Re hot school meal and evening meal?

[rabbitheadlights]

After reading a few threads about evening meals just lately where posted say that if DC's have a hot school meal then they generally do a snack type dinner such as crackers cheese and veg sticks or pot noodles etc.

AIBU to think this is the few and not the many?

My kids all of them healthy weights would be calling child line and declaring starvation if I didn't give them a "proper" cooked meal every night!! By proper I probably mean more substantial I certainly don't cook from scratch every day but I know I could never get away with the above

DH and I work full time and therefore evening meal is sometimes all we get, we wouldn’t consider cooking for ourselves and not DC’s, family meal every night all together.

Depends on lots of factors, but generally if they’ve had a school dinner then I don’t feel bad if they have a lighter dinner. That said, my ds who is in year 7 is making the most of his new found lunch freedom and living off sausage rolls, so I try to cook as often as possible to prevent scurvy.

Little Johnny isn't getting food shoved down his throat whilst he's crying.

I didn't for one moment imagine that

It's still inappropriate exactly as you have described it.

Do you expect the children to tell adults that their future relationships with food are being affected by policies like this so they know they're doing the wrong thing?

Adults should make a healthy balanced selection of food available to children and then allow them to decide how much of it to eat. They then learn how to listen to their own appetites and have healthier future relationships with food.

There is no role for adults in deciding when children should stop putting food in their own mouths. It's a culture of control that needs to change.

I'm going to stop responding to your comments now, @arethereanyleftatall, because you are clearly determined not to see how wrong you are and to continue would risk derailing the thread.

Ok.

My son is at a private school and they have an amazing chef cook their meals! All homemade. And it's quite a substantial amount.

But still, we usually all eat as a family around 5-6pm. And I cook most nights. If he doesn't like what we are having, sometimes I'll do some pasta and pesto or a sandwich with fruit and veg, which he loves! He calls it 'a snacky dinner'.

@littlepeaegg I work at a private school with a fantastic chef, food grown onsite etc.

Portions are great, but only when parents or visitors are in.

The photos that go on social media look nothing like what the kids actually get.

It's a farce and it's been the same at all the independent schools I've worked at.

I went to a nice private school- part of my food issues are probably related to the catering from my junior years. I had a hot meal every evening because DM knew I'd have eaten bare minimum for lunch and possibly just a bread roll and yoghurt in the seniors. I was incredibly fussy.

At boarding school we ate well at lunch time because the day pupils had lunch too. So the budget was higher and the food was better than supper time.

My husband was brought up that way. One hot meal a day. I think it's ridiculous. Something proper poor people have to do surely.
My son and I are very active personalities and one hot meal a day wouldn't sustain us.

I'm a manager in a school cafeteria. So just an fyi, I see kiddos daily that do eat their whole meal. Ones that never eat the fruit and veggies, but always encouraged too. One's that pack a lunch and throw some of that in the garbage and buy a school meal also. We can't assume that they eat a full meal at school and don't need to eat much at home. They are growing children and function mentally with proper food intake. If their hungry they can't learn and stay focused, as even adults who are hungry. It hurts to see that a child is hungry, very easy to pick those kids out. Ask them what all they actually eat in school, very hungry children will eat all of the food. Especially ones who don't have food other than school food.

Surely you’re cooking for the adults in the evening so you just feed the kids the same?

Not everyone has families who have all trotted in the door dutifully by dinner time to eat together round the table like an Oxo advert. Kids have after school clubs and activities, kids are at childminders, parents work late, parents work odd or long hours and night shifts. Outside the little Mumsnet bubble anyway. It can mean cooking twice or not at all, kids needing a snack and then a dinner, reheating food for people arriving later.

School dinner portions are miniscule. I've worked in a school and budgets are so tight they cook the bare minimum of food and use the cheapest of ingredients.

This is simply untrue. Might be the case in the schools you know of, but it's certainly not the case in mine. And, no, nothing is differentiated for the benefit of 'visitors' or social media.

Growing up, all the way through primary school, I had the hot lunch, and then another full cooked meal when I got home. School portions were never massive though. I wasn't overweight, but I did lots of running around at playtimes, and would always be out and about with the kids down my road at weekends. I don't think I'd get away with 2 hot meals a day now!
I think, as a parent, just do what suits you and your kids. As long as they're not overweight, and are healthy, I think all is fine.

In my childs school in Scotland children can choose between soup and dessert OR a main course. As I said main courses are tiny. OR basic cheese, ham or tuna sandwich. On two out of five days the sandwich options are not available so its soup and pudding OR shitey main course. For kids upto p4 it is free though so that's something.

My DC's go to a small school and the meals are generally good quality. The dinner lady knows the kids so gives them a portion about the right size to avoid waste. They can go back up for more if they want to. There's the option of a potato and salad if they don't like the main so no issue of them not eating anything. The thing is they eat from 11:30-12:00 and they're among their friends and keen to get out to play so they're never going to eat enough to fill them up for long. You'd have to have quite a small appetite to be filled up by that all day - especially kids who have smaller stomachs. Mine need a snack straight after school then a proper dinner later. I don't think the temperature of the food necessarily determines how filling or nutritious it is though. Tonight it's too hot to cook so we'll have fresh bread from the bread maker, some left over cold roast chicken, a huge salad, cheese, olives, coleslaw and whatever else is lying around in the fridge.

Mine usually have several snacks after school, mostly fruit or sandwiches but they’re in secondary school now. I could still get away with a picnic type tea especially in summer. Just because it sounds like it might be a smaller meal doesn’t make it so, they can be as big or as little as you like!

I do a snack tea like sandwiches, boiled egg and soldiers or similar when they have a hot dinner at school.

I also agree with gold that it's important for children to learn to regulate their own appetites. They're needs will vary depending on their personal metabolism, whether they're having a growth spurt, their activity levels, whether they're fighting a bug etc. They should be allowed to eat more some days and less others.