Le bébé mange de la purée avec une petite cuillère.

In French, nouns usually need an article. So bébé normally appears as le bébé, un bébé, ce bébé, etc.

Here, le bébé can mean the baby in a normal specific sense. In context, it often just refers to the baby being talked about.

French uses articles much more often than English, so where English might sometimes say Baby is eating, French generally prefers Le bébé mange.

Because the subject is le bébé, which is third person singular: he/she/it.

The verb manger in the present tense goes like this:

• je mange
• tu manges
• il / elle / on mange
• nous mangeons
• vous mangez
• ils / elles mangent

So Le bébé mange = The baby eats / is eating.

De la is a partitive article. French often uses a partitive article for food, drink, or any uncountable substance when you mean some.

So:

• de la purée = some mashed food / some purée

This is similar to:

• du pain = some bread
• de l’eau = some water
• des légumes = some vegetables

French usually requires this article, even when English often leaves some out.

Because after manger, when you are talking about eating some amount of a food, French normally uses the partitive article:

• manger de la purée
• manger du riz
• manger de la soupe

You often get plain de instead of du / de la / des after negation or expressions of quantity, for example:

• Le bébé ne mange pas de purée.
• Le bébé mange beaucoup de purée.

But in the original sentence, there is no negation and no quantity expression, so de la purée is the normal form.

Because cuillère is a feminine noun, so its article is une, not un.

Also, the adjective must agree with the noun:

• masculine: petit
• feminine: petite

So:

• une petite cuillère = a small spoon

Some common French adjectives often come before the noun, especially short everyday ones such as:

• petit / petite
• grand / grande
• jeune
• vieux / vieille
• bon / bonne

So une petite cuillère is the normal order.

If you are a native English speaker, this is one of the adjective-position patterns you just gradually get used to in French.

Here avec means using or with the help of a small spoon.

So the sentence means the baby is eating with a small spoon as an instrument.

French often uses avec this way:

• écrire avec un stylo = to write with a pen
• couper avec un couteau = to cut with a knife

So in this sentence, avec une petite cuillère tells you how the baby is eating.

Une means a or one, while la means the.

• avec une petite cuillère = with a small spoon
• avec la petite cuillère = with the small spoon

The original sentence introduces the spoon as unspecified, so une is the natural choice.

If both speaker and listener already know exactly which spoon is meant, then la petite cuillère could be used instead.

Yes. The French present tense often covers both ideas.

So Le bébé mange can mean:

• The baby eats (general/simple present)
• The baby is eating (right now)

Context tells you which meaning is intended. In a sentence like this, many people would understand it as The baby is eating.

Yes. That would mean The baby is eating his/her purée or the baby is eating his/her mashed food.

The difference is:

• de la purée = some purée, focusing on the food as a substance
• sa purée = his/her purée, focusing on it as the baby’s portion

Both are natural, but they are not exactly the same.

Here purée is treated as an uncountable food noun, like soup, rice, or mashed potato in English.

That is why French uses the partitive:

• de la purée

You would use a plural only if you were talking about different kinds or separate servings in a countable way, but that is not the normal meaning here.

A simple approximation is:

• bébé ≈ bay-bay
• purée ≈ pyu-ray or pu-ray, depending on your accent and how well you produce French u

A few useful notes:

• é has a clear ay sound, like in café
• the final -e in purée is not silent in the same way as English spelling might suggest; the word ends on the é sound
• bébé has the stress pattern typical of French, which is more even than English stress

Yes. The accent é is called the accent aigu.

It tells you that the vowel is pronounced like ay in a clear, closed way:

• bébé
• purée

So the accents are not optional decorations; they are part of the spelling and help show pronunciation.

It can, but it usually does not need to.

French often uses the simple present where English might use the present continuous:

• Le bébé mange. = The baby is eating.
• Le bébé est en train de manger. = The baby is in the middle of eating / is eating right now.

The être en train de form is more emphatic and specifically highlights the ongoing action. In most ordinary situations, Le bébé mange is enough.