Learn how and why to serve ricotta cheese for babies in this informative article. Keep reading to know the benefits and methods to use as well.
If you are curious about serving ricotta cheese to your baby, you must know the benefits and methods to conform to your baby. Cheese, being a milk product, is always a healthy thing to serve to a baby. Learn more about ricotta cheese for babies and whether it is good for babies or not! Get all your intriguing queries cleared in the below article.
What is Ricotta Cheese?
An Italian whey cheese made up from the milk of a sheep, cow, goat, or Indian water buffalo milk whey, Ricotta cheese is made by coagulating the proteins that remain after the casein has been used to make cheese. The two unique contents are albumin and globulin.
Coming to the nutritional value of the respective cheese, it contains 174 calories in a hundred grams. Fat in the same quantity is 13 grams, and cholesterol is 8 milligrams. Sodium and potassium are present in 84 mg and 105 mg portions, respectively. The total carbohydrate content in hundred grams of cheese is 3 grams, uniformly divided into dietary fiber and sugar. The amount of protein is 11 g which is a good figure for the development of the baby.
Can You Serve Ricotta Cheese to Babies?
As for the research done by the medical science department, there are no harmful effects of ricotta cheese on the health of the baby. However, it should be understood by you that excess of everything is dangerous.
- Ricotta is counted among one of the mildest cheeses served to babies in the initial years of their growth.
- Another thing that makes the cheese safer for the kids to consume is that it consists of total fat and is pasteurized for the child’s safety.
- The types of fat found in Ricotta Cheese are helpful in the baby’s mental and cognitive growth. It also accelerates the physical development of the baby.
Benefits of Ricotta Cheese for Babies
The list of benefits you can enjoy as a parent if you serve Ricotta cheese to your babies is quite long. Refer to the below-given points if you want to know about the details:
- The most prevalent and preferred method is to start offering your baby just 1 to 2 ounces of ricotta cheese in a day when your baby is between 6 and 8 months old.
- All the babies between 8 and 10 months of age can take 3 to 5 ounces of ricotta cheese in a day.
These amounts may sound minor, but they offer notable benefits for the kids.
- Full-fat ricotta cheese is a good source of calcium, protein, and other essential nutrients essential for your baby’s holistic growth. If you serve just half a cup of ricotta cheese to your baby, it can provide 12 grams of protein.
- In half a cup of ricotta cheese, you can find 87 mg of calcium, 167 mg of phosphorus, and 10.2 mg of Selenium.
- Ricotta cheese is a significant source of vitamin A, vitamin B12, riboflavin, and many healthy fats that a baby’s body might require for growth.
When you can see that there are many health benefits of ricotta cheese for babies, you, as a parent, should be aware of all the possible methods to serve it to your baby.
Ricotta Cheese for Babies
The usage for beginners and relatively elder kids varies to a great extent. Below is some information for your reference.
For toddlers (6 to 12 months old)
You can serve fresh ricotta in a bowl and encourage your toddler to use their hands to scoop it out. Do not worry if they make it messy; know that they are learning something new. If you want to help them in the process, you can preload the spoon and hand it to your baby. It requires a lot of effort for the babies to use utensils to eat. Let them eat the way they want to.
For 12 to 24 months old
It is high time that you start serving some nutrition to your baby by adding some fruits like lemon and Cranberries or fresh cheese. This not only gives them more nutrition but also helps them to recognize various tastes.
This is how you serve ricotta cheese to your baby from the age of six months to 2 years.
Bonus Recipe with Ricotta Cheese
Here is a recipe that will tell you how to use ricotta cheese for your baby’s meal.
Ricotta Cheese with Fresh Cranberry Sauce
Ingredients
- Fresh or frozen Cranberries
- Fresh ricotta cheese
Directions
- Wash a large handful of Cranberries under cold water and pick out all the inedible stems or leaves simultaneously.
- Transfer the rinsed Cranberries to a saucepan and add some water to it.
- Cover the saucepan with the lid and boil it. Reduce the heat and let the Cranberries burst and completely soften. The process will take about 30 minutes.
- Once you turn off the heat, use a masher to remove any chance of whole Cranberries if there are some.
- Take out the portion that you want to serve your baby and put the rest in the freezer.
- Add some fresh cheese to a bowl and the Cranberry sauce on top of it. Serve this to your child in a bowl and let them eat with their fingers or a spoon, whichever way they like.
This is how you can use ricotta cheese for babies and its benefits are also mentioned in the article. Let us know how ricotta cheese helped your baby in their early stages of growth.