She ate all the biscuits

The number of fat cells you have is laid down when you are a child - as an adult they just get bigger and smaller, you don’t gain any but they don’t disappear. So more biscuits is literally storing up more physical problems in life.

My mum also worried I was too small and thin as a child so, as she says, she filled me up on cake and cookies. 🙄 It didn’t stop me binging on snacks as a child or as an adult.

THIS!

Exactly. A 7 year old sneaking sugar is just typical 7 year old naughty behaviour.

I wouldn’t like if my 8 year old did this, but we have a larder groaning with easily reachable biscuits, chocolate, etc. I don’t think the problem is that she ate the biscuits after you’d told her not to (straightforward disobedience I always get cross about), because it sounds as if you weren’t clear. It’s that eating a whole packet of biscuits after dinner is greedy and unhealthy. Nothing wrong with biscuits, but you need to teach her that she can have two or three as a snack, and none after dinner. Otherwise how will she learn to eat well as an adult?

Children do not NEED biscuits. They’re ultraprocessed and full of saturated fat and free sugars. Children can enjoy them on occasion. They’re not an everyday food.

She can’t regulate herself around that food, so you need to be let her have a good amount of it but then be clear she is not allowed to help herself and have a consequence if she does. My DSS has adhd and will nick sweets/chocolate at any opportunity if he can get away with it because he literally can’t seem to help himself. It doesn’t matter how many treats we have on offer at other times. I thought initially we weren’t giving him enough chance to have it but that wasn’t it and he had it every day when he lived with his mum and would still sneak food with her. It’s the temptation. So until she can regulate herself she shouldn’t be accessing that food herself. You can be honest with her that we can all struggle with self control when it comes to certain foods so it’s your job to set that boundary until she can do it for herself. No anger, no guilt, just acknowledgement that she can’t go sneaking around and taking something that’s for everyone and you’ll help her manage it until she can manage it herself.

... So...?

Nether option is acceptable.

She took without asking, that is crossing boundaries in my opinion. Its not about the food its about what she did.
If you didnt tell her she couldn't have a biscuit without asking then in future you need to stipulate the rules and possible consequences.
I remember asking for another piece of chocolate cake when I was about that age. I was told no, but helped myself (to probably about a doorstep sized piece!) anyway and I remember being sent to bed early and not being allowed anymore of the cake the next day. I remember my dad asking me whether helping myself to the extra piece without asking was worth it...... I learnt a valuable lesson that day.

Why? Has she not been taught to ask before she takes something?

Whatever you do, please don’t shame your young daughter for eating too many biscuits. My mother gave me long lasting body image issues as she regularly did this to me as a young girl, and it took many, many decades to get over it. I’m sure the way she treated me made the overeating worse.

I think hiding certain foods away suggests an unhealthy dynamic around food and control.
Did you explain to your DD that the biscuits were being set aside to enjoy for another day or just "hide" them and say nothing ?
Is it that your DD ate the biscuits perse angering you ?

Its not clear if you are actually telling her that these remaining biscuits or cake or whatever are for another day...

If you are, are you following through on that, so making it clear 'well, there are no biscuits for dessert today because you ate all of them yesterday' - and do that EVERY time she does this.

It does sound as if she gets quite a lot of treat/junk food and that taking and consuming all of something results in zero consequences whatsoever.

That behaviour might be mildly annoying now when it is just biscuits but what about when she is older and you reach for ingredients to cook a meal with, only to find she's eaten them all as a snack earlier on in the day? Thats going to cost you a lot of time as well as money.

I'd be cross but also laughing. Everyone does this sometimes. I'd be saying that it's better to save some for later and not eat them all at once.

But I wouldn't get angry. My Mum used to get so mad when I ate all the biscuits. It didn't stop me, I just got really upset.

I have ADHD and I confess I strongly relate to your description of how your daughter would just not stop and eat a whole packet if left lying around. I still struggle to eat sensibly /not too much sweet stuff and I'm in my 40s!

Didn't want to armchair diagnose, but worth keeping in the back of your mind. As you said though, to a certain point she's a child who likes sweet stuff - that's fairly normal! just keep it in mind.

I find this quite strange, hiding food is not something I have ever thought to do. My children would obviously enjoy eating chocolate everyday but they know they need to ask not just take what they want.
She is 7 at this age she knows right from wrong. If she were in school and the teacher left something out would your daughter have no self control to not take it? Id be more concerned about the relationship with food you are fostering and the lack of respect

I’d be annoyed and explain that eating all the biscuits and leaving none for anyone else is greedy but leave it there

The responses on here are ridiculous.

She's 7 and she ate all the cookies because they taste good and she probably felt a bit sick afterwards.

Of course it's not going to cause an eating disorder to tell your 7 year old that eating a whole pack of cookies is not acceptable.

My kids once asked me if they could have a Jaffa cake, I said sure, you can have 1 each ( they were like 2 and 3yo at this stage. Maybe 10 mins later older one comes to me and says she tried one but didn't like it, but 2yo has eaten the packet. I said "you mean one Jaffa cake?" She said "no, one packet." Turns out I should have been more specific and said they could have 1 JAFFA each 😂. Didn't get mad, just watched how much sugar she ate the rest of the day and now it's a funny story to tell at family dinners.

Not compared to what would have happened in my generation as consequence for this type of behaviour

Brutal.

Nope. She’s 7, not 2. She’s old enough to understand.

She’d been allowed to have some biscuits. Then went hunting for more and ate the lot.

Unless there’s a drip-feed about SEN, I’d be annoyed too.

Buy more biscuits so the rest of the family can have some. She should go without as consequence for taking the others without permission.

Buy the biscuits more often. Shes a child. She needs biscuits! The more of a rarity you treat them, the more she will crave them.

She's 7 not 2. Yes, I would make sure she knew she had taken something which had been put away. Being told off for that won't cause an eating issue.

I had friends who were super strict about not letting their children eat sweets, chocolate, etc. They came to my home one Easter for dinner and their children went missing for a few minutes and were unusually quiet (age 4). Their mother ran into the kitchen to find them eating a bowl of mini chocolate easter eggs from the fridge with the foil still on.... They shoved as many as they could in their mouths when their mother arrived and she used her forefinger and thumb to prize the chewed-up chocolate out of their mouths.

They cried their eyes out.
Hilarious.