How much do you relax on young childrens diet on holiday?

[Cloudybutwarm]

Yes of course there's going to be more ice cream and puddings and treats etc but I think that actual meals should still be vaguely healthy?

Ds4 has chosen some terrible 100% sugar cereal as a treat for breakfast and I've just got out of the shower to find that Dh has deemed it acceptable for our 20m old to basically pick the marshmallows out of his brothers cereal and eat them for breakfast. And it's ok because we're on holiday.

I may be slightly biased because Dh is rubbish with their food when we're at home as well, doesn't give a thought to balanced meals, fruit, veg etc that's all down to me, but surely even on holiday on holiday marshmallows for breakfast for an under 2 is a bit much?!

Sorry, posted too soon - OP I relax quite a lot especially as Ds1 is a picky wee bugger but I do want them to have a decent breakfast and halfway decent for at least one other meal, or DS1 (4) gets ratty and ultimately shattered.

We still refer to last year's holiday as "The Week When DD2 Ate Chips"

Ok, it wasn't just chips. But mostly chips. And ice-cream.....

She even had chips for breakfast one day.

We ordered cooked breakfasts and they came......with chips

Last year DD ate pancakes each day for breakfast. She had some kind of cake each day at the coffee shop in the resort. Most days followed by ice cream at the pool. Oh, and cake for pudding after lunch and/or dinner.

But, she had so much fresh fruit and freshly made smoothies I think she actually had a better toilet routine than at home.

She is not big on fizzy drinks, drinks water as if it would go out of fashion and runs around until she drops.

At home we went back to chocolate like you need a ration book to get it.

Depends on what type of holiday, if we were self catering in the UK then we'd just take/buy what we normally have and we'd eat out more than usual where they would be eating what they liked from the menu.

If you are in a hotel or whatever and it's a buffet breakfast then I'd get them a glass of fruit juice and a piece of fruit and let them crack on with whatever else they fancied.

We treat fizzy juice a bit like alcohol - only with/after dinner in the evening unless it's a pub lunch/we are in an all inclusive where it tends to be freely available and cold (and watered down). We just tell them to have a plain water from time to time.

We went to Majorca when ds1 was about 20mo and he lived on chocolate fingers and jammy dodgers. Apart from a bit of jacket potato one day i can't remember him eating anything else.

The main thing is that I allow them 'holiday cereal' i.e. ones with too much sugar, chocolate, etc. Makes it much easier to ban them during term time. Since they spend more weeks of the year at school than on holiday I reckon I come out ahead.

DDs diet is generally ace, but on holiday she eats pretty much whatever she wants - luckily most days that includes veg or fruit. One year she had salty chips every single lunchtime because she was craving them - any other time she doesn't have salt. She does have a pudding every day on hols, but some days that will be hunks of watermelon etc instead of ice-cream or cake (which is what I choose! )

I don't restrict any foods from her diet though - we've always had a bowl of choc/sweets on the go and ice creams in the freezer. Because it's there all the time she doesn't bother with it (unlike her friends whose eyes pop out of their heads as soon as they walk through the door).

We tend to do all inclusive holidays and I let the dc eat what they want. I do insist on veg/salad with main course and fruit alongside pudding, mainly because I don't want them to get constipated. I don't care if they eat sugary cereal and 3 ice creams a day though.

We went to the US quite a few times on holiday when DS was little, where he discovered a breakfast cereal called Reese's Puffs (basically Reese's peanut butter cups in cereal form, bloody lovely) and he had it all the time for breakfast whenever we were there.
Fast forward 20 years, and last week he was telling me how delicious quinoa is, as are fresh sprouted wheat/kale/whatever smoothies. Made in his own juicer.
They'll be fine.

We totally relax rules on holiday.

Our favourite thing to eat at breakfast is freshly made crepes (from the all inclusive breakfast 😉) with chocolate spread .

Just because he's eaten a few marshmallows doesn't mean he wouldn't eat a banana or satsuma afterwards. Did you actually offer him anything else? Marshmallows aren't exactly filling...

Completely relaxed when we're on holiday. Not bothered what he eats, which is invariably a burger at lunch, spag bol almost every evening and I lose count when it comes to ice creams

You consider Spag Bol junk food??

I don't really relax our diet on holiday. I don't want the kids to think that our so-called healthy diet is a chore or a punishment, so eating mainly healthy food is natural, but they are free to have a slice of cake if they have eaten a reasonable amount of diner or lunch first.

Nothing wrong with pancakes for breakfast, I don't think egg milk and flour are unhealthy.

Fizzy drinks and sweets are reserved for parties, mine eat enough sugar as it is.

I remember one holiday where my breakfast every day for two weeks was water melon and marble cake. Which my parents dutifully went and got from the buffet dining room while I slept (was 7). The very lovely Greek maid, who spoke no English kept and eye on me and thought my breakfast was great! Then I'd have chips/chips and burger/pizza and chips for lunch after all morning in the pool.
Never did us any harm!

I feel very old. I remember when the holiday treat was that when you went on an outing you had an ice cream.

This is still very much the way I approach things. On self-catered holiday we might also buy more treats from the supermarket. But this might well be savoury stuff - cheese, salami, things from the deli counter.

Breakfast is absolutely as normal. Eggs, toast - that kind of stuff.

Tbf my kids have chocolate/cake/biscuits etc every day when not on holiday anyway.

I wouldn't be delighted with marshmallows for breakfast. For me holidays do mean more treats but not junk 24 7.

I don't mind the DC having some treat stuff as long as they're eating some fruit and vegetables as well during the average day. Pretty much like normal really. They're usually barrelling around doing tons of exercise on holiday as well, so provided they clean their teeth and eat enough good stuff to keep their systems moving then I'm happy.

The 20m old might well be in a right mood coz he's starving. Let DH deal with that one.

I tried the free range approach recently on an all inclusive holiday. My DD2 (6yrs) had 6 ice creams from the bar and in the end the barman starting refusing her. After that one day experiment I started limiting them to one between each meal! Some children aren't very good at self regulation!

Flogging no, not really. It's more on the lines of not caring that he has it almost every night for 14 nights The exception being pizza.

So I was coming on to say "of course, let them eat stuff they wouldn't have at home" but actually I probably wouldn't let my 30 month old have marshmallows for breakfast!

I'm currently on holiday with my 19 month old and it's been relaxed in that she's had croissants and OJ for breakfast and chips for lunch (along with plenty of fruit and some healthy meals). So less healthy than what she has at home, but hardly a week of eating jammy dodgers.

We all had extra treats on holiday when our girls were small, that's what holidays are for. Besides all the long walks and swimming meant they were hungrier than usual.
I've always been quite relaxed about food, I never banned anything and they didn't grow up craving rubbish because it wasn't a big deal.
A friend who banned sweets for her kids had the only kids who used to stuff them in their mouths as soon as they laid their hands on them.

I don't think I could stomach marshmallows for breakfast but as a one off its not going to do any harm.

My kids don't eat any fruit or veg at home either, so hoping they might on holiday would be very unrealistic. I suppose I would/do try to stick to as similar meals as we have at home, but as that is basically sausage, breaded fish, chips, toast and jam, plain pizza, and biscuits and cake for ds1 then it isn't going to be 'healthy' anywhere he eats it. I would cry with happiness if he ate what people on this thread are saying was unhealthy.