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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think most kids menus are awful

104 replies

ditziness · 01/08/2011 16:14

Is it just me that always ends up getting ds a starter rather than anything off the kids menu? Why are they usually just chips, chips, chips, goujons, Chios and fishfingers?

Surely a veg soup, a pasta dish, an omlette, bangers and mash and peas, a spag bol, lasagne, would all be healthier and more balanced and still popular?

OP posts:
BawbagBiggins · 01/08/2011 16:33

My thoughts exactly cremeegg, especially when we were forking out nearly 150 euros for the meals, desserts and drinks.
Non chain but highly regarded restaurant too.
Cheeky buggers

BornToFolk · 01/08/2011 16:34

carrotsandcelery - me too. I get so fed up with pasta and tomato sauce. For us, that's a quick and easy midweek supper, not anything special! I won't take DS anywhere that just offers him pasta and sauce or plain pizza.

We like Wagamama or Tampopo. Las Iguanas is good too as they have a special kids's menu but also offer lots of their main menu as half portions. Carluccios is good too. Even though it's pasta, it's really good pasta e.g. spinach and ricotta ravioli with sage butter.

LineRunner · 01/08/2011 16:36

Wetherspoons should be shamed, shamed I tell you, by its "kids' menu".

Although it's not the worst feature of the "family area" in my local one...

onepieceofcremeegg · 01/08/2011 16:39

LineRunner - the menu in most Wetherspoons is the least of your problems ime. Wink

Last time we went (breakfast) our local-ish one had just started opening at 9am. Unfortunately the staff didn't seem to find it necessary to have the toilets cleaned from the night before. We had to step over a number of drunken fellow customers. (not sure why we carried on in at this point, but we like a challenge!)

Staff were rude, dh's card was declined, (they only tried once) He asked politely could they try again "naah" said the staff member. He was told to go to the local cashpoint.

haggisaggis · 01/08/2011 16:44

If you thinlk the kids' menus here are bad, you should see the ones in the US - grilled cheese, peanut butter + jelly sandwich, kraft mac n' cheese, hot dog, - perhaps if you're lucky fish and chips..
1/2 portions not an option
Luckily my 2 are older now and able to eat off teh adult menu - or are happy with a salad or starters

yousankmybattleship · 01/08/2011 16:46

There are plenty of places that do interesting, healthy children's menus. If all you're finding is nuggets and burgers you need to branch out.
Our local takeaway does Doner Kebab meat and chips on their kids menu. Now that's classy!!

Insomnia11 · 01/08/2011 16:50

I think if a restauarant won't do a half portion it's because everything is pre-cooked/part cooked/pre-prepared in one giant silo in Slough in 'adult portion sized' dishes and then sent to the pub to be microwaved/deep fried for your pleasure...

Usually the places with massive menus. Avoid.

LineRunner · 01/08/2011 16:50

Onepiece, sounds about typical. My local W'spoons isn't that classy, I'd say.

One of my DCs found an unconscious adult in the toilet once. Sparked out on drink. Niiiiiice.

That was a Sunday lunchtime.

Insomnia11 · 01/08/2011 16:54

I remember going to the local Berni Inn with my dad when I was 8/9 and eating prawn cocktail, half a roast chicken and chips and hot chocolate fudge cake with ice cream. AFAIK it was an adult portion. Hmm

LineRunner · 01/08/2011 16:57

Oh, and if Tim Martin's looking in, what do MN mums want from a children's menu?

How about a selection of the adult menu, but smaller? I know it's all prepared beforehand, which is why I merely and humbly suggest a selection.

And get your staff to sling out parents who are clearly pissed when they walk in with their poor kids, or who order the maximum amount of drinks permissable and 'a bag of crips for the nipper' - the nipper who then spends an hour running round screaming and who has to be retrieved from the main road/wrong toilets by fellow customers.

HTH.

LineRunner · 01/08/2011 16:58

And don't even get me going on the loud and aggressive swearing in the W'spoons family areas....

I complained once and was told I should move. Cheers, Tim.

WillowFae · 01/08/2011 17:04

I get fed up with kids menus having main course and desert. DH and I prefer to opt for starter and main if having two courses but that isn't possible with a kids menu in most places.

Original poster
ditziness · 01/08/2011 17:08

If it's due to demand that kids menus are in the main the way they are, who are all these parents whose kids won't eat anything but chips and nuggets?

Anyone here be disappointed if they couldn't order chips and nuggets?

OP posts:
worldgonecrazy · 01/08/2011 17:11

Are children's menus a modern thing? I'm just trying to recall back in my youth (70s) and I can't remember us going out to eat and being given a children's menu, we always had to choose from the adult menu.

PatTheHammer · 01/08/2011 17:14

I do sympathise with the fact that some places seem obsessed that all kids eat is chips............my DC's hate chips and DD actually cries if she is served any (mashed potato fine though, weirdos!).

I think the pizza express and bella italia/frankie and Bennys type places do good kids menus, but then my two like pizza and pasta. i don't think the Harvester kids menu is bad either.

Sometimes it pees me off that the choice of free drink is a fruit shoot or nowt.

Interested in the Wagamamas menu, anyone else got any good recommendations?

Carrotsandcelery · 01/08/2011 17:15

I am a child of the 70's too and I have no memory of the kids menu.

