Oh baby, it’s dinnertime Trendspotting

The makers of new Sweetpea baby food are brave. They included broccoli in the line ( right). Moms in marketing focus groups said broccoli — so nutritious! — was the number 1 ingredient they wanted to see in baby food.

That and the food should be organic, organic, organic, says Tamar Wagman. (She and Eryn Green, friends since kindergarten, gave birth to the company in Toronto this fall.)

Another plus: Sweetpea is packaged frozen in convenient cube trays embossed with curlicue hearts. ( All the better to cut waste and stay fresh, my dears.) Each tray contains a dozen 25- millilitre cubes ( like ice cubes). Packages are priced from $ 7.49 to $ 8.49, depending on the flavour. You can pop out a portion, then put the tray back in the freezer.

Besides broccoli, babies can tuck into sweet potato, banana- blueberry, veggies and chicken, lentils and root vegetables, or beef, barley and veggies. Our two baby testers didn’t scream for more, nor did they reject them. Grownups at the recent Grocery Innovations Canada show revealed no hesitation in finishing their samples.

Sweetpea has been sweeping into large stores, such as Dominion, Whole Foods Market, Longo’s, Pusateri’s and Highland Farms. Similar competition includes Bobobaby in B. C. and Mother Hen ( La Mère Poule) in Quebec. Look for Sweetpea in its own freezer cases, designed because people aren’t used to looking for baby food in the frozen food section — yet. We think frozen and organic may just be the future of baby food. As for broccoli, that’s up to the babies.