Teenager food, is this balanced?

[123teenagerfood]

On a typical day my 13 year old boy, tall and slim eats the following , is this enough/too much and balanced enough?

Breakfast - 2 weetabix or museli, raspberries, blueberries, semi skimmed milk, glass of apple, orange or cherry juice. Or scrambled eggs, mushrooms, tom sauce and two hash browns (usually on a saturday)

Snack - banana

Lunch - white bread roll, smear of butter, either brie, hard cheese, mortadella or roast chicken, apricots. Weekends sometimes packet noodles or homemade veg soup, like minestrone or chickpea and veg.

After school snack - apple or mini cheddars

Dinner - this week so far we've had, cabbage gallettes, spag bol, egg and veg coconut curry and rice, bean stew (all veg heavy)

Evening snack - 2 slices toast with peanut butter (only after training nights)

He trains 4 times per week in a competitive sport, only drinks water, except his morning juice. At the weekend he may have some haribo or crisps.

It sounds absolutely fine. Lunch time is maybe a bit light but if that's all they want then that's obviously enough. I have a son the same age and he has a two course meal at school.
Is he still hungry? I don't really police my sons diet so he is free to help himself to whatever we have in the house.

Everything sounds fine except for lunch. I would add fruit, yogurt etc

Why a ‘smear of butter’? Butter is fine in a balanced diet! Spread butter on the roll. And yes, add more stuff to lunch in general.

He makes his own lunch and doesn't like any spreads such as mayo and only likes a tiny bit of butter. I think his lunch is light, but he nevers says he is hungry.

She says he has apricots with lunch.

My teen would starve on that.
He has sausage rolls/weetabix/protein shake and chocolate pancakes for breakfast. He has a school lunch of pasta and wraps and fruit. Unlimited portions as he's at private school and the food is excellent, he had 5 plates full yesterday much to the amusement of his teachers.
Dinner is meat and veg usually, or spag bol/curry/pizza etc. He will also easily eat massive amounts of Greek yog, share sized bags of crisps, chocolate, crackers and cheese etc.
Skinny as a bloody rake, he lifts weights and has biceps and abs. Pisses me right off 😆

My 10-yr old eats a bit more than that but all kids are different - if he isn't saying he's hungry I'd probably leave it. At least he has plenty of veg and a good mix or protein and carbs!

You don't really say what sort of portion his dinner is but on the face of it my 9 year old probably eats the same or a bit more. It's less than my nephews ate at that age but they were perpetually hungry.

Is your son content on his portions or asking for more? My very fit and active 11-yr eats considerably more than that on a daily basis....

He just mentioned that his friends have massive lunches, such as two rolls, crisps, fruits, yoghurt, cake bars and his is small in comparison. He nevers says he is wants more food though. His dinner portions are large I would say, same as his Dad and larger than mine.

Is it a packed lunch he's taking in and comparing and subtly asking for more? If he isn't complaining of hunger though I wouldn't worry....my 8yo eats like a bird in comparison but doesn't suffer on their energy stakes!

I've asked a few times now and he doesn't want more in his packed lunch. I'll just conclude that all kids are different in terms of eating habits and be happy he's happy with his portions.

looks fine to me, as long as all the evening meals aren't UHP

That doesn't sound a lot to me. My dd12 probably eats more than that. She's plays a competitive sport and trains 5 times per week so she needs to eat more than would be typical.

Sounds very small to me, especially lunch sounds tiny, my 10yo DD and I both eat more than that

My teen is 14 and not tall but pretty skinny.
He probably has similar style meals (breakfast is 1 slice of toast with butter and he doesn't eat anything else until lunch) but he eats fairly large portions of evening meals and often has seconds.

Hi OP,

at a glance and without looking at the macros in detail, I would say that diet looks fantastic and healthy for a teenager. Well done OP on instilling healthy eating habits in your DS's diet!

Some posters have suggested it may be lacking in sufficient calories, so this is something you may wish to calculate..... One observation to consider would be to calculate his protein intake as it may need increasing. It might not, but the diet does look like it could possibly be a little carb heavy (percentage wise) and may benefit from more protein, especially due to his sporting activities. As he grows he will need more calaries anyway, so adding protein will benefit him in multiple ways.

The only way to really know is to key it all into an app like myfitnesspal which will calculate all the macros and then you will clearly see the balance of the diet both in numbers and on charts. It depends how far you want to go with it really.

I think it sounds absolutely fine except there’s a huge amount of sugar coming from all of the fruit and fruit juice that he’s consuming. Definitely worth cutting down a bit and adding more vegetables instead. Hummus and carrot + pepper sticks are a favourite of DDs for snacks and lunchboxes if that’s something he’d like?