that some of my most vivid memories of childhood are of wanting some nice snack?

[slightlysoupstained]

All these coffee shop threads are reminding me of all those gazillion times when my parents would grumpily drag us past various cafes or pastry shops, ignoring our pleas to stop for a burger/cake/milkshake/icecream/bun shaped like childrens' tv character with vast amounts of tasty icing?

Was I just a greedy child, or do most small children devote large amounts of time to campaigning for the next sugar/fat laden treat? DS is still only tiny, so rice cakes are the most awesome thing ever and I can supply those.

[NeoMaxiZoomDweebie]

You weren't alone! I was like you....as a result my children often visit coffee shops for silly fluffy drinks and cakes....my 9 year old could eat all day long...kids like food.

[NeoMaxiZoomDweebie]

Disclaimer...we're not overweight! I don;t allow cakes etc all the time....but on weekends...well...

[AgentZigzag]

YANBU, we had a few value type of crisps, and the rest was fruit/veg/decent meals

My parents hated me

I suppose I was very lucky, but I craved sweet things all the time.

I hate fruit now and don't eat it, but still eat the sweets (which I'd prefer than being stuck troughing pile-on-the-lbs crisps )

[slightlysoupstained]

Oh I was an equal opportunity glutton. Savoury, sweet, it was all good. All glistening temptingly lit up in some forbidden shop window.

I used to think stopping at Little Chef was the most exciting thing ever.

[WilsonFrickett]

My theory on this is when you are little eating is so boring. 3 times a day, regular as clockwork, controlled choices, it's just so meh. Whereas a snack from the temple of awesome that is a cafe... They have menus and coke from a glass bottle with a paper straw (showing my age there). And going in for a snack means you don't have to sit for hours either. Heaven on a stick, basically.

Am now very nostalgic for chips and a coke, childhood lunch of choice from home town's sole cafe.

[Pilgit]

Most of mine are to do with injuring myself! Fire, rose bushes, trees -I have lots of memories of how I have given myself scars. And I am a glutton (not entirely sure what my point is - I blame kir royale overdose)

[BestIsWest]

My brother still tells a sorry tale of standing next to a trolley in Tesco and being excited because there was a packet of Jaffa Cakes in it. Then a stranger came and wheeled it off.

Little Chef Jubilee Pancakes - My dad used to take me there for a special treat.

[AgentZigzag]

for your brother Best

Oh, the disappointment.

They are bloody expensive though.

[joanofarchitrave]

My mother has apologised for never ever taking us to cafes when we were children. IIRC I didn't really care at the time, because cafes were just a lot less common (there was ONE tea room in our extremely smugly prosperous dormitory commuter town all the time I was growing up - now it is wall to wall CostaBucks), because it never happened so I never expected it, because my mother was an awesome cook who produced cakes on a regular basis (as well as cooked puddings every single evening) and mainly because I became shudderingly aware quite early on that money was very tight with us, so would have been very stressed about how much it cost. Only go to cafes if YOU want to.

[BestIsWest]

The disappointment has stayed with him for 40 years Agent

[Monty27]

I can remember waking up in the night and wanting to open a door of a room that was full of ice cream, like an ice cream block, so I imagined this for a minute, and then I was violently sick all over my bed. I think I must have had a temperature and was hallucinating a bit. I can't remember how old I was, very very young I think.

[Binkyridesagain]

My wanting the nice snack memory is not a nice one, my father would indulge himself in high calorie foods whenever we went out, knowing that my sis and I had not eaten that day, and refuse to buy us anything, including lunch.

Also any tasty snacks at home were his and his alone, if we had been good then we could have 2/3 strawberries from his very large punnet.

He also would buy my DM prawns for a nice little treat for her and then eat them, even though he cannot stand seafood of any variety.

[RozziRaspberry]

My mum would only buy digestives and rich tea biscuits when we were younger due to the fact that if she bought exciting biscuits like penguins or kit kats me and my brother tended to scoff them all within 2 days

My mum left my dad for two weeks and I stayed with him and it was heaven because he bought gold bars, time outs and other good biscuits while she was away. I was happy but a bit downhearted as well when she came back

[70isaLimitNotaTarget]

Years ago we nagged Dad to take us to a MilkBar (milkshakes, ice-cream type place)
When we went (eventually) it was okay nothing more.

In my pre-vegetarian days I coveted a Wimpy Meal. You sat at a real table and had food on a plate not a polystyrene box.

