Nursery’s comments about 3 year old’s lunchbox

[Fussyeating]

DS is 3 and he recently started at a new nursery. DH and I work FT so he attends 4 full days a week 8-6. He previously attended a different nursery who were great in ways but utterly useless in others so we decided to find a new one to cover this academic year.

The issue we have with this nursery is their attitude to food and fussy eating. DS has always been a fussy eater, even as a small infant when he first started weaning. I have no idea why, older DS is not fussy at all and will eat just about anything without complaint. We didn’t do anything differently when we weaned him, we still offer him all the same foods we eat on a daily basis but he often just won’t touch them. He won’t eat pieces of fruit at all, he actually never has. We followed BLW with both DC but DS2 just rejected any form of fruit or veg unless the veg was disguised within a meal. He’s still the same now, he will only eat vegetables if they’re very well disguised within a meal such as chilli, curry, pasta bake etc.

With regards to fruit intake, the only way we can get him to consume any fruit of any sort is within snacks such as innocent smoothie cartons, bear yo-yos and Nakd bars. I appreciate none of this is ideal, I obviously wish he’d just eat a bowl of berries or whatever like DC1 does but this is all we can get him to accept fruit wise.

The nursery offers one set meal a day with no other selection. Initially we thought we’d try DS with their hot meals and see if maybe it broadened his horizons, perhaps he’d try something new when he saw all of the other children there eating it. What actually happened was he went the full day between breakfast at 7am and dinner when he got home just after 6pm without eating anything at all. The nursery didn’t attempt to offer him anything outside of their set meal such as plain toast like his previous nursery would have, they just essentially let him starve.

Suffice to say, we switched him over to a lunchbox after this. The issue is, the nursery staff keep commenting on the contents within his lunchbox. When DH drops him off, they actually open the lunchbox and will remove certain items and pass them to DH saying DS can’t eat them. Examples are as I mentioned previously- innocent smoothie cartons, bear yo-yos and oat bars. These items are on a very small list of lunchbox style items DS will actually willingly eat. They have said they don’t mind if he brings more packets of crisps and extra sandwiches but they don’t want him to bring ‘high sugar’ foods. The weird thing is, they offer the children dessert with their meal every single day and it’s things such as profiteroles or cake and custard so to offer that but have an issue with something like an oat bar seems bonkers to me! He also often returns home with items like that uneaten and I know he would eat them so I’m gathering they’re intentionally not opening them for him.

I ended up sending a long ranting email yesterday because I was pretty furious that they keep restricting his already quite restrictive diet. When he’s there for 10 hours and there’s an 11 hour gap between the meals he has at home, we need to make sure he’s eating adequately and isn’t going hungry. I’ve already enquired at different nurseries, however I do know FT slots in the area we live in are rare so the chances of us sourcing alternative childcare are slim. I’m just looking for advice really, what’s the best course of action here? Also, if anyone has any tips regarding fussy eating, I’d fully appreciate those!

If this is DC’s diet, I really wouldn’t be worrying about getting fruit in there too. You’re much better off offering real versions of things until they eat them. DS hasn’t eaten a vegetable in 3.5 years (he’s 5). We did BLW and he ate everything under the sun until he turned 2. He is offered veg every week, tries but doesn’t like. He eats fruit and doesn’t eat any processed food, so I’m not teally worried.

Most nurseries (and all schools) have a water-only policy. Personally, I would stick to that to get used to it.

I know. But it is so wrong that this is the case.

It's a real 'Emperor's New Clothes' thing: each successive government says that nursery is such a wonderful and fantastic thing, and offers parents incentives to send their children to them. But days that long - and particularly with nothing to eat - can't possibly be benefiting the child. All it does is keep both parents in the workforce.

There aren't any easy answers to any of this, but small children should not be the ones who suffer.

There's always one 😳

BEAR Yoyos are made from 100% pure fruit and gently baked, with no added nonsense. They contain absolutely no added sugar, sulphites or stabilisers, and are never made from concentrate. Packed full of fibre, they count as 1 of your 5 a day.

Hello BEAR marketing team 👋

Wow that’s a good variety for a fussy eater, my fussy eater has 5 items, send him something they can warm up

My LG ID extremely fussy to, she refused most of their meals except sausages and baked beans.
We went to a lunchbox and apart from no nuts have never had an issues

We put in
Brioche roll or croissant
Cheese
Kiddilicous smoothie melts (her fruit alternative)
Organix rice cakes
Heinz baby biscotti
It's honestly beige overload and makes me feel awful but the nursery from the outset said we try and replicate what you do at home so have never made me feel bad or refused food in the building.

I would ask to have a meeting with the nursery manager and raise your concerns.

Could you provide a hot dinner in one of those insulated food flasks?

Hope things improve for you guys

You need a weekend where you offer him as many types of fruit and veg cooked in many ways as much as possible. Just leave a big platter on the table. You will soon find out what he likes.

