I didn't know, so I looked up BabyCenter, which doesn't say, so then I thought I'd check Earth's Best and Gerber since they're the 2 rice cereal brands that are everywhere. Both websites say go up to 4 tablespoons, but of course Gerber says this is just a guide, so I'd say 5 tablespoons is probably not too much although it'd be interesting to see if you decrease it to 4 tablespoons whether your baby would be willing to eat more fruit/veggies? Let me give you the links to the pages where Earth's Best and Gerber suggest 4 tablespoons:

http://www.earthsbest.com/baby_nutrition/feeding_schedule_print.php
http://www.gerber.com/fpidea?ideaid=idea1

By the way, you may find it interesting that Earth's Best, on the page provided above, suggests for 9-12 months, only 1 grains feeding a day (1/4 - 1/2 cup). I'm still feeding my 11.5-month-old grains twice a day (once in the morning with fruit and once in the evening with meat and veggies), but I did recently add a third solid meal (midday) of plain yogurt and fruit.

P.S. Cereal that's fortified with iron, like beef and spinach, which I mentioned last time, is also great in terms of supplementing breastmilk (which is near perfect except it lacks iron.) I thought I'd call this out since your baby seems to like cereal very much! :)

I think there is about 10 tablespoons to 3/4 cup, so he is eating about 5 tbsp of cereal each meal. Is that too much?

Thanks for sharing your thought and your experience.

How many tablespoons of cereal do you use to make 3/4 cup? I've read somewhere 3 tablespoons of cereal is pretty typical per meal. But I actually was using only 2 tablespoons for a long while because my baby would finish the whole jar of level 2 fruit on top of the cereal. That's his late morning meal. Then for his supper, we feed him porridge and level 2 vegetable baby food. We always have some kind of protein in the porridge, rotating among chicken, pork, and beef. Sometimes I also add tofu, broccoli, or cauliflower per my pediatrician's recommendation. My baby usually will finish the whole jar of vegetable baby food as well. So compared to my baby, yours does seem to eat less fruit and vegetable. So if I were you, I'd try to see if he'd take more fruit and vegetable. Does he like to try to self-feed? Have you tried using one of those mesh bags where you could put a piece of fruit and he would suck on it to self-feed? You could try that as a snack outside of the 2 solid meals perhaps? That said, I wouldn't worry too much about it for now because I've read somewhere that the best nutrition for babies under 1 is still your breastmilk and solids are more for supplementing (because while breastmilk is the best and almost perfect nutrition, one imperfection is it doesn't have iron, so you should try to feed him solids like beef, spinach, etc.) and for "educational" purposes (e.g., teaching him the concept of eating meals with the family.)

at almost eight months, my son eats 2 solid meals per day. one in the early morning, and one in the afternoon. i serve him 2 kinds of cereal in 3/4 cup total per day, and 1-2 spoonful of pureed fruit in the morning, and about 1/3 jar of level 2 vegetable baby food in the afternoon. am i serving him enough fruit and vegetable? or should i decrease the amount of cereal for more fruit and vegetable?

thanks.