I would sugest that you leave him some leftovers from your dinners so he can eat what you ate. I didnt buy those pre-packaged foods from gerber because my son was overweight (and still is) so we stuck to healthy easy to chew snacks.
Cheese, crackers, beans, pasta, veggies, oatmeal, french toast sticks (take off the crust because its too hard to chew sometimes), yogurt, saugage links (small peices to hold), chicken nuggets, french fries (baked at home lol), mac-n-cheese, mash potatoes, peas, carrots, corn, green beans, soups, some fish.
The list could go on and on. Really, anything you can think of that you have time to make thats easy to chew, and more importantly healthier choices of food would be the best way to go. As far as peanut butter, my son is allergic, but I gave him his first bite of scrambled well cooked eggs at about 14months. Also tuna at around that time, and other fish. But I would feed him those things when you are comfortable feeding them to him.