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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Adult and child foods? A British thing?

717 replies

StandardRussian66 · 27/01/2018 16:15

I got bitched at yet again today by the group I meet with for lunch occasionally.
They find it very strange that my 3 year old eat “adult food”.
I have lived in 4 countries and have only ever come across this in Britain.
It is very strange?
Why would child’s only eat plain food?
My DD had calamari, for reference, incase that is odd. I am part Japanese so she is no stranger to fish.
Aibu to find it equally strange that some toddlers were still being fed mashed food?

OP posts:
AndhowcouldIeverrefuse · 30/01/2018 20:17

I want squid now... we cannot get fresh squid where we are (UK coast) for love or money

AndhowcouldIeverrefuse · 30/01/2018 20:18

DullandOld cross posts! I call dibs on the little tentacles, too! Grin

DullAndOld · 30/01/2018 20:30

ha ha high five Andhow!

movingtowardsthelight · 30/01/2018 22:16

My son has always eaten well. When he was small I used to get exasperated when we visited relatives. Children were served chips and sausages or chicken nuggets whilst the adults had a proper meal.

My son was always very direct and vocal and after a while they stopped cooking ‘children’s food’ for him.

He’s always chosen from the adult menu and had a smaller portion. Most pubs and restaurants will do this for half the adult price.

It’s normal British culture. Kids menus and plain and safe food.

limitedperiodonly · 30/01/2018 22:24

pallisers I love tongue sandwiches. They used to sell it to be sliced off a whole tongue in butchers or as pre-packed like ham slices but I haven't seen it for years.

I have a recipe for preparing tongue that's not from the olden days. It's in a lovely book from a 1990 Ch4 series on meat cooking with the cook Sophie Grigson. I still do loads of things from it but not that one. It's not that hard to do, it just takes about four hours of simmering and it's quite hard to get hold of a cow's tongue and they weigh about 2lbs so that's a lot of leftovers Wink

thumb the taste bud thing was unforgiveable. According to Sophie, who was my guru when I first got married, you're supposed to skin them which is quite easy to do once you've simmered them for hours and takes the buds off.

When I first moved here the local butchers often had lamb's tongues. I think it's an eastern Mediterranean or middle eastern/north African thing which was strange because we didn't have that kind of community around here. But he obviously sold them.

I like calf's or lamb brains fried in black butter with capers and a squeeze of lemon.

limitedperiodonly · 30/01/2018 22:36

I hate smug bastards denigrating people for feeding their children so-called 'safe' food.

There are lots of valid things PP have said about children's menus representing good value or that they just want to be confident that their children will eat it and have a good time.

As a child growing up in the 1970s I ate all kinds of offal and also rabbit. I promise you this was not usual but it was in my family because my parents were older than my schoolfriends' parents.

Some of my friends thought it was a bit 'Eww!' and bunny-murdering.

ThumbWitchesAbroad · 31/01/2018 00:36

Dullandold - in Australia we can pretty easily get frozen baby octopus, with all the tentacles on still. My 2 love to get the "leggies" in their seafood pasta/risotto - it's their favourite bit! Grin

MaisyPops · 31/01/2018 06:40

I call dibs on the little tentacles, too!
Eeeew. Sad
I mean I hate the stuff. But seriously, do people eat the tentacles? Confused
by the way that is not me bitching at you for expressing a feeling about food

Original poster
StandardRussian66 · 31/01/2018 12:24

Tentacles are the yummy bit

OP posts:
TheElementsSong · 31/01/2018 12:44

God yes, tentacles are my favourite! (Sorry)

ThumbWitchesAbroad · 31/01/2018 13:14

Yes Maisy - the tentacles are the best bit.

LaurieMarlow · 31/01/2018 13:17

I hate smug bastards denigrating people for feeding their children so-called 'safe' food. There are lots of valid things PP have said about children's menus representing good value or that they just want to be confident that their children will eat it and have a good time

That's all well and good. At the same time, I don't think there's anything wrong with wishing the average kids menu aimed a bit higher than chicken nuggets and chips.

TitaniasCloset · 01/02/2018 02:03

I find this thread very rude. Classist and racist. If white British people are so bloody rude and awful why live here with us?

I think the response some of you get from other parents are probably in reaction to your own lack of manners and your taking a surprised comment to mean a criticism.

Coyoacan · 01/02/2018 05:53

I'm sorry Titanias, what does being white and British have to do with only feeding your children chicken nuggets, chips and burgers? I think the only vaguely British thing there are the chips.

I have very middle-class friends who always cooked stuff like this for their children, while the adults ate much more interesting and nutritious food. Maybe the foreigners are commenting here because they know children are capable of eating other stuff.

MaisyPops · 01/02/2018 06:59

See as someone who hates squid, i always imagine the tentacles to bs like the suction cups on items. That probably sounds silly but it's what's in my head. Grin

speakout · 01/02/2018 07:01

Yes they they do have the "suction cups". but delicious when deep fried.

MaisyPops · 01/02/2018 07:02

I know they have them, eating them seems weird.
But that's personal taste isn't it. I love strong cheeses and my friends say it's swesty socks to them.

speakout · 01/02/2018 07:23

No weirder than a lot of the "meat " that goes into sausages.

TatianaLarina · 01/02/2018 08:38

Nor the centrifuged meat slurry that goes into burgers and nuggets. I don’t know how people put that shit in their mouths.

Tensecondrule · 01/02/2018 08:56

A friend of mine used to buy the children's range of ready meals for her DC as soon as they moved on from jars. Used to feed them early on then cook meals for her and DP to eat once they dc were in bed. Could never understand why they did that.

TheElementsSong · 01/02/2018 09:11

i always imagine the tentacles to bs like the suction cups on items.

Now, the suction cups on octopus tentacles - those are seriously impressive Grin

Original poster
StandardRussian66 · 01/02/2018 10:41

tit
I haven’t called anyone rude. I have been called rude and arrogant though.

OP posts:
TitaniasCloset · 01/02/2018 15:32

Just to say though, it really isn't a class thing or even a British thing this serving children one type of food and adults another. I'm British, I wasn't brought up on beige food, my mum was a very adventurous cook for back in the '80's, she used to go to china town with my dad to get the ingredients for home made Chinese food, you couldn't buy things like that in the normal shops. We had the usual meat and veg and soups as well.

We were always expected to try food in restaurants and behave ourselves. A lot of it might have been trying to save money so she had to cook from scratch most nights.

My kids had some chicken nuggets pizza etc especially my ds1 who was a fussy eater, but I mainly cooked Caribbean food for them in those days with a bit of Italian thrown in. I am very very working class.

Actually if you buy good quality chicken nuggets and always serve these things with a tiny salad that sort of kid friendly food doesn't have to be particularly unhealthy either. It's really hard when kids get to about 5 and start refusing everything though.

In my experience of children enjoying unusual food though most adults are just impressed and perhaps a tiny bit envious. I will say something too if I see a child enjoying something unusual, my twin cousins went through a phase of being crazy about snails, it's unusual so I mentioned it, but I was just very impressed with my aunt.

TitaniasCloset · 01/02/2018 15:34

My paragraphs are all over the place, I think I made it harder to read that because where I put them made no sense Grin sorry!

TitaniasCloset · 01/02/2018 15:38

If I had a few million to start my own charity though, I would set up free cooking classes for young mums and give them free food and cookware as an incentive to attend.

I was a young mum and my own mum had died by that point, I think one of the best gifts you can give a young adult is the ability to cook and to budget and a bit of financial freedom with the food budget to make mistakes. I had to teach myself.