The 3 Safest Baby Food Brands

As little ones grow, parents want to ensure their babies eat the best-tasting, most nutritious, and safest foods available. That’s why we put together this list of the four safest baby food brands, taste-tested and reviewed by TNI experts.

Why Safe Baby Food is Important

Over the past few years, the pressure has been on baby food manufacturers to ensure the safety of food for our most vulnerable human population: babies. It seems reasonable, right?

Well, this push didn’t come out of nowhere. In 2021, The U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Reform published a report revealing that top baby food products (including popular brands like Gerber, Sprouts, and Happy Baby) contained harmful levels of heavy metals, including arsenic, lead, cadmium, and mercury.

But why does this happen? Unfortunately, many of these heavy metals naturally occur in our soil or accumulate from pollutants in the water and air. On top of that, some crops—like rice, carrots, and sweet potatoes—absorb these metals more readily.

Unfortunately, this means that even making baby food at home with store-bought produce does not ensure that it is heavy metal-free either.

Additional concerns about pesticide residue on produce and plasticizers leaking into food from packaging have also been raised.

To protect little ones and ease parents’ concerns, baby food brands have begun to go the extra mile to prevent these harmful compounds from entering their products. This typically includes vetting suppliers, improving packaging quality, and participating in the Clean Label Project, which extensively tests products for hundreds of harmful compounds to ensure babies are only getting the best quality products.

Which brands do it best? Check out the list below!

Insider Picks

Best Overall: Serenity Kids | → Go to Review

Best for Growing Minds: Cerebelly | → Go to Review

Best Tasting: Once Upon a Farm | → Go to Review

Why Trust Our Reviews?

The Nutrition Insider prides itself on being a neutral third party that only reviews products we believe in. Our team consists of doctors, registered dietitians, and food experts who are dedicated to providing you with the best science-backed takes on the latest food and nutrition trends and health products.

Our content dives deeper than surface-level branding and marketing claims, providing you with value-added “industry insider” information. For more information about how The Nutrition Insider conducts its reviews and other aspects of our business, please feel free to read our Editorial Policy.

1. Serenity Kids: Best Overall

Serenity Kids earns an A+ because their products are highly nutritious, low in sugar, and made from sustainable and ethical ingredients, with extensive heavy metal testing to ensure safety. Despite being pricier, their commitment to transparency, eco-friendly practices, and quality sourcing from regenerative farms makes them a standout choice in the baby food market.

Nutrition & Ingredients

The ingredients are a great mix of vegetables, ethically sourced protein sources, and low-sugar fruits to keep the sugar content low. Each pouch contains “baby-appropriate” amounts of protein and healthy fats with no dairy, rice, preservatives, or gluten.

Serenity Kids is exceptionally committed to sourcing ingredients from US farms that follow regenerative agricultural practices. Nearly all the ingredients used are organic. However, I did notice some pouches have the USDA organic label and some do not. 

Here is an explanation from Serenity Kids, “We source from farmers that raise their animals exclusively on pasture in sustainable and regenerative ways, which means they rotate the grazing constantly to avoid overgrazing any one area. This practice makes organic certification extremely costly because every inch of pasture on their farm would have to be certified. On the other hand, our Salmon is wild caught, which means it also cannot be certified organic because it is not a product of agriculture.”

Serenity Kids goes to great lengths to reduce or entirely prevent heavy metal and pollutant contamination. They not only participate in the Clean Label Project, which tests for these contaminants, but they also solely purchase from suppliers that conduct testing on their soil.

Product Experience

The pouch itself is colorful, engaging, and easy to read. It doesn’t scream, “This is baby food!” at the top of its lungs, which I think is kind of nice. It’s definitely made with parents in mind. Compared to other brands, the only difference with this pouch is that it doesn’t have a clear bottom, which could be a concern if you want to check a product for spoilage before opening. On the other hand, you could just smell it before giving it to your baby.

The first smell of the product is definitely “vegetable-y”, though not unpleasant. On the first taste, I definitely noticed the reduced presence of sugar compared to other brands I tried. The taste is savory but mild, though definitely not lacking in flavor. The texture was smooth as well. This was one of the only pouches I actually finished!

