Homemade Goat Milk Formula

Knowing the value of breastfeeding, I really wanted to breastfeed Valentina for at least one year, and thankfully I was able to do that. At around the seven-month mark, we started introducing some homemade goat milk formula to her regimen. It was sooooo nice just to have a little bit of pressure removed from providing all of the milk she needed each day, and I felt good that it was a pretty healthy substitute for her to have.

I was blessed with really good milk supply, so for the first few months it was fairly easy to meet her daily needs. She took to a bottle really early, at about the two month mark, and so while I wanted to nurse her, the reality was I was mostly pumping and she was getting most of that milk from a bottle. When she was around six months, we just started adding 1 or 2 ounces of the goat milk to an 8 ounce bottle of breastmilk. By the time she was one, she was probably getting 50/50.

I found the recipe when I was looking around online, and this is what we gave (amounts are for an 8oz bottle):-

• 1 tablespoon Mt Capra goat milk powder
• 1 teaspoon coconut oil
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon coconut sugar or raw turbinado sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon blackstrap molasses
• 1/8 teaspoon probiotics (I used the HLC Neonate by Pharmax up to six months of age, then Klaire’s Therbiotic Complete after that)
• 1/4 teaspoon NutriStart multivitamin powder

I also added –

• 1/8 teaspoon fermented cod liver oil/ butter oil blend (brand Green Pasture)
• You could also use Baby DHA (nordic naturals)
• 1 drop vitamin D3 (400 IU)

We used to make up 1 gallon batches at a time and store it in individual 8 ounce bottles, and that would last us 2-3 days (bearing in mind she was already 7 months when we started this, and eating some solids too.

For 1 gallon, the ratios are:

• 16 cups water
• 1 cup goat milk powder
• 1 cup coconut sugar
• 8 teaspoons coconut oil
• 8 teaspoons olive oil
• 2 teaspoons molasses
   

* important: the multivitamin, DHA and probiotic amounts given in the first section are the DAILY dose, you do not multiply those out if making larger batches of formula.

Our daughter thrived on that formula. Goat milk protein is the closest to human milk protein, so it’s much easier for babies to digest than cow milk. It certainly is extra work to make it rather than buying commercial formula, but to me it was totally worth it. As she got older, we just reduced the amounts of all the extra goodies in there until at the one year mark she was just having the reconstituted powder, and now we just buy cartons of goat milk for her and she loves that. I tried her a few months ago on raw goat milk from a co-op near me, but she wasn’t having it at all!

I loved the homemade goat milk formula and would absolutely use that recipe again. It served us really well, still allowing me to mix with breastmilk but also taking the pressure off having to provide 100% of her needs every day. It is so full of nutrients and less likely to cause digestive issues than cow milk formula.

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