I did this with my veg hater when he was 1 and found out that DS prefers his veg unsalted and al dente or raw. He will not eat boiled or roast veg, that he won’t eat bananas with brown spots but will eat them green, he eats orange cantelope and watermelon but not green melons. He won’t eat potatoes in any form. And he loves cauliflower, raw sugar snap pees, aubergiene puree, raw courgettes, tangerines (but not satsumas or clementines), and green apples lol. You need to go to a proper grocer - as they’ll have cheaper individual fruit and veg. It worked for us/He’s 3 now and his tastes have broadened.

It's an unpalatable truth. I don't know how society became so fucked up that someone at some point thought it was a good idea for small children to be away from their nests for 11 hours a day, 5 days a week.

Hi, .make a time that is good for you and go and talk( not email) about your concerns. Make sure that you have a list of what he will eat. Together work out whats acceptable for both of you. There is an emphasis in the EYFS on dental health and healthy eating.
Hope that helps and good luck.

It was around the time humanity discovered agriculture. Prior to that babies died when their mums died (or were injured, or gave birth again as malnutrition meant there was only ever enough breastmilk for one baby, or had to go leave a baby to go hunting) - humans lived solo / in groups of 1-2. After agriculture we began to live in societies and so when mums died or had to work and babies had a group of other people to take care of them.

The expectation that a baby needs to be with mum / dad all the time until 5 is recent and new and damaging.

Nope. Not even close to being a "truth." Just an opinion, an uninformed one at that.

@Fussyeating I think you've received some excellent advice on this thread (as well as some less than excellent advice). I agree that it's appalling that the nursery evidently didn't even try to offer an alternative to their lunch or snack options. Having said that, I do think that too much sugary stuff is not ideal. I'd also ditch the crisps, they are just empty calories that won't really fill him up. I hope that the thermos and bento box ideas work out for your DS.

There's a world of difference between a group of women who are already a community taking care of one another's children, and farming out small children to people who don't actually care about them. I would have been very happy to share the care of my children with my female friends when our children were small. I would also have been happy to entrust my children to these friends if I'd dropped dead while digging potatoes. I wouldn't, however, have been happy to drop them off away from home with poorly paid staff whom I barely knew, and collect them 10 hours later and discover that they hadn't been fed all day.

Hi I have not read all the threads so this may repeat something already mentioned by someone else and I have a couple of angles here. Firstly is there anyway you could make homemade oat bars, flapjacks, muffins as there are many low sugar versions out there.? I appreciate you work full time so this is far from ideal and not the way you want to spend your free time but it may be a compromise. Or homemade smoothies? To be honest they need to work with you on the food issue rather than act like the food police and it would be preferable for you and him moving forward if you were able to widen his diet a little with their support and as you say modelling from other children. However on the other hand it could be a safeguarding issue if his basic needs are not being met during his nursery and if pushed you may have to mention this and take the issue further to a safeguarding lead at the local authority. It is simply not good enough for them to say "no" to the foods he will eat and let him starve - they need to work with you to come up with a solution. Good Luck!

I would like to add that I am also appalled that he has been left with no food for so long - it is really TOTALLY unacceptable and distressing for you all and you could also raise an official complaint regarding this - you can also raise complaints with OFSTED at any time you do not need to wait for an inspection.

I'd expect nursery to be more accommodating by providing an alternative meal & actually very unusual to not have a veggie option offered these days so would query that. Nurseries around me tend to have 2 main courses per day (1 veggie/vegan) & 1 being a pretty 'plain' option as well as a simple ham/cheese/tuna sandwich. You DC will not be the only fussy eater so they should be attempting to work with you.
As a childminder I would ask you to send in the sandwiches, plain yohurt, bread sticks, cream cheese/crackers or similar they will eat as a back up but keep persevering with offering small amounts of the nursery option & just ignoring if it's not eating let them eat the safe sandwich . Your child won't starve but doesn't need all the extra bits & it's actually generally not long before even the most stubborn child will decide themselves that they get have a nibble cos they see friends enjoying the food. Obviously this doesn't happen with those who have a real sensory issue with food & are seeing dieticians etc but kindly, your child doesn't sound like this is the case going by what they eat at home.
Nutella was mentioned but obviously 🙄 nut allergies so not allowed.
Nursery are in a tough place though with high sugar snack items - yoyos, sweetened bars, pouches, yoghurt are actually really dreadful for sugar content ( even though they claim to be fruit based it is still sugar! ) Childcare providers are downgraded for allowing these, as well as juice drinks ( water or milk are the only drinks acceptable) & they won't be willing to risk this as their reputations/livelihoods depend upon it. Unless you have a medical reason its unlikely that you will change their stance on this by continuing to send in the same lunches.

I find nurseries like this absolutely abhorrent, as a mother with petite children who the Health Visitors constantly gave me grief about them being so small, like it was my fucking fault. Anyway, I have very strong opinions about a nursery/school withholding food from children, it's neglectful, out of order and adds to the already tough pressure we have already on ensuring our children, be them petite or fussy eaters or both to have enough calorie intake daily.

