My kids started on Farex mixed with breast milk. Then I slowly introduced new foods into the milk and farex, ensuring no intolerances, before moving on to the next food

Finger foods that don’t shred into small pieces! Otherwise use a teether with net attached to it and pop the whole piece of food in there for them to suck safely

Steamed or roasted veg, meat on bones, basically anything cut into sticks they can pick up.

I have tried carrot stick cooked for my little one and there is BLW facebook group that you can join to get further information

The good thing with BLW is that there is no starter foods, they just eat whatever you eat, but cut in safe shapes for them to hold and consume! That’s the fun of it. It’s not about how much they consume, more about food discovery until 12months. Milk is still their main food till then

With my son who is now 6 and a brilliant and adventurous eater, we started with banana, really soft carrots and brocolli trees, sweet potato and normal potato chips (no salt at all) and even things like a lamb cutlet to suck on (expensive but encouraged a liking for meat) but that probably happened a little later after the initial fruit and veg. Anything that is soft and is in a stick shape so they can hold onto it. By 6 months my son was enjoying holding and eating sushi handrolls (I started off with brown rice and avocado and worked into a cooked tuna roll). Our MCHN told us not to stay on puree for long (perhaps only 2 weeks to get used to it) and then simply mash with a fork to leave in some texture. I also gave our son everything we ate but blended/mashed. Made us eat a lot less salt and sugar!

When starting solids everything will still need to be pureed for a while. We started with pumpkin and then Farex with EBM. Just about all fruits and vegetables were successful for us.

When first starting baby led weaning, begin with steamed and sliced food so the infant can easily chew and swallow the items. Give soft fruits and vegetables initially. Then introduce lightly cooked harder foods that can be easily chewed with bare gums. Soft foods should be soft enough to be mash with the tongue or your finger.
Great first soft foods might be avocado, banana, steamed sweet potato, steamed carrots, ricotta cheese, and scrambled eggs. With slippery foods, try rolling the foods in something like ground flax, baby cereal or ground almonds. Offer water in small amounts during mealtime in an open cup as early as 6 months. This helps them develop their oral motor skills faster than them using a sippy cup which require a similar sucking technique as bottles.
Food should ideally be shaped like a finger and be easily able to fit in the infant’s hand with a some sticking out of their fists. Initially, babe will be exploring the food and creating a mess more than eating but hey that’s part of the process.

I mixed a tiny bit of Farex cereal in with my breastfeeding milk, gradually increasing the amount of cereal. I used the cereal and milk with various mashed veggies to when first introduced to bubs diet