Prue Leith wants to ban school packed lunches?

[SneakyGremlins]

Good luck with that.

www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/amp/47733670

At DD's school Y7 and Y8 have to have school dinners. Older pupils can have packed lunch. It works fine, from what DD tells me.

Packed lunches aren't allowed at my kids school in ks1, as school dinners are free. Ks2 are allowed though.

I cut DS (12) down to 2 school dinners per week as when he was every day he started gaining weight. There are healthy choices but he chose pizza or burger and chips every day plus a breakfast pasty at break time 🤦🏻‍♀️

I have food sensory issues and went for a while to a school that banned packed lunches, was awful as the only thing I could eat from the cafeteria was rock hard cold garlic bread.

Primary here, school dinner where lovely, locally sourced. Now mass produced carbs.

No joke this was the dinner last week.

Pizza, garlic bread and bread and butter pudding. The pizza was a cheap thick one with a scrape of tomato purée and a few grains of cheese.

I saw the dinner, it was appalling.

If this is for health reasons I think it's misguided given how shite DS2's school dinners are these days. Ever since the free meals for ks1 came in, it's become a repetitive diet of greasy crap and chips. The weekly fish and chip Fridays is now fish finger (just one) and chips. Bacon eggs and hash browns every Thursday. Or a tiny jacket potato. They used to do sandwiches which has stopped now. It's not at all healthy compared to what I pack for him.

Yes, DS's school did lovely dinners when DS1 was there a few years ago. Varied, fresh, healthy. Not any more.

When the school dinners came in we were sold local produce and small kitchen locally. Now it’s so different, but we pay the same.

The meals are so small and lack nutrition. I know the portions need to be small obesity and all that. But a 4 yr old and an 11 yr old don’t eat the same amount normally.

Huge lack of fresh veg and fruit. I’m shocked by this, given healthy eating etc.

I can provide a packed lunch for under £2.60 that’s healthy. Fresh fruit and veg. No brainier.

My son’s packed lunches are far healthier than the slop the school canteen serves, his packed lunches are a lot cheaper too, Northen deprived area and the school are charging £2.30 a day.

My ds wouldn't eat anything hes 5 has autism and sensory processing disorder. He struggles alot with texture. He has a cheese sandwich banana quavers and a drink for dinner every day not just school days. He actually came home with a pupils opnion questionnaire today about school dinners to which he answered to questions like what don you like to eat? What do you want to eat for dinner? What do you want to learn to cook? He answered every question with blackpudding even the question what fruit and veg do you want to grow 😂😂.

The food at my children's school is terrible but we paid for the conscience but when money got tight we switched to packed lunches and we make them for a fraction of the cost.

I work in a school, there's no way in hell I'd want to spend my lunch hour eating with the kids and "teaching" them, and even less so having to eat what they eat.

Two kids at school here in France. Packed lunches are not allowed. Salad starter, main is protein and veg, cheese, then dessert of yoghurt / fruit. Picky eaters - tough, it’s just not tolerated. They aren’t made to finish but are expected to taste. For allergies / intolerances etc - a medical cert from the GP must be provided before an alternative is given.

I thought it was very harsh at first but tbh they just get on with it - an DS1 is the biggest fusspot at home. Eating at school has been good for him. Oh, and the max cost is about €4 per meal, but it’s means tested - my friend who’s on a very low income only pays €0,22 per meal.

Prue Leith can fuck off, considering my son was once served rice, sweetcorn and bread followed by a biscuit and a cup of custard as his "school meal".

And no, I didn't have a choice about it, he was on FsM as I was on the bones of my arse.

Fuck that

Dd1 is vegetarian and the options on school lunches are frankly crap.

When ds started at school he had the free school meals in the hope he would follow what peers did (he has a very restricted diet). We were told he was eating all sorts he wouldn't touch at home. It was bullshit....when the school had to fill out a diet sheet for the dietician (ds was losing weight) it transpired he was eating a slice of white bread and marge and half a petit filous every day. I spoke to the dinner lady in charge and she said ds had never eaten any of the school dinners. Ever since he has had a packed lunch.

Prue Leith can jog the fuck on. Ds1 has Aspergers/SPD. His diet is very limited due to sensory processing, he has always had packed lunch, he would starve rather than try a food that isn't safe. If his school introduced a no packed lunches rule I would remove him.

Picky eaters - tough, it’s just not tolerated.

Jeez if only.

What has it to do with her anyway - does she have a new book out and need the publicity or something?

I think the fussy eaters do end up caving in as all their mates having similar and the other option is to go hungry, although it’s a stressful few weeks to start

DD is fussy at home but she eats everything at school even when she doesn't like it.

He’s a very picky eater. I just let him get on with it. Sometimes he eats it all, sometimes he only eats veg/ rice/ potatoes/ bread roll/ pudding

Picky eaters - tough, it’s just not tolerated....DS1 is the biggest fusspot at home.

Picky eating...fussy eating....there is no good way of describing a child who will just not eat, to the extent that they lose weight and their growth slows down. The posts above are not the type of restricted eating that I see in ds (and some of the children I work with)

yoursarcasm

Primary teachers in France don’t supervise lunches, at all. They down tools at 1130 and don’t start again until 1330. Yes, they often work, but lunches / playground are supervised by cantine staff / playground supervisors.

Why does she associate "packed lunches" with "unhealthy"? Has she seen what secondary schools dish up from their canteens, and how much they charge?
I like the idea of everyone eating together and banning phones but hope that she can find our school a room big enough to seat 1200 kids plus 100 teaching staff at the same time.

Our school meals (primary) are very good. I've just had the new menu and there is a meat or vegetarian option each day accompanied by salad or veg as well as a choice of sandwiches or jacket potatoes and a healthy-ish pudding. It's actually helped with my fussy eater although they do pander a bit to him and will give him plain pasta etc. I only have one so I would rather pay the £2.30 a day whilst he is at the nursery and then keep him on them as he will get them free from September.

I got fed up of chucking his packed lunch away each day.

Someone save us from interfering, busybody know-it-alls. I put her in the same box as Jamie Oliver. Just because they can cook does not bestow on them some all seeing knowledge.

Stupid bloody idea. My friends DD was on school lunches and she changed to packed lunch as the food barely resembled food.

My son is too young for school yet but I intend to send him with packed lunch. We make our own bread, have good quality Welsh butter and cheese, ham from our fantastic local butchers, and plenty of fruit. I'd prefer to send him with stuff I know what in it when he's still young. Also we eat as a family in the evening. I want it to be our choice what are children have, not stuff full of sweeteners and shit.

It is in my kids' school Grems. They say it's so each child is guaranteed at least 1 hot meal a day, which I find quite insulting.