As parents, we all want the best for our children, and that starts with nutrition. The journey of introducing solids to your baby can be both exciting and overwhelming. With countless baby food brands on the market, each promising optimal health and nutrition, it's hard to know where to start. This article provides a comprehensive review of several popular healthy baby food brands, examining their ingredients, variety, packaging, cost, and transparency to help you make informed decisions.
The Importance of Real Food
In a world saturated with dietary advice and prescribed "regimens," one thing remains constant: the importance of eating real food, right from the start. Starting your baby's culinary journey with wholesome, unprocessed foods sets the stage for a lifetime of healthy eating habits.
A Hodgepodge Approach: Balancing Convenience and Homemade
Many families, when introducing solids, opt for a mix of convenient baby purees and homemade options. Packaged baby food can be a lifesaver for busy parents, but it's essential to choose brands that prioritize quality and nutrition.
Amara: A Unique Powdered Option
Amara stands out with its unique powdered form, which requires mixing with water, breast milk, or formula. This innovative approach uses a "nutrient protection technology" to remove water from whole foods, preserving their nutritional content. While third-party data on Amara's proprietary process is limited, existing research suggests that food dehydration is an effective preservation method.
Taste and Nutritional Value
Amara baby foods retain much more of the nutritional contents of their ingredients than your average repeat high heat, processed baby food. Amara tastes like real, rich, wholesome food. This is particularly important during infancy and toddlerhood, when taste preferences are being developed.
Read also: Healthy food access with Highmark Wholecare explained.
Additional Benefits
Each Amara box comes with a fun "toddler recipe" that’s simple enough for a toddler to work on independently (at least partly), like pancakes or a smoothie.
Cost
At full price, each Amara pouch is ~$2.50 if you bought a bulk pack (though each pouch only makes ~3.5 oz food).
Yumi: Organic, Convenient, and Flavorful
Yumi is an organic, direct-to-consumer (DTC) baby food company that emphasizes "whole foods with no junk," as well as being gluten and dairy-free. Yumi is intentional about its ingredients, which are all high quality and organic, sourced from local farmers. The brand’s goal is “an easy, worry-free option that you can feel good about and to share knowledge that inspires a lifetime of eating.”
Ingredients and Quality
Yumi's commitment to real food is evident in its high-quality, organic ingredients sourced from local farmers. Every meal is free of sugar, preservatives, and allergens. Yumi is the recipient of the Clean Label Project Purity Award, which tests for over 400 environmental and industrial toxins including heavy metals. Yumi doesn’t use any rice products, thus avoiding the issue altogether.
Variety
Ingredient and meal variety is one of my favorite things about Yumi. From basics like simple peach or zucchini purees, to more complex flavors like adzuki bean, Japanese sweet potato and dragon fruit, Yumi’s meals make it so easy to expose your baby to a huge array of flavors from day one. Once baby is a bit older, Yumi offers combination meals like a Cubano quinoa bowl, mushroom bolognese, and broccoli lentil bites that -- dare I say -- give your baby a five star restaurant experience right at home.
Read also: Healthy Eating on the Run
Packaging
Yumi’s packaging is very cute. I love that the jars are compact and come with resealable lids in case your little doesn’t eat everything at once. They’re made with BPA/BPS-free plastic, and while I prefer glass, Yumi actually intentionally chose plastic so that babies could self-feed (aka throw the jar on the ground). What’s even more awesome is that the jars and insulation are curbside recyclable and the custom ice packs are reusable.
Cost and Purchase Model
Yumi’s model is anchored in weekly subscription, where fresh food is delivered right to your door (awesome). Depending which plan you choose, meals range from $3.75-$4.30/jar and are totally customizable based on what you want to serve each week.
Little Spoon: Fresh, Organic, and Convenient
Little Spoon is another DTC brand that creates fresh meals with a variety of high-quality ingredients. Little Spoon also boasts 100% organic, non-GMO ingredients that are free of preservatives, and after testing out the brand’s baby blends and toddler smoothie pouches, I am really impressed with the ingredient quality. It truly tastes fresh.
Ingredients and Quality
Little Spoon also boasts 100% organic, non-GMO ingredients that are free of preservatives. Little Spoon’s meals are not totally allergen free -- many of the meals do contain gluten or dairy.
