Do people really not know what to eat?

I give you ... Westlers tinned or packet burgers, plastic hot dogs and turkey twizzlers.

It’s both. Processed meat and lack of fibre are both associated with increased bowel cancer.

A banana is like 20p. Satsumas about the same.

Every excuse under the sun is used as to why people feed their children garbage instead of real food.

As a Scot, porridge should be made with water and a pinch of salt. Milk can be added afterwards but should not be used as the cooking liquid.

@PattiPatty

"At school in the 1970s we were taught cooking and nutrition but my DC who are 27 and 29 were not taught any basic cooking at school. They were taught "food tech" which was very, very limited. How to make a sandwich was one lesson.
I had to teach them everything from baking to veg prep and nutrition myself."

Mmm. I was at school in the 70's, in a newbuild fancy private girls' school wot I won an 11+ scholarship to. One of the stories about our awesome headmistress was that, when the architects of our building asked her where ma'am wanted the domestic economy labs, she replied "I don't want no domestic economy labs. Build me more science labs", which they did. We were expected to learn to cook at home. Which I did.

(Dolmio or Grossman's)

I don't use ready-made pasta sauce, but felt it unlikely these are full of industrialised ingredients. So I looked one up - Loyd Grossman Pasta Sauce, Tomato & Chilli.

Tomatoes (59%), Tomato Purée, Garlic Purée, Parsley, Sugar, Sunflower Oil, Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Red Chilli, Sea Salt, Concentrated Lemon Juice, Dried Red Chilli

What the hell's wrong with that?

Now I've looked, I guess the sugar and lemon are what make it taste funny to me, though I can see why they're there. And I put sugar in mine if my tomatoes are bitter. This is nutritionally fine, even healthy!

Did you have children when you were learning how to cook on a small budget? I think it's easier to take risks and build confidence knowing if it goes wrong the consequence is you going hungry but you are going to be more cautious if it also means your children going hungry because you made a mistake and wasted vital food.

It also depends on your personal circumstances too. I have a disabled child with a limited diet, I absolutely find it to be time consuming and an absolute faff so it's rare that I bother. Especially with my son's limited diet when simply eating at all is the priority.

One of DDs friends would eat anythjng, literally anything. Her mum would still feed her McDonalds for tea (and make her own dinner) just for convenience.

DD has ARFID getting her to eat anything is impossible, I still try every day to eat some good things.

Apples last bloody ages. And the varieties taste so different.

I hate it when they put too much vinegar in the salt and vinegar McCoys. It makes my eyes water. Very rarely do they hit the sweet spot where the ingredients are perfectly balanced. And don't get me started on green crisps.

People need to learn to eat seasonally. It's cheaper, more flavoursome and better for you.
They also need to learn how to store food properly so that it doesn't go off so quickly/loose it's appeal.

Lots of people sounding very pleased with themselves on this thread. We just go for a balance in our home.

You should become a social worker specialising in children’s health, you’ll be great at it.
You have no idea of some families realities. Unless you want to help others, just worry about your own family.

I'm reminded of conversations with some of my coworkers about how there were times when they were young when schools would give the 'dessert', sometimes just toast with jam first, hoping to fill the kids up, because of difficulties sourcing of more nutritional foods - and some kids just not eating it.

Also reminded of discussions family members had when I was growing up, including those among the first to use ready meals - how it was considered a sign of making it, that no one had to go out and wring the chicken's neck, we can just pop it in the oven, pull it out or even better, having someone else cook it for you.

Now ready meals are treated as borderline abuse, and the only time I've seen discussions on encouraging jam on toast is in supporting those who've become underweight through loss of appetite.

I understand the importance of caring for ourselves and our kids, including though nutrition, and on the other hand that what is considered doing that has a cultural tint to it that changes with time as views towards and understanding of food changes. I do think for some there is confusion with the changes and with marketing around us around what to eat. I think for many others, there is knowledge, but a struggle in trying to get better foods to be palatable.

I was in my 30s before I enjoyed a salad. I'm still working on beans outside of a chili - I try something every week, and still struggling with it. Maybe I'm lazy - I mean, currently, my three teenagers each cook at least one night a week, and I let them cook what they want even if it's chicken nuggets and cheese chips - I think I'm just a finite person living with others with very different palates just having a go at it, when really, I prefer thinking about food as little as I can get away with.

