What you feed at this age will be what baby prefers. If it is high potassium foods that you introduce, then that will be preferred.

If it is processed food with high sodium, then that will be preferred. If you introduce the high potassium vegetables at this table, they will tend to prefer them.

Precautions

There are still some precautions for foods to make them safer. The baby's airway is still at risk from choking, so avoid seeds and tough skins. Fruits and vegetables should be peeled and have seeds removed. Meats should be soft. The pieces should be easy for them to handle, and there shouldn't be much chewing involved.

Avoid foods that can choke, such as nuts, seeds, raw carrots and celery, unpeeled fruits and vegetables, whole kernel corn, whole beans, cherry tomatoes, whole grapes and berries, peanuts, popcorn, raisins, candies, gum, or large chunks of foods, especially tough foods

Usefulness Of Hand Held Blender/Food Mill

For many of these foods a hand held blender or food mill should be obtained for quick and easy processing of food into a puree for the younger baby, or to introduce the taste of a food that would be a choking hazard if taken whole. If you have a small mechanical mill, you can take two tablespoons of food and with two turns of the crank have suitable food. Or you can make a batch and store the extra in a plastic ice cube tray in the refrigerator. Cover the tray with plastic wrap to keep it from picking up the refrigerator odors. Some of the foods may still need straining. Nuts and beans are such good high potassium foods, that the taste should be introduced as a puree.  High potassium nuts can be found here, and beans here.

Finger Food

By ten months, strips and slices of food can be managed by baby. The goal is to get the child eating the same food as the family. Good choices to start are cooked vegetables as strips or slices, peeled, soft fruit without seeds as a wedge or slice, cereal, bread, beans, eggs, cow's milk, and fruit juice (no added sugar).  High potassium vegetables can be found here, and fruits here.

Institute Of Medicine Recommendations

The Institute of Medicine recommends 700 mg of potassium a day for babies 7 to 12 months, 3000 mg for those 1 to 3 years old, 3800 mg for 4 to 8 year olds.

Table

The weights all are grams except for the potassium and sodium, which are milligrams. Calories, protein, total fat, carbohydrate, sugar, fiber, potassium and sodium values given are for 100 grams of food.

The serving size and weight for a baby differs from 100 grams, so we have listed the serving weight and the common measurement that corresponds to that weight as listed in the USDA table. As the baby ages, the serving size grows to 2 to 4 tablespoons.

K is potassium. Na is sodium. 

Except for the potassium to sodium ratio and the amount of potassium per serving (which we calculated), the source of data is: 

USDA National Nutrient Database Standard Reference – Release 22