British kids and eating habits - IABU ?

Because, as advised several times above, you parent them and say no when necessary.

Having raised DC between the UK and Italy, for me this is an interesting thread. I can kind of see where OP is coming from, but in my experience neither country has a particularly good balance when it comes to children's diets and from what other posters are saying, it sounds like other European countries have similar problems.

A key difference I noticed is that British school dinners are indeed dreadful. (At dd's secondary I get the feeling they give the kids whatever they want just to get them into school. Giving them sugary junk as rewards for good behaviour etc). On the Continent most kids finish by lunchtime and so depending on the family they'll eat "proper" food twice a day. But their breakfasts are dire, UPFs and dairy no fruit or low sugar cereals. My DC used to get teased for having fruit at snack time instead of those crappy Kinder cake things in packets.

OP just send them in with healthy lunches and either ignore the "why can't I have that too" or explain what sugary junk does to their teeth and insides.

Autistic adult here. Only started eating meat in last year after thirty five without, in attempt to improve nutrition.
Genuinely gutted to find out a ham sandwich isn't healthy.

So you won't give your children a packed lunch because they whine and moan their friends get the school puddings but you can't say no.....I'm glad they don't have temper tantrums then.

You parent them, the same as we all parent our kids.

It's tough but it's called being a parent 🤷‍♀️

Did your midwife promise you an easy ride, is that why you're surprised you need to tell your child what you expect of them and stick to it?

You parent them. Hope this helps.
Do they not say “no” in Malta?
You don’t have to give in to every request.

Thats an estimate, not a fact.

mugboat · Today 16:34
children from other European countries do not have temper tantrums??? Who knew.

Having recently experienced families from other European countries at close quarters OP I can categorically state that you're deluded!

I agree that comparatively speaking British children are very overweight and have a horrendous diet 🤷‍♀️

So you say something about your body and brains needing lots of energy for a busy day at school, and we don’t need to have pudding today 🙄

You’re the parent

You are coming across as having food issues in your posts.

namely your reaction to the beef chilli, rice and nachos which would have been meat, loads of hidden veg, beans, rice and about 3 corn chips for crunch. Nothing to fret about.

If your son is picking up on this than that is probably why your son is obsessed with pudding.

Nout to do with a joyless flapjack at 12:30 on a Tuesday

Where do you live that people are eatimg like this?

My kids eat normal food. Vegetable curries, spaghetti bolognese, fish, loads of choices of veg, roast dinners etc, tuna sandwiches on home made bread, yoghurts without added sugar. They don't drink squash and only have juice on weekends.

Its cold and damp in winter so ime people don't eat "light" dinners as much because the weather really can sap your energy.

I dislike the anti dessert campaign. Traditional homemade desserts like rice puddings, custards and crumbles don't have to have a lot of sugar in or are sweetened by fruit. They are a good way to get things like eggs, milk and fruit into growing kids. Life doesn't have to be joyless, some low sugar desserts are really not a huge issue in moderation if you are doing plenty of exercise amd generally eating a broad and varied diet.

Howling at there being no pizza on “the continent”

Just make your own food if you don’t like other peoples. I, like dozens of other people, are from a culture where food, and the enjoyment of eating, is huge. I couldn’t cope with “why do you need a nacho”. We eat good quality, home cooked food 95% of the time but I dgaf if my dc eat a nacho or a slice of birthday cake or a packet of haribo every so often. Food is pleasure as well as basic fuel.

But that’s not possible!

other countries may have problems too, but the UK definitely has a problem. The OP was not judging lower income parents who may struggle to afford healthier, pricier options.

They don’t have tantrums … except the tantrums they have if OP sends them with a packed lunch 😂
So she takes the lazy parenting option of school dinners to avoid said tantrums I guess?

Discipline.

Or move back to your utopian country where absolutely no one is obese at all ever

No this is not a UK problem. Really. You seem like you’re looking for bad examples. Not all kids are given fruit shoots, nuggets and pizza all the time! Lots of children eat very healthily in many households - salad, lean meat, whole-foods and water with their main meals.

And I honestly never knew that children on the continent never had temper tantrums. Similarly, the last time I looked, when I went to France for example, there were kids being stuffed with BN biscuits, hot dogs, ice-creams and yes, pizza. When we went to Germany I saw kids sitting down with plates loaded high with chips.

Oh, and our most recent trip to Spain - more chips! And I swear I saw a kid eating spaghetti out of a tin. But the very worst - a kid eating microwaved meatballs in sauce as a ready meal.

So…………not sure you’ve got the evidence base right for a sustained argument that kids in the UK eat any worse than kids on the continent.

Think thats saying plenty about the type of place you shop. Not everywhere is like that.

There are plenty of other things in there with the beans. 😂

You sound like a food snob.

Our school is hot on healthy food, the school cooks food from locally sourced farms, has a salad bar etc.

If you don't want your kids to eat the school meal then give them a packed lunch, it's really that simple.

But try not to be so judgey of others who do eat it, for some kids that's they're most nutritious meal of the day.

This is the advice on fat intake for children....

Malta has for years topped overweight and obesity lists, with predictions by the World Obesity Federation published in March suggesting the problem is set to worsen and over a third of the adult population will be obese by 2030.

https://timesofmalta.com/article/more-than-75-of-maltese-men-are-overweight.952336

@SummerDays2020 me too, took me a while to get truth be told. Then it was very obvious

I think she means obese with diabetes.