A baby's immune system is not finished, and their stomach acid is less protective than yours. Something that would give you an unpleasant evening can put a six-month-old in hospital. None of this is difficult — but a fair amount of it is done backwards.
Most parents sterilise the weaning bowls obsessively and rinse the bottles. It should be the other way round.
Milk is close to a perfect bacterial growth medium, and teats have crevices that a brush cannot reach.
Hot soapy water and a proper rinse, or a hot dishwasher cycle, is genuinely sufficient. Sterilising these is not harmful — it is simply not achieving anything.
Always wash and rinse first. Sterilising does not clean — it kills what is left on something already clean. And wash your hands before taking anything out.
If you are making up formula, it must be prepared fresh for each feed with water that has been boiled and left to cool for no more than 30 minutes, so it is still at least 70°C. That temperature is the point — it kills bacteria that can be present in the powder itself, because formula powder is not sterile. Made-up formula left standing at room temperature is one of the genuinely high-risk things in infant feeding.
Your grandmother's glass jars were not a period detail. They were the right answer, and they still are.
| Glass | Plastic | |
|---|---|---|
| Leaching into food | None. Glass is inert. | Varies. Heat, fat, acid and scratches all increase it. |
| Staining and smells | Neither. Tomato and turmeric wash straight out. | Both, permanently. |
| Scratching | Effectively no. | Yes — and scratches harbour bacteria and shed particles. |
| Sterilising | Boil, steam or dishwasher without limit. | Degrades with repeated heat. |
| Seeing what is in it | Completely clear, even after years. | Clouds over. |
| Weight and breakage | Heavy, and it breaks. | Light, and it does not. |
The one genuine advantage of plastic is that it does not shatter — which matters once a toddler is holding it. Glass for storage, preparation and freezing; something unbreakable for the thing that actually goes on the highchair tray.
Thermal shock. Glass cracks when the temperature changes suddenly. Never put a hot jar straight into cold water, never pour boiling food into a jar straight from the fridge, and never take a jar from freezer to oven. Let it come up or down gradually — which is precisely what standing a jar in a pan of warm water achieves.
Freezing without headspace. Food expands as it freezes. Leave 2cm at the top, and use jars with straight or outward-sloping sides — anything that narrows at the neck will crack as the contents push against the shoulder.
Fridge temperature should be between 0°C and 5°C. Most home fridges run warmer than their owners believe — a £3 fridge thermometer is the single best value item in this entire section.
The logic of shelf order is simple: nothing can drip onto something that will be eaten without further cooking. That is the whole principle.
| Where | What goes there | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Top shelf | Baby food. Cooked food, leftovers, expressed milk. | Furthest from anything raw. Nothing above it to drip down. |
| Middle shelves | Dairy, eggs, cheese, yoghurt. | Ready to eat, but robust. |
| Bottom shelf | Raw meat, poultry and fish — always sealed, always on a plate or tray. | Lowest point in the fridge. If it drips, it drips onto the bottom of the fridge and nothing else. |
| Salad drawer | Vegetables and fruit. | Humidity controlled, and below the drip line of everything raw. |
| Door | Condiments and juice. | Warmest and most temperature-variable part of the fridge. Never milk, never eggs, never baby food. |
Every time it opens, the door swings out into a warm kitchen. The temperature there fluctuates far more than anywhere else. That the manufacturer moulded a little milk-bottle-shaped shelf into it is a design decision, not nutritional advice.
These are short because there is nothing in the food to make them longer. That is the whole point of the section, and it is worth repeating every time it becomes inconvenient.
| What | Fridge | Freezer |
|---|---|---|
| Home-made purée, vegetable or fruit | 2 days | 3 months |
| Home-made purée containing egg or dairy | 1 day | 1 month |
| Cooked pulses, beans, lentils | 3 days | 3 months |
| Cooked rice | 1 day — cool within 1 hour | 1 month |
| Anything already served to a baby | Throw it away. See below. | |
The moment a spoon that has been in a baby's mouth goes back into the jar, saliva enzymes begin breaking the food down and oral bacteria start multiplying in it. That batch is now a one-meal batch, whatever the fridge says.
Always decant the portion you intend to feed into a separate bowl, and put the jar back in the fridge before you start. Whatever is left in the bowl at the end goes in the bin — not back in the jar, however wasteful it feels.
Food should be cooled and into the fridge within one to two hours of cooking. The danger zone is 8°C to 63°C, and the longer food sits in it the more bacteria multiply. Decanting into shallow portions cools far faster than leaving it in the pan — and freezing in ice cube trays gives you baby-sized portions that cool almost instantly.
Overnight in the fridge, or in the microwave if you are using it immediately. Never at room temperature — the outside reaches bacterial growth temperature long before the middle has thawed.
Steaming throughout, not warm in the middle. Then cool it back down to feeding temperature. Heating it "to warm" does not kill anything.
Never reheat anything a second time. Each cycle through the danger zone is another opportunity for whatever survived to multiply. If you have reheated a portion and the baby does not want it, it goes in the bin.
Microwaves heat unevenly, and baby food is thick enough to hold those pockets. A purée that feels warm on the outside can hold a scalding core.
Always stir thoroughly, let it stand for a minute, stir again, then test. Test on the inside of your wrist — it is far more sensitive than your fingertips. Never test by tasting from the baby's spoon and putting it back.
Never heat a bottle of milk in the microwave at all. Stand it in a jug of warm water instead.
This is how the whole thing becomes sustainable rather than a daily chore, and it is more or less what people did before pouches existed.