Does your child’s packed lunch contain a treat everyday?

[Mrssheepskin]

Currently DS4 takes a packed lunch 3 days a a week to preschool.
He has a sandwich/wrap (always cheese although hoping to broaden the range soon!), salad bits, fruit and a piece of homemade cake or biscuit (shortbread, cookie, lemon drizzle, cupcake etc.) If he continues packed lunches when he starts school, would it be bad to have a sweet treat like this everyday still? Not sure what to swap it with if not.

Yes it is free but I don’t know how good they actually are… and looking at the menu, they get a dessert after every lunch anyway. Including ice cream, chocolate ‘crunch’ and sponge cakes etc…

Tbh I’m quite surprised at the number of people who refuse to use the word ‘treat’ but also put chocolate etc in lunches every day. I don’t personally see that as a healthy approach to food.

In the context of a varied, mostly home cooked, unprocessed diet a Freddo or Kit Kat isn’t going to hurt.

Comparison to school dinner puddings is misleading - there are rules on school food and a school dinner flapjack or cake will have vastly less sugar than something you buy in a supermarket or a typical home recipe. School “chocolate cake” typically contains things like courgette and beetroot and tastes nothing like a typical chocolate cake, they’re often very bland.

Mine take a substantial sandwich, a tub of cut up fruit and a handful of crisps or popcorn. They don’t have time or inclination to eat much, they want to go out to play. Their school asks for no sweets, chocolate or fizzy drinks but are ok with cake or biscuits.

In infants they usually took a main, 2 vegetables or a fruit and a vegetable and something else, it varied daily but typical things were a yogurt, cheese, crisps, mini savoury pastry, cake, jellly, popcorn, biscuit, sausage, crackers and cheese.

No because my DD has packed lunch precisely to avoid ‘treats’ from the canteen for lunch. She is nearly 13 though so it’s her choice. She hates the unhealthy offerings of the school canteen and often ends up eating a croissant for lunch therefore if packed lunch she will only choose really healthy options.

Ours looks something like this-
Cheese or ham wrap, crackers or bagel. (Wholemeal).
Pepper, carrot and cucumber sticks.
A variety of fruit chopped up in a pot (usually 3 types)
A yoghurt or 2x jaffa cakes or homemade small bake.
Sometimes a few crisps or a pepperami.

I remember my packed lunches in school consisted of:
Sandwich
Yogurt
Biscuit - I remember having wagon wheels now and again!

This was about 20-30 years ago now though...looking back, I would definitely be adding some fruit to my lunches!

The only member of our household who understands the word “treat” in its proper context is our dog.

Growing up, the kids we knew who were deprived of anything “treat”-like acted like proper food weirdos. I can remember them literally drooling over my ice cream cone and begging for some. Sure their parents were patting themselves on the back for their carrot stick approach in the meantime.

Sensible balance and all things in moderation works best.

Mine all have a piece of cake, malt loaf or cookie in their lunchbox unload it’s a yoghurt or jelly day. All have veggies, fruit & pasta salad, wrap or sandwich or picky bits. They’re all active, healthy weight and eat a reasonably balanced diet.

This is what I’m struggling with a bit. If they have packed lunch everyday. Should they get a sweet treat for 5 of the days or maybe less every other day for example.

I always gave DD a sweet treat as we usually have one with our morning coffee - ie part of family life. Everything else was deemed healthy. I work at a school and believe me, one treat is nothing - many bring in crisps, 2-3 biscuit type snacks and odd one will have these and nothing else!

except school dinners have pudding every day sooo ....

just give it to him like normal.

ignore the school "rules"

I'd rather my daughter continue to have the decent homemade flapjack i make with organic oats, honey and seeds than some mass catered "low sugar" junk provided by Catering companies at the lowest possible cost.

The Head Teacher can fuck right off.

Snap. My DC school used to inspect lunch boxes and anything sweet was taken away.

Lots of the "healthy" things that people are putting in their children's lunch boxes - sandwiches or wraps made from processed white bread, sweetened yoghurts, veggie straws, yoyos - are probably all worse than a small piece of homemade cake tbh

Absolutely!

Snap. My DC school used to inspect lunch boxes and anything sweet was taken away.

Thats a massive overreach on the part of the school, as a parent I decide what my children eat and if the school have a particular concern they can speak to me about it, but they’d better have a more significant concern than me putting a Kit Kat in their lunch box.

Yes, mine do - they are teens and make their own lunches, and they always put a biscuit bar or similar in, it’s just part of their lunch, and not worth getting hung up about.

Once they are at secondary they could stop at the shop on the way and buy a whole pack of biscuits or a big 2 litre bottle of cola tbh - I often see kids doing this - so I’m very happy to provide a penguin or Blue riband bar instead for their lunchbox!

They always have a sandwich (usually cheese/hummus for one, ham /tuna and lettuce for other), fruit, biscuit bar, plus something for morning break time - today one has a hot cross bun and the other some popcorn, but they sometimes take things like scotch eggs, mini sausage rolls, leftover quiche etc.

They don’t eat like that at home, but there needs to be some pragmatism over what is easily transported in a lunchbox - my dc are very fussy about foods deteriorating in lunchboxes, so tend to pack quite simple stuff to keep them going, and then eat other things when they get home.
For eg one of mine has apple slices and peanut butter often on return from school - peanut butter not allowed anyway and apple slices would “go brown”, so they are out for lunchbox purposes.
Other dc eats a lot of nuts at home - also not allowed. Won’t take veg or salad as it gets “soggy”, eats plenty at home though.
So pragmatism rules.

They are allowed it I’m just not sure whether I want/should be!

Our preschool doesn’t allow sweets / crisps. Although my DS sometimes tells me that X had chocolate rice cakes or Y had a strawberry milkshake, etc… He usually has a little treat when he’s at home in the afternoon. A biscuit or crisps / chocolate.

Could you replace with a bigger portion of the 'main' or add something else, e.g. breadsticks/carrot sticks and houmous, fruit winder, squeezy yoghurt, babybel, strips of chicken or ham? So he has more food and isn't hungry rather than try to think of an exact substitute for a biscuit. I don't think it's too bad but agree 5 days a week is quite a lot. I don't always give DS 'treats' (although i try to avoid calling them that!) because i don't want him to grown up thinking a meal is not complete until you've had something sweet like biscuit/cake!

No wholemeal sandwich over night oats with seeds or chia seed pudding & crudite and/ or fruit often a boiled egg

Or a hot meal in a thermos + crudite -

No crisps / cake / chocolate

I'm not especially anti sugar but it has no place in day to day breakfast or lunch imo

They do get treat for a school trip pack up - chocolate rice cake or cereal bar

A squeezy yogurt or a fruit winder would have more sugar and be worse for teeth than a bit of home made cake quite aside from all the ultra processed stuff and the packaging