First Meals
Monday, December 4th, 2000
“You know how you became six months old a couple days ago?” Harry cooed, strapping Sage into their highchair. “Well, that means you’re ready to eat food with dada instead of just having formula!”
“Foo!”
“Yeah, food! And, lucky you, you get lots of different food from the get go. You see, in the non-magical world, babies have to try one food at a time to make sure they aren’t allergic. But, since we have magic, I already know you’re not allergic to anything, food or otherwise. That’s why you get oatmeal, applesauce, and, of course, a bottle of formula for breakfast today!”
“Foo! Dada!” Sage giggled.
“Exactly right, kiddo.” Harry made sure the bib, red with a smiling blue train, was on correctly before beginning to spoon feed Sage a bit of oatmeal.
Sage’s first reaction was confusion, they couldn’t quite understand this new sustenance, or why it wasn’t liquid. Still, after Harry took a couple bites of his own, they consented to a second baby spoon full. Then a third.
It wasn’t until Sage was halfway through with the oatmeal, and had drunk some of the formula, that they noticed the applesauce and tried to grab for it. Though this attempt was unsuccessful due to their small arms.
“You want to try the applesauce now, Sage?”
“Aahsau!” The sixth month old insisted, making Harry chuckle a little.
“Alright, kid, don’t worry. You can have some applesauce.”
The applesauce was even more shocking to Sage than the oatmeal. It was another solid(ish) food, but it tasted different! Who would have ever thought?
Sage looked between the two foods before deciding to try the oatmeal again, suspicious about whether or not it tasted the same. When it did, they experimented on the applesauce, creating a bit of a mess, just to discover it was in fact a different substance with a different taste.
“What a little scientist.” Harry chuckled while wiping a bit of applesauce off of Sage’s forehead with his thumb.
“This-” Harry pointed at the first bowl, which was green and had dinosaurs decorating it. “is oatmeal. It’s ground up oats mixed with milk and cinnamon after being cooked in water. And this-” Harry pointed towards the second bowl, blue and covered in sea creatures. “is applesauce. Applesauce is a puree made of apples with optional cinnamon and sugar. They taste and look different because they are made of different ingredients. All food is like that, though some may be more similar in different ways than others.”
Sage was more busy using their hands to shovel the last bits of their food into their mouth than they were listening to Harry, but that was just fine with everyone in the room. The goal at the moment was, after all, to get Sage to start eating, not to teach them about the ingredients in different foods. Not that Harry thought any six month old would ever want to listen to that nor would they really understand or remember it.
So, pulling Sage out of the highchair to clean up, Harry decided the mission was successful.
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“Alright, munchkin, lunch time! Guess what we’re having to eat?!” Harry asked, not really expecting an answer, as he reintroduced Sage and the highchair.
“Foo!” Sage exclaimed, smiling brightly.
Harry matched Sage’s smile, having to bite the inside of his lip so as not to burst out laughing and perhaps make Sage, later on, feel mocked. “You’re not wrong. We are having food. In fact, I would only suggest eating food, but you do you.”
Sage giggled a little, having fun watching their dada situate the food so they could eat together.
“To be a bit more specific we’re eating: some yummy yogurt, a little bit of banana, and formula! Well, you’re having formula, I’m having milk.” Harry explained, demonstrating how to eat the sliced banana first since it was most different from breakfast.
Sage conceded and ate a couple pieces of banana, but was mostly enthralled by the yogurt. After they made grabby hands for it a couple times, Harry gave in.
“Alright, you can have some yogurt now! It’s sort of like the oatmeal and applesauce you had for breakfast, but it tastes and feels a bit different.” Sage enthusiastically took the first bite, kicking their legs in excitement. The yogurt was another piece of the food puzzle, they quickly realized, but didn’t hold it against the food.
Their dada was right, yogurt was yummy.
Sage finished off the rest of the yogurt, though made Harry eat some first before taking a second bite, first, then went back to the banana. Although they were originally slightly put off by it, the fruit was more accepted now. Perhaps because they were yet to find out about other fruit, or the banana plague.
It took Harry a little while longer to finish his food, but that was to be expected considering that there was more of it, and he didn’t spread half of it over himself and the table. Still, Sage was just fine amusing themself by continuing to inspect the remains of their yogurt.
How was it all so similar and different at the same time?
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“Alright, paprika, for dinner we are eating Shepherd’s Pie! And, of course, our classic formula/milk duo.”
Harry ate three bites of his own Shepherd's Pie to try and convince Sage the food was good when they initially refused to even try it. This, unfortunately, didn’t work for this food.
“I know, I know, paprika. Shepherd’s Pie is very different from what you had for breakfast and lunch, but I promise it’s just as good. Plus it has lots of vitamins and protein so your body will function right!” Harry gave a wide smile and shook his hands next to his face like pom poms.
Sage copied the cheerleader move as best as they could, but didn’t seem convinced.
“What’s wrong, kiddo? Why don’t you want to try the Shepherd's Pie?”
Of course, Sage couldn’t answer him, didn’t even really know what he meant. But, even if they could, how would they? This new food was different and not a puree or cereal or finger food and they didn’t know how to handle that, it was overwhelming to their little brain.
“Look, Sage. Look at dada.” Harry made his voice as happy and light as possible though he was becoming frustrated. Still it wasn’t Sage’s fault, this was a part of parenting. He could handle it, had to for Sage.
When the baby finally looked over after a couple more calls, Harry demonstrated eating the pie a few more times. Then he picked up a little bit on Sage’s plastic fork which matched their spoon and brought it towards their face.
Sage still seemed hesitant, but, after a few seconds, they opened their mouth and allowed Harry to place the foreign food inside.
They didn’t immediately like the food, it still took some coercion for them to eat more, but eventually the plate was mostly empty and Sage seemed happy with it.
Harry wasn’t sure if he should present Sage with this food more or less often in the future, but thought that that was likely one of those things Madame Pomfrey said he would just have to learn as he went along.
For now though, the meal was over and Sage didn’t seem completely miserable. So, Harry counted that as a win.
Now, if he could just get them used to the new bedtime routine everything would be golden.