A Brown Derby was a donought with ice-cream and chocolate sauce.
Not worth the anticipation TBH.

[Mogz]

We weren't allowed sweets or junk food, I remember not being allowed to go to friend's parties if they were eating at Maccy D's/Pizza Hut/the soft play cafe. And if we were at parties held in homes or halls mum would stay and hover over us making us eat the grapes and carrots instead of crisps and cake.
Luckily our dad made up for all this when he started seeing us regularly. It's a well known fact the man simply can't walk past a bakery without the sudden urge to buy Chelsea buns and steak bakes good ol' dad.

[70isaLimitNotaTarget]

My sad tale of woe...............

My grandmother made no secret of the fact she favoured my older sister. No idea why, but I didn't let it bother me much

At a family gathering (lots of elderly relatives, afternoon tea at my Aunts house) a plate of biscuits was handed round. I was fixated on a Royal Scot biscuit sandwiched together with jam , icing on top and silver balls.
My G/M was the "adults first" type. She's never had said "Oh would you like a cake first 70"

As the cake plate got nearer.....she picked up MY cake and wedged it into her mouth. I was gutted.

[Misspixietrix]

70 I haven't had a Wimpy in years!

[DanicaJones]

That's sad Binky.
When we went on hols I would always see Little Chefs on the way and wish we could stop and eat there, but we never did as too expensive. So I thought of Little Chef as being this amazing unattainable eatery. Probably best I don't go to one as an adult as i might spoil the magic.

[DanicaJones]

I also wasn't allowed pot noodles so thought they must be wonderful. Happily made up for lost time in the sixth form when I often bought them with my lunch money from the shop across the road from school.

[Misspixietrix]

Danica I remember us all living on Pot Noodles for like a week when.DM moved house noce. I still cant face one more to this day so DC's had never had one. Daddy had them when the DC's were last there. That was the most amazing thing about staying at his all weekend according to my Dd!

[DameDoom]

My parents owned a sweet shop but we were allowed a 5p mix-up on Fridays only - quite a good haul in the 70's mind.

I remember going to a Wimpey and thinking it was the watch word in sophisticated fine dining. I shared a plate of chips with my mum and thought it v glam even though I secretly wished for a burger I could call my own.
I also longed for scampi in a basket but was forced to eat a proper Sunday lunch if we ever visited a country pub - which was very rare.

I thought I was a bit deprived but in hindsight would like to thank my parents for not letting me gorge myself silly on knickerbockerglories and the other delights I so badly wished for. Tis' shocking watching kids gorge themselves nowadays.

[AgentZigzag]

Very disturbing Binky, it must have been obvious you were hungry if you were asking (so not him accidentally not noticing) what nasty bastard (sorry) would do that to children?

[Budgiegirlbob]

I desperately wanted to go to the local Chinese restaurant, it seemed very exotic and a place of wonder! But I was always under the impression that my parents didn't like Chinese food.

Imagine my utter horror when I returned home from school one day, to be told by my sister (who was off school, supposedly sick ) that she had been taken to the Chinese for lunch! I was gutted by the injustice of it all, made far worse by the fact that it turned out my parents found that they didn't like Chinese food, and never went again.

[MrsKoala]

I have never had a sweet tooth or wanted treats (still don't - i only ever eat when hungry and when hungry a cake/biscuit/bar of choc is just not going to do it for me - therefore i never eat them). My mum used to give me 5 chocolate bars a day in my pack lunch and the only one i would eat was an orange viscount. I used to give the rest away. Mum had cupboards of sweet things i could have at any time, but i never touched them. My easter eggs from family would go white on the shelf. We gave them away. My friends were so jealous. But i just never got it. However, one of my over riding memories of childhood is being hungry. I've always had a big appetite and went to CMs till 6pm so by the time we got home it was 7 and then dinner was cooked and we would eat at 9 (with mum ringing the pub from 8 onwards telling dad to get home). I would be starving by the time we were allowed to eat. Starving and tired. I wasn't allowed to complain tho as that would make dad fly into a drunken violent rage.

[CanadianJohn]

I'm older than most of you, born at the end of WWII. We were a large family, very broke, and my mother would buy a Mars bar and cut it into slices. My ambition was to have a whole Mars bar to myself.

Chatting with my big sister recently, she confessed that she had the same ambition.

We both have a sweet tooth, over 60 years later, and we are both overweight.