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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think Hula Hoops in a Friday packed lunch is ok...

76 replies

MerryMarigold · 25/03/2011 16:27

OK. So ds1 went on packed lunches this week. He's had healthy lunches all week. Today he had a sandwich (2 slices of thick sliced wholemeal bread), 3 cherry tomatoes, raisins and [shock, horror] a packet of ready salted Hula Hoops as a treat 'cos it's Friday and wanted to give him a little treat at the end of the week.

So, they confiscated his crisps!

This was part of his packed lunch. No replacement given so he just had to not have part of his lunch. No-one has told me that you can't have crisps. One boy has chocolate spread sarnies and a pepperami every day. And this ok. School dinner on fridays is Fish & Chips.

OK, so I know you'll say I need to get over myself. But is this common in schools? Are Hula Hoops really damaging to children?

OP posts:
reelingintheyears · 25/03/2011 16:46

Do they eat the Hula Hoops and chocolate cake in the staff room?

Give them back at the end of the day?

Bin them?

Ooopsadaisy · 25/03/2011 16:48

Schools take food off the children?

Schools dictate what goes into lunchboxes?

Really?

I've never heard of this before.

Are they trying to encourage food issues in 4 year olds now?

They would only try it once with one of my DCs.

Original poster
MerryMarigold · 25/03/2011 16:49

Am shocked at the taking away the sandwiches! Pancake, the thing that gets me is that the dinners are hardly SUPER healthy, as you say, stodgy puddings, ice-cream, chips (every other day). But if you have packed lunch you are only allowed bread and fruit! Oh, they do allow flapjacks, but I think choc cake would be removed.

OP posts:
kittybuttoon · 25/03/2011 16:50

IMO it's no wonder that eating disorders are on the increase, when the food police are operating in primary schools, snatching carbohydrates off children!

I don't know what I'd do in your position, OP. Whatever I decided, it wouldn't be legal, I can assure you! But I just wanted to post to show solidarity.

Original poster
MerryMarigold · 25/03/2011 16:51

They gave the crisps back! But on the school trip we went on last week the teachers were eating crisps (in front of the kids) so I did assume it was ok.

OP posts:
strandedpolarbear · 25/03/2011 16:51

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ddubsgirl · 25/03/2011 16:51

i would complain to the school,kids schools are pretty good twins school did send letter home about chocolate bars turns out some parents were sending kids in with kingsize mars bars and the big dairymilk bars!

Pancakeflipper · 25/03/2011 16:52

I never got my chocolate cake back. But her tummy might have been hiding it.

I did get an apology from the school.

Divster · 25/03/2011 16:54

There was a time a few years back when Jamie first stuck his nose in, where pack lunches were checked on the school gates, and anything classed as unhealthy was made to be taken back home

ShirleyKnot · 25/03/2011 16:59

er and also, if there are children coming into school with just a bag of haribo and a mars bar then confiscating their only bit of food is dreadful

DREADFUL.

Pancakeflipper · 25/03/2011 17:00

And MerryM - pull up a chair and we can rant together about school dinners. Thankfully my DS who has school dinners twice a week has seen the light and fallen out with over boiled veg etc and asked to have packed lunches all week now.

Hulababy · 25/03/2011 17:05

The whole thing re school packed lunches annoys me so much, and I don't actually have to put up ith it - DD has compulsary school lunch. But I do see it via my job.

Children should be allowed the equivalent of the school dinner in their lunh box.

School dinners = main meal with a carb and some vegetable, followed by a dessert.

Therefore, packed lunch so allow children to have the same - their main sandwiches or whatever, with some veg/fruit, and a dessert.

School dinner desserts include chocolate cake, sponge puddings, custard, etc. Therefore packed lunches should allow the same kind of thing.

I do think peanut based products should be avoided as a peanut allergy reaction is potentally so dangerous.

onlion · 25/03/2011 17:08

You think thats bad?

I once sent my son in with his usual healthy lunch plus one cookie I made at home. It had raisins and the smallest sprinkle of choc chips, so that he would probably had maybe 2 in the cookie (the rest went into the cook's gob).

Confiscated.

So she must have scrutinised the cookie , madness.