There have also been studies in "food desserts" in America that parents living in poverty just junk food as a substitute gesture of love because they cannot afford anything else.

Food deserts aren't about not being able to afford anything else, they're about the separate issue of there not being access to shops that sell decent food within a particular radius of a residential area. People can't buy what the shops aren't selling.

Most of the writing on it was decades back before food deliveries became so common. It is worse in the US due to zoning laws and many areas far out not having deliveries. It also happens in the UK - I've absolutely lived in places where you can walk 30-40 minutes, visit each shop, and not see a single vegetable. Last month, I nipped out of a train station for some bread, and it took til the 4th shop to find any - the others, it was all pretty much UPFs. The train station was a near secondary and a college, and they were clearly going after the 'I just got free with some money' child demographic.

That's true, but we all learn somewhere. I haven't always been a confident cook; I grew up with very basic meals (home cooked but basic), that bear little resemblance to the meals I cook now. I'm also very financially stable now but haven't always been. When I was learning to cook I was on a very tight budget, but realised that if I wanted to eat well and enjoy it then I had to do something. It's actually pretty difficult to ruin a meal.

It's even easier these days with the sheer amount of access to simple recipes online. And I'm sorry, but anyone can fry onion, garlic, celery, chop some veg and make a soup. Stock can be as simple the saved veg water from previous meals. It's not difficult and it really isn't that time consuming at all.

I think the biggest risk of bowel cancer is lack of fibre.

Lots of other countries eat high levels of processed meats, their health is better than ours

But now that I know chicken nuggets have great fibre in them, its all good!!

I have two children with genuinely excellent diets. Easily 7-8 portions of fruit and veg a day, mainly veg. Plenty of protein. Decent carbs. Will eat most things, don’t eat sweets etc with any regularity.
I also have a child with ARFID. All rules go out of the window! If he eats at all we’re happy.

I usually cook from scratch but anyone who says they don’t have a back up freezer stash must by lying. Last night we had fish fingers, frozen peas and even (shock horror) frozen mash! Pure laziness I know but I was shattered! I’ll have to watch this show, love nosing into how other people live :)

I think people definitely need more education about sausages and bacon and the bowel cancer risks with some foods.

They mentioned it last night I think, but in a way that implied that people know about it now.

Yes, whats my favourite flavour soup

'leftovers flavour'

yes! I remember that!

Afraid this was my only contribution to this thread.. both my kids have awful diets, but both have diagnosed ARFID, so i'm just happy when they're eating, even if it is bland, UPF freezer fare.

I'm having home made, cooked from scratch, beef stew for my dinner.. neither of them would touch it if they were starving.

Sorry, I misread.

Didn't George Orwell nail this back in 1937 when he wrote "The Road To Wigan Pier"?

“A man dies and is buried, and all his words and actions are forgotten, but the food he has eaten lives after him in the sound or rotten bones of his children. I think it could be plausibly argued that changes of diet are more important than changes of dynasty or even of religion....Yet it is curious how seldom the all-importance of food is recognized. You see statues everywhere to politicians, poets, bishops, but none to cooks or bacon-curers or market gardeners.”

and

“And the peculiar evil is this, that the less money you have, the less inclined you feel to spend it on wholesome food. A millionaire may enjoy breakfasting off orange juice and Ryvita biscuits; an unemployed man doesn't. Here the tendency of which I spoke at the end of the last chapter comes into play. When you are unemployed, which is to say when you are underfed, harassed, bored, and miserable, you don't want to eat dull wholesome food. You want something a little bit 'tasty'. There is always some cheaply pleasant thing to tempt you.”

Im a very confident cook, I have never and will never make pasta.

I make a lot of soup too, it’s such a good way to use up veg that’s about to turn. And it’s quite often an unplanned thing so it’s handy to grab a bit of soffritto mix from the freezer rather than think “crap I don’t have an onion/celery/carrot”. I’ll usually fry that up, add the main veg and some stock then once it’s cooked blitz it up.

If you aren't a confident cook, it is going to be more time consuming as well as also struggling to know how to adjust recipes and again, having the confidence to do that and know you aren't about to ruin dinner which is incredibly important if you are on a strict budget and need to make sure that your kids are fed.

Im going to add it to my healthy eating meal plan!!!