To think that babies dont have to have pudding every day?

[Aimee1987]

I got into a disagreement with someone on a weaning Facebook group so want to pool for opinions.
The woman had given her 7 month old chocolate cake after dinner on the advice of her health visitor to increase calories before bed. She also posted a picture of the baby who was not underweight.
I asked why the HV had given that advice as it does not sound healthy to me and got told that babies should have pudding.

So my question is why do we give puddings after meals? Surely it just teaches one of 2 things either eat your dinner to get your pudding (potentially overeating) or dont eat savory and you can just have sweet. Is this not just asking for trouble when they are toddlers and will just start demanding pudding.
By the way I do give my DS( 1) and DSS (9) age appropiate treats but I dislike the association with dinner. So as not to drop feed when I met DSS at 2 every meal was a battle to eat 2 more bites and you can have pudding which really annoyed me so we ended up getting rid of pudding when he was 3/4 and replacing with an afternoon treat that has nothing to do with his dinner.

So
YABU - kids should have pudding after dinner
YANBU - pudding is not necessary after dinner

Because how do you decide how much they should eat. Some days I'm hungrier then other so some days I have a big dinner other days I'll have a smaller one. So how do you decide which size the child should eat? Does he always have to have the same amount?

@Aimee1987 why are you fixated on stopping the association with finishing a plate to get your pudding?

I can tell you, without knowing any of the issues around your DSS, you are overthinking it. Every family/household is different.

Just like sometimes my DD has homemade tomato sauce from scratch with spinach gnocchi for her dinner, and sometimes she has fish fingers, potato waffle and peas.
I prefer my DD to have a small (mainly, but not always sweet) pudding after a meal over snacking on sweet foods.
In my opinion, it's a better way to eat sugary, sweet foods in moderation when they are part of a meal. (And I would constantly snack on chocolate or biscuits all day everyday!) but I don't judge other parents who choose to feed their child in a different way!

No, pudding is not necessary at all and it’s really a stretch to say HV advice is medical- I’ve had ridiculous advice from several, and their training is very basic.

I give pudding when my (youngest) children have tried at least everything on the plate, even if just a nibble.

Mine get fruit or yogurt after lunch and dinner. Plus snacks. Sometimes pudding might be a biscuit or a chocolate.

I thought that was normal??

FWIW my DDs are both between the 25th-50th percentiles for their weight (appropriate for their height).

I wonder if the health visitor suggested that the mum gave her baby desert, meaning fruit purée or yogurt (standard baby desert) but the mum misunderstood as her idea of desert was chocolate cake .

No. Of course you don't have to give your baby a desert after every meal .

I did, though, in terms of fruit or yoghurt .

Come to think of it . 20 years later that's still the only desert my DS will eat (with a little blip around the age of 11-12 when he was chocolate mad). He is pretty health conscious though , of his own choice I would add as I'm as chocoholic as they come .

Pudding for my toddler (on an everyday basis) means yoghurt, tinned fruit, stewed fruit, bit of home made low sugar cake, bananas and custard, slice of fruit loaf, strawberries and cream etc. I grew up with always having a second course and I think it’s good to do it with growing kids who need lots of energy.

I don’t think there’s a place for super sweet adult style puddings everyday though. No need - fruit is sweet enough.

@DogsAreShit

Yanbu.

I cut out all puddings and just feed my DC celery when they ask for a treat. Nobody needs cake, especially not cute little babies who you love with all your heart and soul and who experience and communicate feelings of innocent unbridled joy and excitement when they get hold of a bit of chocolate.

Fuck em. And fuck those thick fat NHS wrecking obese seven month olds.

You win

Seriously OP who gives a shit. I'm sure your parenting and food choices aren't perfect either, I'd never dream of commenting something like that on someone else's parenting choices

Yeah I probably am overthinking it. There are still issues with my DSS and eating so I'm just dreading my DS following in his footsteps once he learns to talk. But I'm sure I'm overthinking it.
We do give plenty of yogurts and fruit but tend to use them as snack food.

The kids dont have perfectly home cooked meals every day. They eat things like burgers and chips but I try to balance it as much as I can with healthy stuff. I'm not perfect by any means I was just genuinely curious if it was normal to give pudding after every meal.

@Crunchymum

If this is true then the mum is an idiot, but what are your motives for posting *@Aimee1987*

Is it another attempt to froth about the uneducated, fat thickos who don't know how to feed their children?

This

Mine have pudding after dinner every day.

Generally, on Sundays and Fridays we have a treat pudding like cheesecake, apple pie and custard etc.

In the week most nights they have plain yoghurt with honey, fruit or granola. But once or twice a week they might have a biscuit or some rice pudding or something.

So I'd say on balance 70/30 healthy/unhealthy.

I don't make them finish their dinner in order to eat it. I won't let the have it if they haven't had a good try of everything or eaten a decent amount. So last night we had sausage and mash and broccoli. Youngest wanted to leave his broccoli but I said if he wanted his pudding he had to eat it, as I know he likes broccoli! The day before we had a stir fry. They hardly ate anything but they gave everything a try and didn't make a fuss so that was fine.

Mine are never required to clear their plates. They tell me when they have had enough. I hate this "you must clear your plate". I leave it mostly up to them what they eat and just supervise. Both are good eaters.