Variety
Little Spoon’s babyblend line is also full of interesting and delicious flavors, like parsnip, broccoli banana hemp, or our current favorite gingerbread cookie (a festive blend of pumpkin, cloves, allspice, cinnamon, ginger, date, squash and pear).
Read also: Mobile Dining Revolution
Packaging
The Little Spoon jars have a similar vibe (100% BPA free; made with #1 PET plastic and #5 PP Plastic), but because they’re square I find it’s easier to stack them up in the fridge (it’s the little things, you know?). They also come with mini spoons, which are nice for feeding on the go. In addition, Little Spoon’s toddler plates are microwave and dishwasher safe, meaning you can reuse them for future meals or even crafts.
Cost and Purchase Model
Little Spoon is also an online-only subscription model based business. Deliveries come roughly every 2 weeks and baby blends range from $2.74-$3.49/jar. Similarly, you can customize what you like/don’t like for each delivery.
Gerber: A Household Staple with Organic Options
Gerber, a household staple, offers an entire line of organic purees that are also unsalted and made without artificial flavors or colors. In fact, other than a Vitamin C preservative (to ensure shelf stability), the ingredients are squeaky clean. Gerber is also pretty transparent about ingredient sourcing which I really appreciate. Even the “natural” line is more or less clean making Gerber a great option for families who prefer to buy in store.
Ingredients and Quality
Gerber has an entire line of organic purees that are also unsalted and made without artificial flavors or colors. Gerber is also pretty transparent about ingredient sourcing which I really appreciate. Even the “natural” line is more or less clean making Gerber a great option for families who prefer to buy in store.
Variety
While I was pleasantly impressed with the food quality, unfortunately Gerber doesn’t offer nearly the same variety as we see with Yumi and Little Spoon. The lineup is largely full of the “basics” - squash, apple, pear, broccoli, things like that. It would be great for first foods, but doesn’t do much in terms of consistently exposing your kids to a range of flavors.
Packaging
There are a few things I really love about Gerber’s packaging -- first, I appreciate that the jars are on the smaller side (in case baby doesn’t want a bigger meal) and glass. Second, Gerber recently shared plans to be 100% carbon neutral by 2035, starting with baby jars and pouches. In early 2020, Gerber announced a first-of-its-kind, single-material baby food pouch which is more recyclable than its competitors.
Cost and Purchase Model
Gerber, as we all know, is widely available and can be purchased at pretty much any grocery or convenience store. Prices vary a bit based on store, but generally range from $0.98-$2 per jar, making it super affordable.
Transparency and Heavy Metal Testing: A Crucial Factor
Consumer Reports and Unleaded Kids recently evaluated 39 baby food brands to assess their transparency in sharing test results for contaminants. A new California state law requires testing for toxic elements in most baby food, including lead and arsenic-and the public disclosure of those results.
AB 899: A Step Towards Transparency
California Assembly Bill No. 899 (AB 899), which passed in 2023, requires all baby food manufacturers selling in the state to test their products at least once a month for lead, arsenic, cadmium, and mercury. This law is a major win for parents, who are faced with making complex decisions about what to feed their babies after numerous studies have found concerning levels of toxic elements in store-bought baby food.
Transparency Challenges
While some brands are making strides toward full transparency, the industry as a whole has a long way to go toward providing meaningful comparative information that’s easy for consumers to access. Some companies require consumers to track down additional information, including best-by dates, lot numbers, or UPCs (unique serial numbers), making the process of accessing test results more difficult for busy parents.
Why Transparency Matters
Exposure to heavy metals is harmful to all humans, but it can be especially detrimental in infancy and early childhood-a period of rapid growth and development. Lead, arsenic, and cadmium are regularly found in fruits, vegetables, and grains-primary ingredients used in both store-bought and homemade baby food.
FDA's Closer to Zero Plan
The Food and Drug Administration’s Closer to Zero plan aims to reduce children’s exposure to lead, cadmium, arsenic, and mercury while maintaining access to nutrient-rich foods.
Brand Responses to AB 899
Several baby food companies have responded to AB 899 by implementing various testing and transparency measures.
