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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To be sick of the food Gestapo on here?

286 replies

MaddyHatter · 01/09/2016 18:44

Honestly, the amount of declarations about what is healthy and unhealthy.. its ridiculous.

if you listened to everyone on here we'd all have to be vegans and living off sucking water through a celery stick.

Just shut up. If you honestly think food like Sausages, Mashed Potato, Tomato Soup, bread, cheese, milk and most fruit are unhealthy, the you're teaching your kids into eating disorders.

OP posts:
Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 02/09/2016 10:51

If I listened to MN gumpf Id believe there are hordes of fat adults and children waddling everywhere. Anyone who is promoting that as a truth/norm is a born liar. The vast majority of people I come across, walk past in the real world are normal size. Schools are not awash with obese children. & if some people are overweight then so what?

It may depend where you live. I'm in a very socially mixed area in inner SE London and there are a lot of overweight people about, of all ages. Skinny people are probably in a minority round here. Don't know about schools, as my children are adults now.

By and large, though, I agree that there is a lot of angst about food which is not healthy at all.

CreepyPasta · 02/09/2016 10:55

Eolian I'm the same. It makes me throw up about half an hour of eating it too. I'd started a health kick and had it in a salad for lunch everyday. Thought I had a sickness bug then it clicked. Tried it once again since with the same result. Apparently some people can't break down one of the proteins that's in it. Back to good old white rice for me Grin

TaraCarter · 02/09/2016 11:07

Grin I'm glad it's appreciated!

ThumbWitch I suspect Munro wasn't nice to know in person; definitely someone whose biting wit was best appreciated at a distance.

IggyPopsicle · 02/09/2016 11:11

I try to eat as healthily as I can on a small budget. Most of the time, that means frozen vegetables instead of fresh, and a lot of Value products. My only real indulgences are lean cuts of meat and Jersey gold top milk.

I used to live with a real food snob who would often make snidey comments about other people's food choices. Unfortunately for her, she became unemployed and it was back to basics for her, including good old Tesco Value Humble Pie. Grin

midnightlurker · 02/09/2016 11:12

Reality vs Mumsnet is your dietician telling you to try ice cream, hot chocolate, custard, nesquick, rice pudding and basically anything possible to get milk into your child who has an extremely restricted diet and really must have some milk to stay healthy. Stuff the sugar content! Also telling you that cereal for lunch is actually fine. It gets some milk in, has protein, fat, carbohydrate and some nutrients. Equally, dried fruit. Lots of important vitamins there.

miserablesod · 02/09/2016 11:17

Well i'm only going to live once and i intend to enjoy it. I love my food, whether thats a big fat steak, chips, takeaway, chocolate, fruit and veg. No calorie counting, low fat or low carb diet in sight.

And no i'm not overweight.

ThumbWitchesAbroad · 02/09/2016 11:22

Tara - I strongly suspect you may be right!

Eolian · 02/09/2016 11:22

CreepyPasta - sorry to hear you, like me, are tragically deprived of being able to eat quinoa Wink.
I used to have food gestapo tendencies but I'm sooo bored with thinking about what I should and shouldn't be eating all the bloody time. My dc would constantly gorge themselves on sweets, white bread and fizzy drinks if I let them though - so there have to be some limits!
The recent threads about demonising sausage and mash and cheese etc really show how messed up and obsessive people can get though.

foursillybeans · 02/09/2016 11:25

Actually on here it doesn't bother me at all. Fairly certain most people don't actually feed their kids what they say they do on here anyway

But the school lunches & lunch box police irritate me so much. I don't think they should be allowed to ban crisps or chocolate bars when they are perfectly fine in a lunchbox. The school have absolutely no idea what my children eat for breakfast or dinner therefore whether they have a balanced diet. Also I suspect (haven't checked) that a shop bought flapjack, that would be allowed, would have more sugar and fat than the small Rocky bar that I chose to give my kids.

WhirlwindHugs · 02/09/2016 11:37

Ha, the one time I had quinoa (at a restaurant) I had horrible food poisoning - maybe not though if it's a thing that it doesn't agree with some people!

I agree, some people's diets are shit but moaning about meals that are perfectly okay helps no one. We've also had the dietician do the 'here's all the premade kid appealing stuff with calcium in!' thing which was a surprise but reassuring.

