to show you these pictures of Danish children's packed lunches?

[wallyfeatures]

I've followed a few of the lunchbox threads and thought it might be of interest to mumsnet to see what is allowed and typically given to young children here in Denmark in schools and kindergardens. I am a member of a closed facebook group where Danish mothers share ideas on packed lunches. The photos below are a typical sample of what is given to children from 3+ years up. The food shown would be enough for lunch and a mid afternoon snack. Happy to answer questions about what is shown.

We moved from London to Sweden two years ago. My children have school meals and they are disgusting, it's free but foul. The children cone home starving. And the they are not allowed to take packed lunches. I would willingly pay double for the lovely meals cooked on the premises in their former London primary school. Don't be fooled that all Scandinavian is good, it isn't.

My goodness there are some chippy responses here . I find this fascinating as there are cultural differences and similarities between countries that are very interesting. I am in a country where school dinners/indoor eating at tables/ hot lunches are unheard of apart from some preschools, and thus all the threads about school dinners (and people's insistence that the only real meal is a hot one ) fascinating. My DCs have to take their lunch everyday (one has multiple allergies) with the alternative being a parent-run not for profit tuckshop. That's open 4 days a week with the fifth being order-in sushi from a local shop; all orders are made online apart from snacks which kids can buy with cash after they have been allowed up from the mandated 'sit down and eat till the bell rings' period at the start of every lunch time. I pack enough for 'crunch'n'sip' fruit break (in class at 10am), morning tea at 11 (30
minutes) and lunch at 1pm (45 minutes) as well as an after school snack as they are in after school care till about 5:30. My biggest concern is keeping things cool - so insulated bags with ice packs and frozen food that will thaw by eating time (yogurts in soft packs, muffins and bread rolls I've prepared on the weekend and frozen for a weeks supply). Saves time in the mornings, for sure!

Sarahrelly Sorry but giving an 8 month old whole grapes is just so ridiculous and lazy.

6 years olds die eating grapes, don't be so arrogant.

pimmsy,

"I have very good memories of the canteen in my lycée in the south of France. Proper plates and glasses and water jugs, a choice of starters , mains, cheese or fruit and a dessert and bread of course, and at least one 100% organic day a week!"

Astoria7974,

"Typical Indian school lunch options at my nephew's bog standard school in Mumbai. Everything is freshly made in school and free for teachers and students:

"1. Dal, rice, wholewheat chappati, two curries with non-starchy veg. Kids with wheat allergies get a millet or corn rotlo instead of chapattis
2. Masala dosa or idli or uttapam, sambhar, coconut chutney.
3. Chicken or goat biryani.
4. Rice and lentil risotto (khitchdi), yoghurt soup, and either black chickpea curry or okra curry."

Wow. Those both sound wonderful. (Well, aside from goat biryani!) Are these for Primary School age kids, as well as Seniors?

My goodness there are some chippy responses here hmm. I find this fascinating as there are cultural differences and similarities between countries that are very interesting

I agree with you. I've found it to be a really interesting thread.

It's a lovely thread, but all this talk about Finnish food made me remember the most amazing desserts ever. Little puddings with animal character on them. Made by Valio, I believe. They are sooo good.
Drooling

Little puddings with animal character on them. Made by Valio, I believe.

We buy Valio lactose-free milk. I have yet to come across desserts with animals on them. I feel cheated!

We live in Canada and my children haven't been to a school with a cafeteria/dining room here, although they did have one when we were in the States for a while and yes they did have Mac and Cheese, and much to my surprise peanut butter and jelly sandwiches).

My kids are teenagers. ds only really eats crackers at school and then eats a meal when he gets home. dd usually has a sandwich. She likes to do bento boxes every now and then, but the mess! In fairness most bento boxes are made form finish ups of the meal the night before.

Really interesting thread , love reading things like this. Can't see why posters thought it was smug to share and as for grape hysteria .....

Found this really interesting. Thanks for sharing!

