To be shocked by this government dietary advice for babies and children?

Cereal with banana is perfectly fine as a meal for a growing child 🙄

It is accurate. What they’re suggesting is totally fine.

when a child has a small digestion system, its far better to give nutritional food rather than food that doesn't have any nutritional value. Feed is best, but if you can give babies and toodles food with decent nutrients its better.

As for juice, there is a video on YouTube that I was linked to on mums net many years ago, that explains why juice isn't really something to be giving children or babies. The video is by an endocrinologist and is called sugar the bitter truth. It's about and hour and half long. he talks about drinking orange juice and the fibre being extracted and why that isn't a good thing to do. if you don't want to watch it all watch between 40 minutes and make sure you watch up to 111 minutes

My. Ind is boggled by the sanctimonious poster who is getting the vapours at the idea of orange juice but happily gives her kids jam.
I yjink people are thinkingbin terms of a 8 oz glass of oj!

The fact remains that UK food culture, for many of today’s parents, is ‘cereal and / or toast for breakfast’. It’s what they were fed as children, and it is what they will reach for to feed their own children.

The advice given - a range of plain cereals, with milk and with fruit or fruit juice - is a better version of what the ‘default’ might be (sugared cereal or a ‘cereal bar’ with no fruit / veg content at all).

A breakfast such as this, in a context of 3 varied meals a day and a couple of plain snacks, with water / milk to drink, and with main meals being home-prepared rather than takeaway / ready meals / pouches, is not a recipe for obesity.

An apple tastes very different to apple juice. If you've been drinking sweetened apple juice since you're a baby, an apple isn't going to be a substitute. People tend to eat and prefer that which they are used to. There are people who believe Sunny D and Nutella are very healthy drinks/foods, because the adverts give that impression.

I've typed it out twice now 😂

Kids who have sweetened drinks as a normal part of their daily routine are more likely to refuse healthier, unsweetened drinks.

And let's be honest there are plenty of parents who'll give in to pressure from their kids once those kids moan or refuse water.

You see plenty of it on here and in other forums/social media with parents moaning about the mean schools that won't let kids have juice or squash when their little darling just won't drink water because they hate the taste. Where did the kids develop the sole preference for sweetened drinks in the first place?

And then they'll be teens who don't drink water (and frankly they're not going to be sticking to the diluted juice are they?) and adults who don't drink water and gosh I wonder why we've ended up with a sugar tax on drinks.

All for fuck all nutritional benefit.

Getting people into good habits is a lot easier if you start from the start, as it were. And health authorities should be encouraging good habits and giving parents advice to support that.

But a slice of toast has fewer nutrients than a bowl of Rice Crispies, and is just as processed - unless you're making your own bread, in which case we're making to the 'is it realistic advice' question.

Government nutritional guidance is aimed largely at people who don't already know. Mumsnet families are absolutely not the target for this piece of guidance.

At a population level, helping and supporting the most deprived and under-privileged families to do a better job of meeting all of a child's nutritional needs is really important. It isn't about whether Felix should have an avocado or eggs or homemade muesli for breakfast, it's about adequately feeding the vast numbers of children who are at risk of malnutrition through poor diet. You can tell the parents of under-privileged children to provide salmon and eggs for breakfast until the end of time but in most cases it simply isn't achievable, for many different reasons.

Don't let perfect get in the way of good, or 'good enough'. The difference that would be made to many many children if they were able to adopt a diet similar to the guidance would be immense. Once they've managed that, maybe that is the time to build and start swapping in better alternatives.

And i ate cereal for breakfast every day growing up and I've never had a weight problem.

Is buying an apple really more expensive than buying apple juice? I'd say not, especially if considering the price in relation to the nutritional value.

But in any case the government could have an 'ideal' food list and then give alternatives like rice crispies for picky eaters/lower budgets. They shouldn't be blanket recommending cereal to everybody.

I was in Iceland on my lunch break a few days ago. It's a very deprived area and a colleague (who is foreign) commented that the shoppers all looked ill. Pale, sunken eyes with dark circles underneath. They were mostly young women with at least one young child in a buggy. Their baskets were full of those microwaveable burgers, chicken nuggets, energy drinks and microwave pizza slices. I couldn't get over how many things you could buy for £1. People in prison have a similar look due to high carb/empty calorie food. This empty calorie food is a big part of the obesity crisis in children.

That's not true though...

So rice crispies is so processed and devoid of nutrients that it has to be fortified with vitamins/minerals to make it at all nutritious. How is that a better choice than a pot of yogurt or cheese or an apple or whatever?

So what’s the alternative? Should they say “if you can’t afford salmon or eggs and your kids won’t eat porridge don’t feed them any breakfast at all?”

I really don't think you can lay the UK obesity crisis at the door of foods like fruit juice and Rice Krispies

I live in France, a country with one of the lowest obesity rates in Europe. White bread and pastries are staples here, yet far fewer people are fat.

It's thought that obesity rates are so high for a multitude of reasons:

Brits don't move enough, don't eat enough fruit and veg, don't stop for a proper lunch, snack too much and eat too many pre-prepared meals in the evening.

My baby’s first food was broccoli at six months. Put her in the high chair with a few florets and let her work it out for herself.

Baby rice is fine if you’re not baby-led weaning but going from baby rice to purées to normal food sounds like a major faff to me.

Do you honestly think a slice of processed, supermarket bread is better than a bowl of rice crispies in terms of nutrition?

A they do recommend whole fruit - one of the meals is weetabix with sliced banana.

But there are other options apart from elaborate home cooked meals. Instead of fruit juice they could recommend actual fruit. Instead of rice crispies they could say a slice of toast or whatever.

I agree. There's just a lot of neurotic behaviour around food nowadays.

Government advice should be accurate. If a first time mum googles what to feed her newborn she should be able to trust what the government tells her.

If you’re going to sneer, at least get your facts right - rice crispies, like all UK cereals, are fortified and contain plenty of nutrition.

Yes. Because advice needs to be realistic and appeal to the majority. Telling people they should be cooking scrambled eggs or whipping up pans of porridge every morning is not going achieve anything - it will just put them off.

Most schools are moving towards a common sense approach with this now. They’re relaxing the rules and allowing sugar free squash (of course they don’t know it’s sugar free) I think the general consensus is that being hydrated by weak squash is better than kids not drinking at all as many choose to do if they can only have water.

Government advice needs to be realistic and to appeal to the masses though - it’s why we’re told to eat 5 bits of fruit and veg a day when the reality is that we should be having a lot more, but 5 is seen as realistic and not as off-putting.