Since the macronutrients are so well-balanced and the flavor is tasty, I would totally eat this as a snack on the go.

Transparency

Serenity Kids goes the extra mile with transparency and labeling. Their website answers almost any question about the product or brand in their FAQ. Consumers can also read learn more about their suppliers, the reasoning behind their product formulation, and the lengths they go to prevent heavy metals and pollutant contamination.

Sustainability

Serenity Kids isn’t just among the most sustainable baby food brands I’ve found; it’s one of the most sustainable food brands, period. Their ingredient sourcing from ethical and regenerative farms, quality testing, and eco-friendly packaging sets them well above the rest.

They demonstrate that it is possible for brands to do more than one thing really well: being tasty, safe to eat, and environmentally friendly.

Value

Serenity Kids baby food pouches cost between $3.79 and $4.49 each. This is well above the average price of other baby food pouches on this list. Still, you do get highly nutritious, high-quality organic ingredients sourced from ethical and sustainable farms.

2. Cerebelly: Best for Growing Minds

I gave Cerebelly an A grade due to its formulation for cognitive development and stringent heavy metals testing. Despite its high sugar content and lack of sustainability efforts, these tasty pouches are backed by neuroscience and provide exceptional brain-boosting benefits for babies.

Nutrition & Ingredients

As the name suggests, Cerebelly’s baby food is highly focused on early brain development. Each pouch contains 16 key nutrients essential for cognitive growth. Cerebelly’s founder, Dr. Teresa Purzner, a neurosurgeon and developmental neurobiologist, is responsible for the combined neuroscience and nutrition formulation. 

Their products are veggie-first and fruits-second, using whole, organic foods. That said, their carbohydrates and sugars are a bit high (at least for the pouch I tried) and low in protein and fats. As a result, I think the balance of macronutrients could be a little better. That being said, the micronutrient content is still incredible.
Cerebelly has also received recognition from the Clean Label Project, which certifies that their pouches meet the standards for testing over 400 contaminants. That makes this baby product both safe and important for cognitive development.

Product Experience

The pouch was very easy to open and reseal. The first whiff smelled strongly of beets. Though this wasn’t entirely unpleasant, it may not be pleasing to a picky baby. That said, the flavor and texture are very good! They are enjoyable, even for an adult palate.

The packaging is simple, colorful, and pleasing to the eye, made with parents in mind. The pouches have clear bottoms so you can check the food for freshness before opening. They also specify that they use non-BPA packaging.

Transparency

The packaging and their website contain so much information. You can learn about the science behind their product formulation and how they truly go above and beyond to tackle heavy metal contamination. 

When shopping on their website, I appreciated that they are transparent about the cost and make searching for products based on age and vegan-only products easy.

Sustainability

Unfortunately, there is almost no information about their sustainability efforts, resulting in this being one of their lowest-scoring section. One small section on their About page indicates they source quality ingredients, but when you click on “Smart Food,” it just goes to their blog page. 

Most of the focus is on ingredient quality and testing, which is fantastic. Still, it would be nice to see some effort on sustainability or at least information about what they are doing (if anything).

Value

Each pouch costs between $2.69 and $3.49, depending on where you purchase it. Pouches purchased on the Cerebelly website cost around $2.79 if you buy them in a bundle. This makes them the second most expensive on this list, but it’s still great value for the quality.

3. Once Upon a Farm: Best Tasting

Once Upon a Farm offers tasty, high-quality, organic baby food pouches with thoroughly tested ingredients and great social and environmental initiatives. They include probiotics for digestion but are high in naturally occurring sugars and require refrigeration, an aspect that could benefit from clearer labeling. Despite these drawbacks, they provide excellent transparency and sustainability efforts, offering really good value for the price.

Nutrition & Ingredients

Once Upon a Farm baby food pouches are made from organic ingredients entirely sourced from trusted USDA organic-certified farms. The ingredients are cold-pressed to preserve nutrients and flavor and include a variety of vegetables, fruits, and seeds for balanced nutrition for each flavor. They do not contain any added sugars, dairy, preservatives, or synthetic ingredients. However, they do have added probiotics for improved digestion, something that no other brand in this list can claim. Cool!