Mine usually has 2 small yoghurts or some rice pudding. He would very much disagree that he doesn't have to have pudding.

I just see it as a good way of getting extra dairy/calcium into him. And sometimes he'll only try a new food if I tell him he can have pudding.

I think your 'babies' shouldn't have pudding after every meal' is a bit much just because that didn't work for you. But I'd agree that there is no way a 7 month old baby should be given chocolate cake after every dinner and hopefully the health visitor didn't actually say that! There are many more calorie dense foods that aren't ridiculously unhealthy - peanut butter (the natural kind) on toast, mashed avocado etc.

My question is do people routinely give babies pudding after every meal? If you do how do you stol the association with finishing a plate to get your pudding?

IME people who do routinely give pudding do so for this exact reason. People who don't want the association with finishing a plate don't give pudding every day, or have the pudding as a non-conditional part of the meal.

I tend towards the second. DH tends towards the first. I do think we can overthink food - I cringe a bit when DH is bargaining with DS2 over how many bites he needs to eat but TBH it's probably no big deal in the scheme of things.

That said I have heard some HVs give out bonkers advice over food - they use a combination of training and their own common sense/childrearing experience, so of course some HVs will bring cultural beliefs about pudding being a perfectly reasonable form of bribery to eat some kind of substantial food and/or vegetables.

Bizarre advice from the health visitor. My DS is 22 months and he rarely has “pudding”. If he does it’s fruit or yoghurt.

He has healthy snacks and good portions at each meal, all balanced, so I don’t see pudding as necessary. It’s not banned or anything, but I don’t give him actual sugary things and I don’t think it’s necessary after meals.

I certainly wouldn’t give chocolate based things to a 7 month old.

My dc1 did have low weight at about that age I was advised by a dietitian to increase calories making sure I included a variety of foods (savoury more than sweet) and to add in a bowl of porridge before evening bf.
Mine get a sweet pudding occasionally, in the main if they want anything after tea it's fruit or yoghurt.

@VestaTilley

Bizarre advice from the health visitor. My DS is 22 months and he rarely has “pudding”. If he does it’s fruit or yoghurt.

He has healthy snacks and good portions at each meal, all balanced, so I don’t see pudding as necessary. It’s not banned or anything, but I don’t give him actual sugary things and I don’t think it’s necessary after meals.

I certainly wouldn’t give chocolate based things to a 7 month old.

I'm glad it's not just me. This is exactly how I feel, I just wondered if I was alone

No one needs to have pudding every day. I'm grateful to my mum that pudding was never a regular thing for us, and my husband grew up the same. I had an ex who didn't feel like he'd had a meal unless it finished with something sweet, which was a learned habit from childhood - it's a terrible habit to get in to.

@BertieBotts

> My question is do people routinely give babies pudding after every meal? If you do how do you stol the association with finishing a plate to get your pudding?

IME people who do routinely give pudding do so for this exact reason. People who don't want the association with finishing a plate don't give pudding every day, or have the pudding as a non-conditional part of the meal.

I tend towards the second. DH tends towards the first. I do think we can overthink food - I cringe a bit when DH is bargaining with DS2 over how many bites he needs to eat but TBH it's probably no big deal in the scheme of things.

That said I have heard some HVs give out bonkers advice over food - they use a combination of training and their own common sense/childrearing experience, so of course some HVs will bring cultural beliefs about pudding being a perfectly reasonable form of bribery to eat some kind of substantial food and/or vegetables.

I can definely see this being the case in a year or so with DP but so far the one year old eats everything hes given so hopefully he wont go through a refusal stage ( I'm sure he will but wishful thinking)

You're getting unnecessarily flamed here, OP. If you had started the thread saying you gave your 7mo baby chocolate cake pudding after meals it would be full of cries of 'nobody needs a pudding!' Or 'my children think a strawberry is a treat'.

I agree with you anyway. If the baby has problems putting weight on then they should be referred to a paediatrician (I do understand that under some circumstances children not gaining well are recommended to be given things like chocolate cake but not by a HV)

On a completely separate note if I had chocolate cake after dinner I would be off my face on sugar and wouldn't be able to sleep!

I would love some pudding now.

Anyone else reading this and just daydreaming about being able to have a lovely pudding after every meal...I've got apple crumb,e and custard on the brain now

Fruit and yoghurt are puddings, and they're fine to eat regularly. (Sorry, I can't remember how old babies have to be to have cow's milk yoghurt! )
No 7mo should be eating chocolate cake. Sugar is highly addictive.

For a baby it seems odd to be offering empty calories if they are underweight though full fat yoghurt would be appropriate. However my adult dd has a lot of food issues and when she's really low weight it's a case of anything is better than nothing and she does have chocolate mousse etc after dinner to increase calories, not cake because if she had room for that she should be having proper food!

My kids get pudding after pretty much every lunch and dinner! It differs, some days it actually is a small piece of chocolate cake (it was DH birthday last week and the baby was covered in chocolate cake ), some days it’s a fruit salad, sometimes a yogurt, one of their favourites is warm weetabix

Mine have fruit and/or yoghurt after tea every day. I think that's pretty normal.

On the weekend he might get a bit of rice pudding, if I can be bothered to make it.