Early Foods

Early Foods

Added on September 8, 2026

Shalini Santhosh Kumar started Early Foods in 2015 with the kind of frustration most new parents will recognise, packaged baby food full of glucose syrup dressed up as nutrition. Her answer was to go back to the soaking, sprouting, and roasting her own grandmother would have done, and turn it into something that could sit on a shelf.

The catalogue runs to porridge mixes, millet cookies, rusks, teething sticks, and A2 ghee laddoos, along with a line for pregnancy and postpartum nutrition. Production runs out of Lohegaon, on the edge of Pune, where more than 25 women from the neighbouring village, most without a completed tenth grade education, now run the line, manage Amazon operations, and handle invoicing.

The business is entirely self-funded, started on about a lakh, and has grown into a nationally recognised operation. It won the National Entrepreneurship Award from the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship in 2019.

Caveat: this is a food brand, so anyone with specific dietary restrictions for their child should check ingredient lists directly rather than relying on category labels alone.

Best for: parents who want baby food that reads like a recipe, not an ingredient panel.

— D2C Bazaar

About this brand— in their own words

Porridges for Babies, Sugar Free Cookies for Toddlers, Snacks for New Moms & Snacks for Pregnant Moms are inspired by Traditional Indian Recipes from Grandma's Kitchen.