What food to take on plane for 1 year old?

donkey

Registered User
We will fly to Australia in the next few weeks and am wondering what other mommies will normally take on plane - do you take freshly cooked food or canned? Does the airplane has facilities like fridge to keep the uneaten food and also heat up food?

I think the flight is 8 hours so it will be one to two meal...
 
Hiya! Every time we fly to Oz we always try and take jar food. Sometimes they take it off us when we go through customs. We now phone ahead of time or at time of booking advise that we are bringing a 1 year old and they often cater to their needs by providing Heinz jar food and drinks (This is with Qantas). We do often try and sneak it on though as we have been caught out with flavours that our daughter will not eat. Bear in mind too that if you can buy under 100mls then you are allowed to take on flight. It is 8 - 9 hours to Sydney/Melbourne. xox
 
We always bring our own jar food and baby rice cereal. Finger foods like bread sticks keep our kids happy for a while. You can also pack an avocado or banana if your child likes that and it's ok to have it as long as it's consumed on the plane before you land. We don't normally heat up the jar food, just serve it straight but i am sure if you asked for hot water, they would give it to you to warm up it up.
 
i, too, took jarred food, not heating it up. if it wasn't finished, we threw it out and openned a new jar for the next feeding.

i took a small box of animal crackers, bread sticks, cut grapes (again, make sure you finish or discard BEFORE you get off the plane! VERY IMPORTANT!)
 
can a 1 year old take the kids meal that's serve on board? Cos my gal doesnt take jar food at all, in fact, she hates it. I'm buying an additional seat for her (altho she doesnt need one cos she's just 14mths old) so thinking of requesting for a child's meal instead.
 
you can go for it. once a child gets to a year, they can pretty much eat anything and everything. you might just have to cut the food into really small pieces.

i have found that neither of my kids particularly like the meals. they usually eat the bread/roll and maybe the dessert. not much else. i might get htem to have a few bites of rice or potatoes/noodles and that's it. i don't force it. the LAST thing i want to do on a plane is argue about food.
 
I second the avocado and banana, easy to take onboard and mash up or eat in pieces. Mine eats the yoghurt, fruit salad and bread rolls from the plane. 'Rachels' squeezy packeted fruit and vege puree is good too as I finish it if they don't (B2B and 360).
 
Our plane staples include Cheerios, animal crackers, grapes, and blueberries. Sometimes, cheese wedges, too.
 
My baby also won't eat jar food. On long flights I take homecooked food straight from the freezer. By the time I am ready for him to eat it, it has almost defrosted and then I just ask the stewardess to heat it up. This works particularly well if your bub won't be eating the food for say 5-6 hours after you leave home and you want it to stay chilled so no bacteria grows before eats it. You just have to time it well so that you don't have the food sitting around at room temperature.

The important thing to remember is that it can take 20mins+ to have the food warmed up on the plane so ask before your bub is hungry. I haven't asked them to keep the uneaten portions as I usually just throw that out.

Also, take heaps of snacks - fruit, rice cakes, sultanas etc.

The other thing I take on long flights is formula milk. My baby doesn't drink formula anymore (just cows milk) but I find that bottles of formula keep him occupied and full in case he is too over excited to eat much. Sucking on the bottle keeps him calm and helps him get to sleep on the plane which is very important to me!!

My next trip to Oz is in about 3 weeks and I have ordered a child's meal for him. I will bring back up food though in case the child's meal is not nice.

I hope the flight goes well. The last flight we did from Oz our baby only fell asleep 30 mins before landing. He spent the rest of the time making a LOT of loud noise and trying to get under the feet of the airline staff when they were carrying hot coffee. I think he sat down for 30 mins max and he was specifically interested in "talking to" the passangers who were trying to sleep. I think I was the most hated person on the flight!! After that experience I can survive anything....
 
I didn't take jar food either, not after age 9 months. I would order child meals and I would bring bananas, apple sauce, crackers, bread, waffles, other fruits, raisins, rice cakes, sultana, cereal bars, etc. That's plenty for a 1 yo to eat in a 8-9 hour time frame, especially overnight when they usually don't eat.
 
My dd was 18mths when we went to Melb. on CX. we brought her a ticket and requested the child's meal. From memory, there were meatball noodles, hamburgers, sandwiches & biscuits but we thought the meals were more suitable for children over 2. my child hated and the father ate it all.

They also offered us Heinz jar food but my dd much preferred her own milk bottle.
 
was just talking about this to hubby tonight.

both of my kids love the "hot dog buns" they are the buns that actually have the hot dog baked into it, similare to a "pig in a blanket". i think on my next trip, i'm going to take a couple of them for each of my kids.
 
Thanks guys all very helpful advices. I am definitely taking banana, avocado (hope i can find a ripe one!), yoghurt, cheerios and some jar food. I had already tried different jar food with bub to prepare him and he seems to be fine with them - lucky!

Sherwes, I also think that he will not sleep and will do exactly what you just described! May try to do a day flight instead of an overnight flight so that he will not disturb other passengers too much....
 
We just got back from a trip on Cathay. Cathay gives Heinz jars as their baby meal. We took tons of finger foods which helps, but it also gets everywhere. Bananas are great as well as avocadoes.
 
for finger foods, there are now these freeze dried fruits apples, banana, persimmons, etc. my toddler loves them!! we put them into a cup on the plane so he can eat them by himself and becomes an activity.
 
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