- Square Baby: Vets farms and suppliers, selects those that have implemented systems to reduce heavy metals in their soil, and works with a lab that tests finished products for contaminants down to 3 ppb-which is more stringent than the 6 ppb required by AB 899.
- Cerebelly: Monitors its supply chain and partners with growers who regularly test their soil, water, and products for heavy metals.
- Nestlé (Cerelac, Nestum, and Gerber): Tests crops, water, ingredients, and final products to ensure high-quality, safe baby food.
- Once Upon a Farm, Plum Organics, and Square Baby: Voluntarily made their 2024 testing results publicly available, which the companies say goes beyond what’s required by AB 899.
- Little Spoon: Requires a lot code to access test results, arguing that it provides a traceable and accurate mechanism to link a consumer to the specific testing results for the product they received.
- Babylife Organics: Requires consumers to enter a lot number to view test results, believing it's more responsible to share precise data for the exact package of baby food, rather than averages or representative samples.
- Beech-Nut: Designed its testing results platform based on customer feedback, aiming to provide context and specific information about products consumers are actually buying.
- Sprout Organics: Also requires a lot number to check test results.
- Little Bellies: Requires a lot code to access product testing results, noting that all of its products meet best-in-class international standards.
- Happy Family Organics: Requires entering a best-by date and product name before viewing results.
- Kroger (Simple Truth): Test results are accessible by QR code and lot code on products sold in California.
- Walmart (Parent’s Choice): Test results for baby foods are accessed through a QR code and lot code on product packaging.
- Love Child Organics: Test results are accessible by lot code via a QR code on the package.
- Piko Provisions: Is working with a third-party testing company to test products for contaminants, including heavy metals, and is working on making those results accessible to customers, in compliance with AB 899.
- Loco Bebé: Is working to publish its test results on its site.
Factors to Consider When Evaluating Test Results
- Level of Detection: Some brands may list their test results as “too low” to be detected, using the term “non-detect” or ND. AB 899 requires a threshold of 6 ppb for each toxic element, though more sensitive assessments exist.
- Serving Size: Parts per billion (ppb) is a ratio, not an amount, and doesn’t take serving size into account.
- Testing Methods: It's important to understand how the testing was performed and how serving sizes relate to the level of exposure.
Minimizing Heavy Metal Exposure: Practical Tips
- Increase Variety: Multi-ingredient baby food blends may be a good option over single-ingredient purées because they increase dietary variety, which can help lower the risk of exposure to toxic elements.
- Steer Clear of Rice: Try to avoid rice (especially infant rice cereal) due to arsenic concerns.
- Consider Store-Bought vs. Homemade: Store-bought infant foods could in fact be a little safer when it comes to heavy metal exposure because they are routinely tested.
Other Notable Brands
- Once Upon a Farm: This brand’s recipes are designed by a registered dietitian and made in small batches with high-quality ingredients. The brand has a Clean Label Project Purity Award winner.
- Happy Family Organics: Founded to provide a wide variety of organic baby food options to parents, this brand offers a range of 100% USDA organic jars and pouches that are Clearly Crafted, meaning they are fully transparent so you can see exactly what is inside the pouch.
- Cerebelly: Founded by a practicing neurosurgeon, this line of organic baby food focuses on incorporating 16 brain-supporting nutrients into every product, ranging from pouches to snack bars.
- Serenity Kids: This innovative baby food brand offers exceptional high-quality meats, poultry, and fish in pouch form alongside organic veggies and premium oils.
- Beech-Nut: This brand offers simple purees perfect for baby food introduction. Glass jars make for a more sustainable choice.
- Little Spoon: Designed to grow with your baby as they progress into toddler and big kid years, this subscription-based baby food service is one you can stick with for a while.
- Tiny Organics: These textured organic baby and toddler meals from Tiny Organics are designed for baby-led weaning and are conveniently delivered to your door.
- White Leaf Provisions: Sustainably-minded parents may want to prioritize both regenerative agriculture and organic farming when sourcing ingredients for baby food.
- Square Baby: Ideal for infants between the ages of 4 to 8 months, this line of Square Meals offers a variety of purees with impeccable ingredients.