Lunch at ordinary state lycée in SW France, everything home-made: choice of 2 main courses plus a vegetable and a carbohydrate. And bread. Entrée is soup, you help yourself if you want some, there is another hot entrée twice a week, and every day there is a huge choice of crudités plus things like egg mayo, raw ham, pâté, fish etc. You help yourself to green salad and cheeses, fruit/ yoghurt. You help yourself to soup, crudités, salad and cheese.
We have a huge variety of food over the month, quail, duck, pork, lamb, beef, fish, shellfish, crustaceans... and a huge variety of raw and cooked vegetables.
Yesterday I had: leek vinaigrette, grated carrots, and chicory, 2 slices of lovely bloody roast beef, green salad and a couple of bits of good cheese, a tangerine. There were lots of other things available, there was potato gratin and french beans, but you eat what you like.
The pupils eat the same and I haven't heard any complain, ever, that it isn't good or that they are hungry.

Madamfrog,

yabu - aibu really is a silly topic

My DS is 13 and has requested the pancake/gummi bear combo for his 'playpiece' for Monday!

Those are crap lunches: processed meat, processed cheese... a recipe for cancer in later life.

And don't get me started on the grapes not being cut up.

Not speaking for Denmark but I'm constantly in either Switzerland, Germany or France, bags of crisps like ours just aren't available.

It's true. Britain leads the world in teenage pregnancy, binge drinking and potato-based snacks

wallyfeatures
I envisaged a huber organised child friendly kitchen where they would cook if and when they wished to

Not speaking for Denmark but I'm constantly in either Switzerland, Germany or France, bags of crisps like ours just aren't available.

Switzerland's starting to. You can get little mini bags of Graneos, and then there's Jouxjoux and Jumpies. It's not like the wall of multipack crisps you get in the UK though starts involuntarily salivating at the thought of Walkers smokey bacon crisps

God I miss British crisps!

When you go for a pre-dinner gin and tonic in an Italian hotel bar and the barman in a white jacket and black bow tie hands you a tall glass with lemon, not lime which is disgusting, and just the right amount of ice in it. He pours half the bottle of tonic in and leaves you to do the rest...

Then he puts down a small silver bowl of crisps and they are just not right.

limited you've just described Saturday night out 😂😂😂

Crisps are pretty popular in Spain too. Their supermarkets (the ones aimed at locals not Brits or other tourists) always seem to have huge aisles of sacks of crisps, just like here.

Haven't read the thread in detail, but someone said 'who has time for all these elaborate packed lunches'? but the Danes work much shorter hours than a lot of Brits - they have the very opposite of a presenteeism culture and people are generally expected to have gone home from work by 4 pm.

The Danes also cycle a lot for transport, so are much more active - the country being generally very flat and having excellent safe segregated cycling facilities obviously helps - they don't have the hatred of cyclists culture we have here. Weather is similar or slightly wetter/colder than the UK but a lot of people just get on with it.

On one visit I made there, I noticed that all the DCs walking between Legoland and Lalandia (Center Parcs style dome) a little way away had waterproof coats and trouser suits on

I'll give the Spanish the paprika flavoured crisp Barbara. They are my favourite holiday crisp and we should do them here, rather than those stupid contests Walkers do where people come up with horrible flavours like Spam and marmalade and they go on sale for a few weeks and are never seen again.

Between you and me, I think Gary Lineker is lying to us and those competitions aren't real

The Spanish have the best crisps in the world, ham and cheese sandwich flavour lays 🤗

Ooh, I haven't seen those kids. What colour bag are they in? DP and I like the Lays in the green packet, which I think are garlic and tomato flavour going by the picture - campesina I think they're called.

I honestly think food in the UK is shit compared to most other countries.

Almost every garage in Spain has a nice independent coffee/sandwich shop that sells fresh home made rolls and nice coffee for a good price.

Or there's Asian street food or decent pizza by the slice in Italy and what do we get - fucking Greggs, McDonalds and Subway .