UPF, poverty, obesity.... children’s healthy eating - an impossible challenge?

It is poverty. Children's heights are first determined by genetics, and then poverty.

I think probably it will have something to do with lack of vitamin A, D and K at a young age. Things like cod liver oil, liver and real butter aren’t consumed as well coupled with lack of sunlight will all contribute to shrinking height.

@LakeTiticaca I will not change them because I think it does make a difference. Our plates look full of food, and would not on more modern plates.

It is!! I didn't realise until my DH bought a vintage Hornsea pottery dinner set. They must have got bigger by stealth 🤣🤣

I think it's more they don't have the energy in the time they have. Coming home after a stressful day, picking up dc who might be tired and grumpy and then trying to muster up the energy to cook a meal is a challenge for many people.
A friend of mine used to cook and prep food after dinner for the next day as her time after work was so limited and stressful. Even that sounded exhausting to me. I'd just want to flop on the sofa but she said what else could she do if she wanted everyone to eat well.

We still use old dinner plates. The difference is striking.

Dinner plate sizes were also smaller than they are now

Agreed.

The use of UPFs has risen exponentially since the 70's.

More recently they've risen in line with austerity in order to make food cheaper in the face of rising costs.

For example, this shit that's not actually mayonnaise, is a relatively new product made because actual mayonnaise, even the budget brands, was getting too expensive for a lot of consumers to buy.

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/305431904

Other "cheap" foods have also cut the number of "real" food they contain and replaced them with UPF to make things cheaper instead of having to put up their prices.

There were kids walking to school in the seventies eating crisps for breakfast.
But for those who had a proper breakfast, it was either a cooked breakfast, toast or cereal.

I often have to take breakfast to school for my DD and been trying to make it healthier. But the brioche and croissants I often give her are at least better than haribos and crisps!

The difference is that expectations have changed. There is an idea that we should all be making amazing meals every night. Look at some of the meals people cooked in the seventies that are very quick. Sardines on toast. mince and onions. These take very little time to make.

I hear all the time about people having no time to cook a proper meal. Or 'from scratch' as people now say, as if it's something amazing.

I don't buy it. It really doesn't take long to put a decent home cooked, non UPF meal on the table. Nor need it cost much. I bet the same people who say they have 'no time' are finding time to watch tv or doom scroll.

It's about priorities: prioritising our children's health (and our own). It is time we got angry, it is time governments stepped in. And it is time that feeding your children crap food 90% of the time should be viewed with the same horror as blowing smoke in their faces.

But I totally agree with you about the constant snacking. People think they are not meant to ever feel a bit hungry.

At a really basic level, people are eating far too much. Irregardless of whether they're eating only at mealtimes or snacking frequently. Or whether it's uhp or not.

It wasn’t peak UPFs, they were just getting going. They were new and exciting so we remember the butterscotch Angel Delight and the crispy noodles but they were still quite a small proportion of everyone’s diet compared to now.

Actually the 70s (when UPFs were introduced) is when obesity levels started to rise exponentially. People were slim
in the 70s because they were born before the age of UPFs, but each generation subsequently has been getting fatter.

Imo it’s not the fact of snacking that is the issue - if people were snacking all
day long on apples and carrots they wouldn’t be obese - but they’re not, they’re eating UPFs, often mistakenly believing they are healthy (eg protein bars).

I think this is the major issue. The seventies was peak upfs, people were still slimmer. But you only ate at meal time, snacks were not common. Now kids are snacking at every opportunity and it makes it very easy to over eat. I think lots of children probably do not know what actual hunger feels like.

Yes I agree with this too. The “little and often”/grazing mantra we were all fed 10+ years ago has caused huge damage imo. I am always baffled that so many people seem to believe that children are unable to go more than an hour without eating. When DD is at school and after school club they give her a morning snack and an afternoon snack – when she’s at home she usually chooses to have neither (I have a free access fruit bowl so she can help herself if she’s hungry).

I don’t think austerity caused families to shift from healthy home cooked meals to UPFs. If you were the type of family who ate the former you’d just eat more cheap things like lentils, rice, beans, bread. However, if people have less money to go out they sit at home and eat more.

That fasting between meals is really important to keep insulin levels stable. People aren't aware of this anymore and eat constantly.

What did change in the 90's was a sharp increase in UPFs being used.

What also changed in the 90s was increase in availability of food and increase in quantities consumed - of all types of food.

By way of example - growing up in my area of London in the 80s - the high street had several old pubs, a MacDonalds, a Wimpey and a tea shop. That was it. Now, it is wall to wall cafés and food shops.

Everywhere you go in London now there are food shops and people eating.

I think it's partially snacking culture, I grew up on a diet of high UPF but was always skinny because I wasn't getting enough calories to gain weight over whatever I needed at the time. I wasn't allowed fizzy juice and don't like it now.
Nowadays the snacks seem relentlessly available

I agree this is what happened, along with following the low fat/high carb advice from the US.

I believe it was Giles Yeo who wrote (paraphrasing) "a world that can't decide on a common language or currency and that is in some cases in active armed conflict didn't collectively agree to lose their dietary willpower forty years ago."

you might be more inclined to feed your children food you know they will eat,

But why is the food they will always eat the crap stuff? Who introduced this stuff into their diet in the first place? They aren't born wanting crap food, it is provided by the parent/s.

I tend to buy belvoir cordial, and mix with sparkling water, if I want a fizzy drink. The ginger cordial packs a punch!