Rice

     So, the first "solid" food that I gave Lexi was rice from the box.... needless to say... YUCK! It looked really gross to me, and it was too soupy, even with not a lot of milk in it (it would absorb more and more milk and become soggier as the feeding went on). I started with boxed rice ereal because I figured I'd try one commercially made thing. But I quickly changed my mind and started to think about how I could make rice with real brown rice. [I used short grain brown rice I bought from the Asian food store, but you can use any that you have available to you.] I read a few suggestions and tried them. The suggestions were to grind up the rice in the food processor/blender. Well, yes it did grind it up, but not as fine as I thought it was going to be. So I started to try first the food processor, then finish it off in the blender. Well stupid me, I broke my blender... haha (I now have a Ninja.. its AWESOME).
      But anyway, it was so tedious because I would take the blended rice and sift it to get the big grains out to grind again. I slowly began to loose hope in this battle. But I didn't give up. I used the ground up rice that I had, and all I did was cook it a much longer, CONSTANTLY stirring it, over the stove in small batches. I would make enough to last a couple days so that it didn't go bad. I was lucky that Lexi liked her food with a bit more sustenance to it so I didn't need to make it too thin. I portioned it out for the next few days and the portion that I was going to feed Lexi at the moment I mixed in a very small amount of milk. [Just be aware that when you add liquid to the rice it makes it thinner, don't put too much in at first. The rice does not end up absorbing it.]
      I grind up the rice in a good size batch so that I don't have to keep grinding it a lot. I keep the uncooked ground rice in tupperware in the cupboard (Lexi has her own shelf). And put however much I want in the pot when I'm going to cook it. Yes, it's not as easy as using the boxed cereal, but let me tell you it TASTES much better! (Since I bought the boxed cereal already and didn't want to throw it out, I actually use it to thicken the rice if I added too much milk in, this will thicken it up and not change the flavor of the rice, as long as you don't put more boxed cereal than rice)
     This was a HIT with Lexi. She still LOVES eating rice now, but in whole grain form and with her hands. (Let me tell you it is HARD to clean rice off a baby! It just keeps sticking EVERYWHERE!! haha)
     I think that all I have to say about RICE! Let me know if you have any questions! =o)