In Transit Blog: May I Mash Your Peas and Adjust Your Bib, Sir?

Forget packing those small jars. The rise of family travel meets the trend of homemade baby food at a number of resorts, many of them in foreign destinations where parents may worry about food safety.

Earlier this year, when the chef Torsten Rumprecht joined Rosewood Little Dix Bay on Virgin Gorda in the British Virgin Islands, he began offering guests house-blended fruits and vegetables including pumpkin and pear purée and sweet potato mash with veal and broccoli, based on his experience making baby food for his daughter.

Also in the Caribbean, Hôtel Saint-Barth Isle de France on St. Barts recently introduced custom blends of vegetables, potatoes, fish and meat on its "Pour les Bébés" menu.

On Mexico's Riviera Maya, the Iberostar Paraíso Maya recently added a separate Babies Kitchen, including a refrigerator stocked with baby food made by the staff, and appliances like microwaves for parents who want to prepare their own fruits and vegetables from the pantry. A staff nutritionist is available for consultations.

Many hotels like El Fenn in Marrakesh and all Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, as well as Crystal Cruises, offer house-prepared baby food on request.

But, increasingly the smallest travelers are getting their own menus.

"Because we are in Central America, a lot of our clients with little kids were afraid of exposing them to bacteria they haven't been exposed to before," said Ruthy Ghitis, co-owner of Nayara Hotel, Spa & Gardens near Arenal Volcano in Costa Rica. The property began offering a baby's menu, using produce from the on-site organic garden, three years ago. "We were getting a lot of petitions to do something special," she said, "so we decided to do a simple menu to make it easier."

The kitchen concessions are a seeming boon to traveling families, though some parents suggest quizzing the chefs on their food sources before ordering those mashed peas.

"If I knew where the food was coming from, it might be better than schlepping your own food, which we were doing before," said Megy Karydes, a blogger at TravelingMom.com. "The bananas always get squashed in flight."