I do remember my parents having to scour menus outside places on holiday to find a vegetarian choice though because even then I just couldn't eat meat.

Invariably it was macaroni cheese.

rookiemater · 01/08/2011 17:18

worldgonecrazy - it may be because people generally did not go out as much for meals in the 70s.There was a kids menu at the golf club we went to sometimes, but there wasn't such a plethora of "child friendly" chain restaurants and I think eating out was more of an adult oriented pleasure rather than a family one. My Dad is American and I don't know if its because of that but we had eaten out quite a lot as a family, when I arrived at uni I was shocked to find out that quite a lot of 18 year olds had never been to a restaurant.

ditziness - I would be gutted if I couldn't order chips and nuggets for DS. He is a fussy eater and yes I'm sure its all my fault but I do try my best when at home to introduce new foods to his diet. However when we go out its nice to actually enjoy a meal and as he can eat politely and behave himself at the dinner table I'm delighted that so many places offer the stuff he eats happily.

northerngirl41 · 01/08/2011 17:27

I wonder from an economic point of view if it's worthwhile for the restaurants to do kids portions of adult dishes.... So for example it's not unreasonable to expect that a 1/2 lasagne which on the main menu is £8 would be £4 for a kids portion.

But the chef still has to cook it, the waitress still has to serve it, the plate still needs to be washed etc. So it might be that they'd need to charge almost as much for a half portion as for a full portion - I'm not in the restaurant trade, but perhaps someone can shed light? They might be losing money on half portions hence why they offer completely different (and much cheaper ingredient meals!) than on the main menu so they can offer a discount on kids meals.

TBH we usually just eat off the main menu.

Carrotsandcelery · 01/08/2011 17:27

rookie I think you are right. The seventies were an era of financial hardship for many and I can only remember eating out on holiday or for our birthdays. My parents ate out more but left us at home.

I also remember the holidays where we ate at the kids sitting while our parents had a drink at the bar (remember sausage and chips and beans etc) and then we were left alone in the hotel room while they had their meal downstairs.

I don't think many of us could cope too well with that arrangement these days.

With regards to the op surely there is room for nuggets and chips and something more adventurous on the kids menus. The nuggets and chips only take up freezer space and don't really need preparation (which is presumably why they are so popular on kids menus.)

The worst I have seen is ordering mac and cheese for myself and my daughter in a restaurant. Hers was tinned and mine was lovely homemade. Hmm

limitedperiodonly · 01/08/2011 17:33

OT a bit but I wanted to say it's not just Britain that has strange ideas about what children eat.

I was in a posh hotel in Sweden that was aimed at adults but one Italian couple had brought their 10 year old daughter.

The menu had things like herrings, sea trout, elk stew, reindeer steak, loads of things with lingonberries, lashings of vodka and other grain and spud-based spirits. It was lovely - apart from the herring bit Grin

It must have been unusual for a child to stay because the chef had got in a special menu for her of chicken nuggets and chips which the waitress was trying to force on her to the point of tears.

In the end her dad shouted: 'Go away, girl. My daughter will eat reindeer.'

And she did.

pawsnclaws · 01/08/2011 17:37

I agree with thursday, it's driven by what people want/expect. We were really fed up with the menu on holiday recently (lovely hotel in Portugal) - they had three restaurants but the child menu was the same for each of them (pizza/chicken and chips/fish and chips).

We're Wagamama's addicts though, and even ds1 (8) who I would say is pretty fussy, can always find something he likes - usually the mini chicken katsu, which is lovely though he doesn't like the curry sauce - luckily it comes on the side. Giraffe is nice too.

We never ate out when I was a child - we might have occasionally got fish and chips but that was it. I do remember a birthday trip once to a Wimpy Bar - I thought I'd died and gone to heaven!

rookiemater · 01/08/2011 17:41

pawsandclaws not trying to be cheeky but is chicken katsu without sauce not just a large chicken nugget - am interested as we have to go Japanese on Sunday to suit grandad who wants teppanyaki

limitedperiodonly · 01/08/2011 17:41

That said, they should have chips on the menu. I like chips and many adults wouldn't stomach Bambi let alone 10 year olds.

northern DH and I usually share a starter because I can't eat a whole starter and DH doesn't want to look like a pig by eating all his and half of mine.

I always wonder if they're cursing us over their profits. We more than make up for it with alcohol but if you were asking for a half portion and not spending in other ways I suppose it would affect them.

pawsnclaws · 01/08/2011 17:42

Oh and on a previous trip to Portugal we made the mistake of booking the whole family into the swanky beachfront restaurant for their seafood buffet, then cringed with shame as ds1 (then aged 6) pronounced that the oysters in the seafood display looked "like bogeys." I apologised profusely to the nice young man next to me helping himself to seafood, who smiled and said "well to be fair, they kind of do!"

Ds1 ate ...... (drum roll) ....... a single bread roll. Which cost us 40 euros (the price per head of the meal).

Sirzy · 01/08/2011 17:42

I hate it when places have fantastic menus for adults but the same old rubbish for children. I much prefer it when places offer the option of half size dishes for children or at least a greatly varied childrens menu.

Before now I have ordered a jacket potato or sandwich for Ds instead of off the childrens menu