QueenLizIII · 02/09/2016 11:46

It can be taken way too far too. I've just remembered my mum being obsessive to the extreme and she got my sister to watch me at school too, as my sister picked up her obsessive eating habits.

I remember being 16 and on my own at 6th form college with no one watching for once and buying a can of coca-cola for the first time. I'd had it before but rarely. I had an almost obsession with it as I wasnt allowed it. Ever.

I felt amazing buying it like it was a real treat and also deviant as i didnt want mum finding out.

That is unhealthy in so many ways.

liz70 · 02/09/2016 11:47

"You all need to read this story. Need. It's a darkly comic short story on health food promotion, and it is wickedly cutting and to-the-point. It applies very well today, but it was actually written before the first world war. www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/FilStu.shtml"

I knew it was going be that story before I'd finished reading your post, or seen the link (major Sakiphile here Smile).

MalcolmFucker · 02/09/2016 12:19

Does anyone on here remember the Jam Sandwich thread?!

OP made a complaint to the nursery Grin

expatinscotland · 02/09/2016 12:46

Dinner threads are my personal fav. Unless it's unicorn tears and the flesh of Vestal virgins, someone will label it junk/junky. 'That's a bit of a junky tea'.

toffeeboffin · 02/09/2016 13:07

I think midnightlurker has it right too, especially with kids.

Ice cream, cheese, (gasp!) , bread and peanut butter is getting plenty of fat and protein into kids. Yes, it's great if they eat aduki bean casserole but what if they don't? They have to eat something!

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 02/09/2016 13:38

Yes, there's a lot of very PA critiquing of other people's food.

Poster A: we're going to have sausage, mash and beans.

Poster B: Wow! I didn't know anybody still ate things like that. I suppose there's still a long way to go with health education. A few simple tweaks would make that meal a lot better, OP. Instead of sausages, you could roast an organic chicken breast (skinless, of course), no salt or pepper of course, and definitely no butter or olive oil! You've got to think about food poisoning as well as nutrition, so cook it for about two hours to be on the safe side. You don't want to overload the kidneys with protein, so one chicken breast between four people will be fine. I find when cooked like this, nobody wants more than that, anyway! It's just a matter of relearning what's a good portion size. I personally use a baby bowl for my own food as I find that helps to keep my inner glutton Blush under control!

Then instead of mash and beans, serve a mix of veggies (organic again, goes without saying really) that you've steamed for 30 seconds, which is all they ever really need, or just raw. So much better for veggies still to have a bit of bite. We have a minimum of seven different veggies at every meal, including breakfast, each one a different colour, which is absolutely essential or else you die a horrible death within days. It really doesn't take long once you get in the way of it. I think I only spend seven hours a day prepping veg.

Of course, when I say veggies, I'm not including potatoes! Potatoes are a rubbish food, they really ought to be banned. So much better to fill up your stomach with lots and lots of spring water (not tap of course, that's really dangerous).

We don't bother with sauces because they tend to be too salty. After about ten years of cooking with no salt, you don't notice any more that it's not there.

Hope this helps! Smile

SarfEast1cated · 02/09/2016 13:43

Thankyou Gaspode Grin

TheHiphopopotamus · 02/09/2016 13:44

Unless it's unicorn tears and the flesh of Vestal virgins

Vestal Virgin flesh is ok if they're free range and grass fed but unicorns tears are full of salt.

As a one off it's ok, but I wouldn't give my kids that on a regular basis Wink

SabineUndine · 02/09/2016 13:47

In future, I am going to be living on a diet consisting entirely of superfoods, so there. Goji berries, pomegranate seeds, loads of kale, quinoa and almond milk.

What do you mean, it'll kill me?

Jellybean83 · 02/09/2016 13:54

gaspode this is why I love a foodie thread Grin

DixieNormas · 02/09/2016 14:33

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

expatinscotland · 02/09/2016 15:01

There was one legendary MNer years ago who likened feeding a baby formula to giving them heroin. That was the be all to end all food thread.

Idliketobeabutterfly · 02/09/2016 15:04

All the cheese thread did for me was made me crave cheese.

TaraCarter · 02/09/2016 15:12

Does anyone in Britain eat goji berries because they like them, or is their only market people who feel obliged to eat them because of the 'superfood' label?

ChardonnayKnickertonSmythe · 02/09/2016 15:19

I've never knowingly eaten a fucking goji berry.

People just get sucked in the superfood status.
Have some prunes FFS.