Troy Prince likes to have fun at the checkout register in the grocery store.

He pulls out 30 little jars of baby food from his basket, then waits for the reaction. There are no diapers. No formula. No baby lotion. And the women in line almost invariably ask: “Who is the baby food for?”

That’s when Troy Prince gives them the punchline.

“Me,” he says.

It’s a little juvenile, true. But Prince has his reasons. “The baby foods are great carbohydrates,” he says.

A West Palm Beach chiropractor and competitive body builder, Prince eats five small meals a day — including baby food — so that his metabolism will work more efficiently. He has been training with weights for nine years and using baby food for one.

And yes, it is a small world after all. Fact is, an increasing number of trend-followers have been turning to baby food recently as a way to keep fats down and carbohydrates up. With a few exceptions, baby food contains no sugar, little or no salt, and no preservatives. And it averages just 90 calories a jar.

The Gerber baby food company, with $750 million each year in sales, estimates that 10 percent of its baby food is being bought by adults. From its Freemont, Mich., headquarters, spokesman Steve Poole explains that older people buy baby food because of special dietary considerations. “Many of them have periodontal problems,” he says.

At the same time, a few college students are buying baby food because they like the single servings. Their favorites? The dessert varieties, of course.

“We also get a fair number of letters from runners and tri-athletes who say they train on baby foods,” Poole says, “But we (Gerber) think they are more interested in looking for sponsorship or endorsements.”

At Beechnut headquarters in Fort Washington, Pa., spokeswoman Jeanne Goubeaux doesn’t know how many adults are buying that company’s baby foods. “But I can tell you from our nutrition hot line that many adults who are worried about calories are eating them,” she says. “Women who are eating plain yogurt for lunch, for example, are adding the fruit flavors to the yogurt to give it some taste — and there’s no sugar added to our fruits.”

Apparently atheletes are eating Beechnut, too. Goubeaux says she received a letter from a basketball team not too long ago.

“They named the team the ‘Chiquita Bananas’ — because every time they played a game, they ate our Stage One bananas first.”

Ralph Moye, owner of Florida Electric Motors in West Palm Beach and Jupiter, uses baby food as a boost before the aerobics class he teaches at the Olympiad.

And David Kruck, owner of Muscle Junction Gym in West Palm Beach, eats three jars a day. “Four years ago I started eating the guava and apricot — and found after training it helped to replace glycogen,” he says.

He also discovered “the fruits are always fresh — sometimes it’s hard to get a good apple or a ripe banana and take it with you.”

Like Kruck, Carol Webster likes the convenience of baby food. A public relations and communications director for The Billfish Foundation, she travels I-95 each day equipped with a cooler of baby food, rice cakes and water.

“It’s easy to take with you anywhere,” she says. “I like the mango because I like mangoes, and the real fruit is hard to carry around with you.”

Then there’s the taste. Pet sitter Anne Corley of Lake Worth likes the infant bananas after a meal. She has even purchased a small spoon that can scrape the little sides of the jar.

And Ramon Serano, manager of Golden Glow tanning in West Palm Beach, loves the pears. “A lot of guys just won’t try it because it’s labeled ‘baby food,”‘ he says. “But now it’s really catching on.”

It’s also healthy. Or at least, not unhealthy.

“Perhaps the only factor to mention is that it doesn’t have much fiber,” says Dr. Stanley Weiss, a Lake Park osteopathic physician and nutritional consultant at Wellington Regional Medical Center and Humana Hospital. “But it’s very high in nutrition.”

Donna Bell, a registered dietician in West Palm Beach who is a consultant to hospitals and nursing homes, has come to appreciate the benefits of baby food, particularly for the elderly who have trouble digesting solid foods. But she has found that baby food by another name sometimes sounds sweeter.

“We prefer to call baby foods ‘pureed foods,”‘ she says, “because it sounds better to some of our clients.”

— Whether you prefer to call it baby food or “pureed,” you might like to try some of these low-fat, low-salt recipes:

OATMEAL-BANANA-EGG SOUFFLE

1/2cup instant oatmeal

1egg, beaten

1/2cup boiling water

1jar baby food bananas

1/4cup oat bran

Butter-flavor Pam spray

1teaspoon all-fruit jam

Nutmeg (optional)

In a small bowl, combine oatmeal and egg with 1/2 cup boiling water. Stir in jar of baby food bananas. Sprinkle oat bran on top and spray entire mixture with Pam.

Cover with paper plate and microwave on high for 1 minute. Serve with 1 teaspoon of all-fruit jam on top. Add nutmeg if desired. Makes 1 serving.

SWEET POTATO PIE

1jar baby food sweet potatoes

1jar baby food butternut squash

1/2cup baby food rice cereal

1marshmallow

In a small bowl, combine baby food sweet potatoes, squash and cereal. Place marshmallow on top and microwave on high for 45 seconds, with cover on bowl. Makes 1 serving.

CLAM CHOWDER BISQUE

1baked potato

1can (8 ounces)of clams, rinsed in strainer

1can (10 3/4 ounces)low-sodium tomato soup

1jar baby food carrots

Low-fat Italian salad dressing

Mrs. Dash seasoning

Cut baked potato in half. In bowl, combine soup, baby food carrots, clams and 1 tablespoon of salad dressing. Microwave on high for 1 minute in covered bowl. Pour mixture over potato and season with Mrs. Dash. Makes 1 serving.

RICE AND FRUIT CANAPES

1jar mango baby food

1jar papaya baby food

1jar vanilla custard baby food

1jar peach cobbler baby food

1jar Dutch apple baby food

Rice cakes

All-fruit jam or strawberries, to garnish

Combine all baby foods in bowl and chill for 1 hour. Spread on rice cakes, and garnish with all-fruit jam or strawberries.