Though the ingredient formulation is very good, the macronutrient blend could be better. The pouches I tried are quite high in carbohydrates and low in protein and fat. Though there is no added sugar, there is a large amount of naturally occurring sugar. The micronutrient values are good on some packs but not others.

I am super impressed by Once Upon a Farm’s work with trusted organic farms to source the best ingredients for children. Like the other brands in this list, they also participate in the Clean Label project and test for 400+ environmental and industrial toxins, including heavy metals. They screen all the ingredients in their supply chain and consistently re-evaluate to improve standards.

Product Experience

Though it is likely due to the higher sugar content, this baby food has delicious flavors and verges on being slightly too sweet. Despite being dairy-free, it reminded me of yogurt that I would eat as a kid. The texture is good, too.

I did notice that the labeling saying these should be refrigerated was quite small. I had these delivered to me, so I guess you would know this since you would likely find the pouches in the refrigerated aisle. However, I didn’t see this and left them out, unfortunately. Sure, this comes down to user error, but it might be good to increase the size of the text, just in case.

Transparency

Once Upon a Farm has some of the best transparency of any baby food brand. You can find everything you want to know about their ingredients, heavy metals testing, packaging, social responsibility, and sustainability/environmental impacts on their website. They also discuss what they are doing to continually improve their products.
Something unique from other brands that Once Upon a Farm does is publish a publicly available impact report.

Sustainability

I loved that Once Upon a Farm makes a concerted effort to be a sustainable brand. 

Not only do they source all their ingredients from organic farms, but they are also reducing their impact through Renewable Energy purchases. These purchases support community solar projects that help increase pollinator habitats and grow forage for sheep in alleyways between the solar panels. 

Once Upon a Farm does try to reduce its packaging weight to reduce material usage and carbon emissions. It also participates in a pouch mail-back program called Shippo.

Value

Each pouch will cost consumers between $2.49 and $3.69, which is about the same as other brands on this list. Though it’s not the cheapest, it is an excellent value for the quality product you’re getting.

The Nutrition Insider Methodology

Here at The Nutrition Insider, we utilize bespoke selection and testing criteria to help us find products that we believe are the best the market offers.

Some of these products are from our trusted brands, which we have reviewed in the past and can subsequently count on to offer high-quality products.

Others we’ve found in an extensive search using good old-fashioned search engine sleuthing, perusing internet forums, and consulting consumer reviews.

Here’s a breakdown of how this selection and testing process was carried out.

Selection Criteria

I selected each of these brands based on the quality of ingredients, ingredient sourcing, quality testing (particularly for heavy metals and contaminants), sustainability, and nutritional value.

Testing Methods

Unfortunately, no babies were available on the team to test these products. So, I had the great pleasure (and I do mean this sincerely!) of personally taste-testing each product.

How We Determine Our Grades

For each product category, we utilize unique rubrics that contain product attributes graded on a 0-100 scale. This number is then turned into a letter grade which we feel is a more quickly digestible metric for readers. 

For the baby food product category, I based my grades on the following attributes: nutritional value, ingredient quality, taste and texture, packaging, transparency and certifications, sustainability, accessibility, and value.

Key Takeaways

Ensuring the safety of baby food is crucial due to potential contamination from harmful heavy metals and other toxins which can be detrimental to the health and development of young ones. 

All three brands on this list go above and beyond to ensure the safety of their tiniest customers with extensive testing and quality vetting of ingredient suppliers. 

Serenity Kids stands out for its thorough contaminant testing, sustainable and ethical ingredient sourcing, and low-sugar, nutritious offerings, making them our number one choice in this list.

Cerebelly is equally as committed to quality ingredient sourcing and contaminant testing but also takes an extra step to formulate its products for cognitive development, with a focus on essential nutrients.

Once Upon a Farm also excels in all the key areas we review but takes it up a notch with a fantastic commitment to sustainability and social impact.

FAQs