Chicken

Well-cooked chicken can be offered when your baby is ready for solids, around 6 months.

The chicken comes from a wild bird of South Asian jungles. Almost every part is used in cooking. Iron-rich liver becomes pâté. The carcass, feet and head give collagen-filled, protein-rich stock. The skin yields a tasty fat called schmaltz.

Nutrition

Chicken gives protein and fat along with choline, iron, selenium and zinc. It also holds vitamins B3, B6 and B12. They help growth, the brain, energy levels, red blood cells, the immune system, and hormones.

Drumstick and bone safety

At 6 months you can give a drumstick that is cooked through, with the skin, loose cartilage, and fat taken off. Your baby will not eat much, and that is fine. If a big piece is torn off, do not step in right away. Give your baby time to work with it. The thin bone along the drumstick, the pin bone, is out of reach for most babies' bites. When your baby gets the meat off down to the pin bone, remove the rest of the meat, the cartilage, and the pin bone, and let them hold only the main bone as a teether.

Before serving, bend the bone and press on its edges. If it snaps easily, crumbles at the edge or splinters, do not serve it. Simmering the drumstick or slow cooking it at low heat reduces brittleness.

Other forms

Long flat strips about as thick as two adult fingers, shredded chicken mixed into mashed vegetables, and chicken meatballs all work. Cook meatballs to 165 F (74 C). They should mash between thumb and finger and be larger than your baby's mouth. Simmering minced chicken in a sauce, or folding breadcrumbs, egg and milk into meatballs, keeps them tender.

Food safety

Chicken is linked with bacteria such as Salmonella and Campylobacter. Keep chicken in the fridge or freezer, apart from produce. Thaw frozen chicken in the fridge, never on the counter. Cook it to an inside temperature of 165 F (74 C) before serving. Wash hands and surfaces that touched raw meat.

Chicken nuggets

Nuggets tend to contain a lot of sodium. Now and then is okay, provided the nuggets are prepared to cut the choking risk. If the coating is very hard and crunchy, peel it off or wait until about 18 months. After 9 months, bite-sized pieces of soft, not-too-crunchy nuggets can be offered.

Chicken, as with every meat and poultry, can cause choking. Do not give large chunks or cubes. Do not overcook it, since dry meat is harder to chew and swallow. Stay within arm's reach at meals.

No. Chicken seldom causes allergy. Still, poultry allergy has been reported. Chicken can also trigger a delayed allergy called FPIES. Vomiting starts 2 to 4 hours after eating chicken, and diarrhea may go with it.

People with fish allergy are rarely at higher risk of reacting to chicken. Some people with feather and egg allergy test positive to chicken meat. The allergy-causing protein is heat sensitive, though, so well-cooked meat usually causes no symptoms. Routine testing for chicken meat is not advised in egg allergy.

Start with a small amount for the first servings. If there is no reaction, raise the amount slowly.