Worse still? Im a Dietitian/Nutritionist so think i have a better idea about whether or not that cookie was healthy than the dinner lady did.

Hulababy · 25/03/2011 17:09

Our school only has chips once a week, on a Friday on the fish and chips day.

So, going by my reasoning in prev post, packed lunches should be allowed a crisp type snack in their packed lunch on a Friday too.

withagoat · 25/03/2011 17:11

id query these peoples grimy hands all over your food

blighter · 25/03/2011 17:13

reeling - i don't agree. i think the kid should NOT have had his peanut butter sandwich taken away, i think he should have been allowed to eat it but made sure he was not sitting next to a kid with nut allergy, and made to wash his hands after, simple. but some kids react even to airborne peanut ie if sitting close enough. and if a kid has some on their hands and then ie touches a book etc a child can be seriously ill. my dd has nut allergy and used to have egg and dairy. she is as trained up as she can be but if she were one that had airborne allergic reactions, and i have met a few who do, training them up would not help

spiderlight · 25/03/2011 17:13

Unbelievable - I'd be furious.

Ooopsadaisy · 25/03/2011 17:15

I am still utterly bemused (or stupid).

So, are we saying that someone is peering into each and every lunchbox and taking out whatever does not suit the mood?

Does this really happen?

Isn't it stealing?

When I was at school, if someone took stuff out of your lunchbox they were a thief and a bully.

onlion · 25/03/2011 17:15

I was once on a flight where the sale of nuts was banned as one person on the plane declared they had a nut allergy.

blighter · 25/03/2011 17:21

we flew with dd but didn't mention her nut allergy as didn't want to appear neurotic plus we didn't think she suffered airborne reactions, she was fine although we didn't eat em' obviously. i know of a child so incredibly allergic she was rushed to hospital because a bit of dried egg on a chair leg i kid you not, this really happened. on a different note, i can't stand jamie oliver, has his head up his bottom. dd's school actively regularly encourage us parents to use 'low fat spread' instead of butter on their sandwiches. then can f**k right off. when i meet her from school i always have a small chocolate bar instead of a bag with sliced carrot. she is like a stick insect, she is the last person who needs to lose weight. they should really be approaching the parent of the child who is obese instead of giving all of us a hard time. i remember a child on tv who specialised in eating disorders on a prog re anorexia specifically stating how children NEED these fats. i got told off once for putting a packet of crisps in her lunch box on a wednesday which is their official no crisp day, i am such a rebel

blighter · 25/03/2011 17:22

i meant (above) a dr !! (not a child)

bristolcities · 25/03/2011 17:23

Do people not understand child nutrition. It's about what they don't have rather than what they do have. By this I mean your son sounds like he is getting all the nutrients he needs from his packed lunch and actually children have small stomachs and do need food that is calorific, as long as its not replacing something healthy I really don't see the problem. I would be really angry. It's very patronising.

QueenofDreams · 25/03/2011 17:26

I hate this mentality. It's a bloody police state, inspecting children's lunchboxes in school and confiscating food.

The fact is it's the PARENT's job to ensure their child is well nourished. Why can I not give MY child a chocolate biscuit to lunch every so often?

I think they should contact the child's parents if they are concerned about nutrition, not have a blanket 'thou shalt not' policy on anything considered vaguely unhealthy.

MIL said she watched in on a class a couple of weeks ago at her DD's school, where they were teaching healthy eating. The teacher showed the children a picture of pizza as an example of unhealthy food and then a picture of a cheese and tomato baguette as healthy food. Apparently a little boy said 'but they're the same, exept the pizza is hot and cooked' and the teacher got quite irate with him for contradicting her.

ZZZenAgain · 25/03/2011 17:27

I like querying the grimy hands. That's very good. "Do you mean to say that someone has been touching my dc's lunchbox, fingering his food? OMG how unhygienic!"

I never thought of that, bet they don't wear gloves

geordieminx · 25/03/2011 17:31

Our nursery doesn't allow crisps chocolate sweets cake or biscuits... Not even plain digestive type biscuits or homemade cake... They do however allow sugar cereal bars such as the rice crispy ones, and also those "fruit" winder things.

No logic at all