you can't possibly call a meal junk food if it had all of your 5 a day!

[bonded]

So a few weeks ago we had a play date that went well. Friend just what's capped me asking for advice for a meal tonight. I said recently that this went down well and is super healthy:

Baked beans, one of your 5 a day
Fish fingers, good source of ohmega and protein
Frozen sweet corn and peas, frozen has more nutrients.

Pudding frozen bananas whipped up into ice cream with a little chcoclate sauce and chopped dates.

Said friend called meal a bit to junky. I thought it was really healthy...

Nothing wrong with that really.

Hmm, it's not a terrible meal and it's one I would serve to DCs friends and think I'd done quite well but it is too high in sugar and salt to be considered healthy IMO.

As a meal for a mixed group of DC where you've got to try and find something everyone will eat, it's not bad at all. As a regular family meal it's not hard to do better IMO.

Weeeell, yes, but it contains a lot of processed food

Just my opinion, but better to cook from scratch.

Is this for your child or for the whole family? Are you de-carbing?

The only think processed as the beans and fingers, not pratical to make them from scratch and they were low salt sugar versions, mostly green on the traffic lights!

I'm a low carber so didn't eat the peas or sweetcorn, but these do contain a lot of carbs!

Fish fingers are really easy to makes from scratch

Don't get me wrong, there is nothing 'wrong' with the meal, but it certainly isn't super healthy...

As a treat on a play date - fine, but not really as an everyday meal IMO.

It's fine for an occasional meal.

I wouldn't want it eaten every day due to the sugar content, but it certainly isn't junk.

It's the sort of thing I'd serve to a group of kids as a one-off.

Totally fine, so long as your fishfingers, beans, and ice cream are all good quality. Read the label.

Fishfingers preferably haddock, as cod is over-fished. Other ingredients I'd expect to see are breadcrumbs, cucumin, salt, oil.

Beans about 50% beans, 35% tomatoes, last 15% water, sugar, vinegar, spices.

Ice cream preferably cream, sugar, vanilla, egg.

If your kids are active, they'll burn off the 5-6g sugar in their serving of beans in no time.

Personally, I'd whack some buttered brown toast in there too for complex carbs.
Yummy.

Quite healthy and the type of thing my ds has for tea a couple of times a week. Only problem is slightly high sugar and salt imo.
Sweetcorn is one of 5 a day!

Would you have pudding every night? I ask because growing up we only had pudding on Saturday and Sunday night, but part of that was that we weren't well off... My mum had a very sweet tooth and I'm sure we'd have had it more often if she could have afforded it.

People have strange ideas of what constitutes junk food. To me, junk food is something full of fat and/or sugar with pretty much no nutritional value, like greasy takeaways and chocolate. Something you've made at home that includes vegetables isn't junk.
I'm sure it's not as great as something made entirely from scratch from all fresh ingredients but in the grand scheme of things, there's nothing wrong with it.

Corn and peas contain lots of carbs? Is this true?

Don't listen to all these crazy people. It's fine. Your friend sounds a bitch. You eat what you are given as a guest. Why don't you text her back to cancel? Food police are the most boring fuckers around.

From the nhs site - 3 heaped tablespoons of tinned or frozen sweetcorn = 1 portion

It's not awful, but it's not super healthy either. Too much processed food (beans, fish fingers and ice cream are all processed, ice cream is v high in sugar). It's ok, but I agree with your friend.

Yep, they are all here: the carb, sugar, fat, veg police. Yawn. See how dull it is? Dump food police friend. Enjoy whatever food you like sensibly.

And please forgive my ignorance about the carb level in peas and corn and beans.... I know they are relatively high in carbs compared to other vegetables, but would they provide enough carbs as part of a balanced meal for a growing child?

I have no agenda here... I don't know much about low carbing, as I just generally try to eat a little from all food groups in a balanced way. I don't have kids yet.

I wouldn't class it as a healthy meal, but I wouldn't class it as a bad one either.

Beans, sweetcorn AND peas seems like an odd combination to me though. I would probably have changed the beans for something like mash instead.

I'd agree that it doesn't qualify as 'junk' but there are shades of grey between 'junk' and 'super healthy'

This probably sits somewhere in the middle.

Super healthy, I would define as steamed fish goujons, beans/lentils and better veg, maybe broccoli or something.

Would probably go uneaten too, in fairness

Tbh a big part of you did was what I call industrial food (baked beans and fish fingers). I have no issue with the frozen veg apart from the fact I tend nit to out them into the vegetable category. As you said for me they are mainly a source of carbs!
Dessert is full of sugar as most desserts are BUT has the big advantage nit to be processed and probably with less sugsr than most bought stuff.
What I would say is that that meal provided tecwhmebof your 5 a day. It has 5 different type if fruit and veg but there is no way the quantities are such they will cover that.

No fresh veg? Slightly junky but perfect for when friends come around as i bet you enjoyed it