I did have an issue with my nursery over the same thing by the way. It's absolutely crazy that they won't allow a 150ml Innocent smoothie when they serve those having their hot lunches ultra-processed foods such as baked beans and shop bought dessert laden with preservatives and E numbers with powdered custard. The irony.

Anyway, my suggestion to you, in addition to sending them an email to persuade them to stop being such arseholes & educate them on fucking nutrition, is to get a Thermos food flask, then you can put a hot meal in it for him like chilli and rice, or a pasta meal, or scrambled eggs, or a hot meal you know that he'll eat. I use these food flasks for myself, they are great. It means he'll get a hot healthy meal while he's there.

I'd be wary of the comments from people telling you to just take them out of the wrapper, as I wouldn't put it past your nursery to just bin the food you send in with him. It's not like they thought twice about wanting to flush out the smoothie. Cheeky fuckers.

The funny thing is, when I went through this with my nursery they said they'd had the "start rite" nutrition training which they seemed to think trumped my degree in nutrition 🙄 but it's not just that though, they are not your child's parent and they literally have no right to overrule your decision on what your own child eats. I did not give my children's nursery the loco parentis when they started as I did not agree with it, and I was only ten minutes away at home if needed.

Ask for a meeting to discuss your issues, until you know their policy, you won't be able to make headway.

Working in a school, I know how strict eating policies can be. In ours, apples must be peeled and carrots grated due to 'choking risk', so I totally agree, there is unfortunately no link between setting policy and BLW.

Policy usually means the cooks cannot deviate from the set menu, due to this being dietician planned and approved. (And their are often similar requirements for packed lunches too) This could be why toast won't be offered as an alternative as it won't meet the required protein/fruit/veg content. Crazy, but - in our area anyway, that's the rule. The deserts on the set menu are usually made really healthily, with hidden fruit in place of the normal sugar content. Cakes will likely have hidden courgette, beetroot, carrot etc, custard will have hardly any sugar, crumbles will be full of oats and honey instead of sugar etc.

The items you mention will likely breach the sugar content allowed. Homemade Flapjack or oat cookies are more likely to be allowed. Most settings are also usually water or milk, so no smoothies unfortunately, it's all due to levels of concentrated fruit sugars which occurs in the processing of the fruit.

Things like pasta salad, rice salad, oatcakes and cheese, breadsticks, ricecakes, lentil curls, should all adhere to policy, yet keep him fuller. Pancakes, fruit teacakes, fruit scones might be seen as treats which are lower in sugar. Could you add more protein based snacks rather than sugar based ones - eggs, peperami sticks, cold chicken pieces etc? Also, jelly or custard pots might be alternatives to yoghurt and again can be sugar free. Just some ideas.

Sandwiches, crisps and yogurt sounds ok for lunch and would fit their criteria?

It’s nuts though isn’t it. You’re paying them to care for your child and they are being difficult about it. It’s not like you are sending him in with a cold happy meal.

@direbollockal i attended a childminder several days a week when I was a child because both my parents worked. It didn’t do me or my siblings any harm. I have good memories of my time there playing with the other kids. I was never left without food for the day though.

It annoys me people vilifying Yo-yo bears here- they contain minerals such as potassium and calcium and also contain fibre, which Percy pigs don’t contain.

you cannot compare the two because, despite yo-yo bears having high sugar content, they do still contain vital nutrients that Percy pigs don’t.

Hmmm it’s a tricky one, I understand your concern, of course you can’t leave a 3 year old to starve for almost 12 hours a day 4 days a week but I understand the nursery if there are no suspected special needs. I think you need to have a meeting and both compromise, especially since he will be at school before you know it and it would be best to try and tackle this now.

my understanding is the best way to deal with fussy eating is remove pressure and provide a safe food so what if you provide one safe food per meal and ask for it to be out on his plat along side a small portion of the nursery meal so he is served and eating along side his friends for example:

breakfast- you provide plain toast and they give a small portion of their food

lunch- you pack a cheese sandwich or whatever he will eat and they put a small portion of their lunch next to him on the plate

that way he won’t starve but he’s also not being rewarded for his fussy eating with high sugary snacks that no one else is allowed.

The thing with this is that nurseries and childminders do have to encourage healthy eating and talk to children and parents about healthy options but no where in the guidance does it say that we have to stop parents feeding their child what they want to, so an extreme lunch box policy like this is entirely down to the nursery manager. Nurseries find it easier to be strict about these things because staff can just blame policy, but someone's written it. I'm a childminder and I'm struggling do get parents to send healthy lunches ATM but by that I mean just one cake or sweet thing and actually putting in a sandwich/wrap/pasta option because we go out alot, and not a bachelor's instant pasta packet or last night's burger and chips. (Actual meals that have been sent this week despite sending out very clear advice/requests at the beginning of term and again two weeks ago)

So maybe try a childminder, we're much more likely to make exceptions and to be a bit more relaxed about lunchbox content.

I don't have any issue with childminders at all - children being looked after in a home environment by someone in loco parentis is very different from mass childcare where (as in the OP) the staff aren't engaged with her child and his needs.