Not to let my DD eat cereal?

[Peridotty]

My 16 month old goes to nursery 5 days a week. We pay for her breakfast, lunch and snack (included in the fee). However, I don’t like the thought of her eating cereal so we provide the breakfast and the snack. I don’t think it’s very healthy, even though it’s a wholewheat type cereal. I give her porridge made of steel cut oats instead with some applesauce. Would you be ok with feeding your kids cereal?

You're worried about the sugar in shreddies but you put apple sauce on porridge. Not buying it OP

Apple sauce has nutritional value, sugar has none.

Apple sauce has nutritional value

Nothing that wouldn't be better delivered by, well, apples

@TheKeatingFive

I find so many people so concerned about education not health, what use is having a good career when you get cancer etc

I've yet to see evidence pointing to a strong correlation between cornflakes and cancer

Here you go. www.bmj.com/content/360/bmj.k322

You are right to be suspicious of Wheat Chex, definitely falls under heavily processed food. American here. Re applesauce, we do the same for DD, but buy no sugar added applesauce, or make it myself. Or sometimes cut up fruit to put in. Totally plain porridge is pretty grim (IM obviously totally wrong American O). I would like to point out that porridge is also a cereal though.

My 16 month old grandson loves his weetabix, and I thought I was doing well by him by often giving him them for breakfast, but obviously not! I do, however get a brownie point for giving him his porridge without the apple sauce. Swings and roundabouts hey.

Lol cereal is hardly 'ultra processed' food. And no this applesauce isn't sugary at all - they are special apples grown in the colon of the Dalai lama

As long as you have harvested the oats yourself, and picked organic apples from your own orchard.

Here you go.

www.bmj.com/content/360/bmj.k322

I mean, I'd have thought it would have been obvious, but ultra processed foods is an extremely broad church. I did ask about cornflakes specifically.

Weetabix is 4% sugar and it has added sugar and barley extract (a type of sugar). It's one of the better cereals but it's definitely not sugar free. It's really hard to find no added sugar cereals. Ready brek is one. Even the things that seem like they should be sugar free aren't - all bran is 18% sugar, more than coco pops!

I give my dd cereal sometimes but not every morning. And I sometimes to add banana or some oats to it to make it a bit more filling.

@gogohm

At one point dd only ate cheerios and chicken nuggets, she's at a top university now. I really wouldn't worry about low sugar cereals

How is being at a top university any indication of her health? Or was that a joke I missed

@Dee1975

My DD pretty much lives on special k …

Never though cereal as a problem? (Provided not high sugar)

Special k is 15% sugar. Coco pops are 17% sugar. Do you really think special k is that much better than "high sugar" cereals?

Porridge oats are not ultra processed.
Most breakfast cereals are.
How do you know the apple sauce the OP uses is sweetened - she sounds pretty health concious to me.

@crazyguineapiglady

I let my own kids have weetabix, rice crispies and shreddies. They don't have them every day and have eggs, toast and porridge, fruit and yoghurt too.

I don't think it's wrong for you to send your own food in if you prefer though.

I had to ask my eldest's nursery not to give him cocopops for nursery but they were happy to do him porridge on request instead.

I don't get why coco pops are so demonised. Shreddies have almost as much sugar in them. Why are they OK and coco pops aren't?

No it's a slippery slope.. first it's weetabix and then before you know it she's on heroin

What are steel cut oats?
(Entirely misses point …)

(And why do oats need to be cut, anyway?)

And what are they cut from more to the point ?

@shouldistop

God, everything is so sweet in the US. I couldn't even get normal bread when I've visited, it's always been loaded with sugar.

Everything’s sweet... except the chocolate. It’s so bizarre that American chocolate tastes like regurgitated vomit when every other snack food is sugary sweet.

@dryasaboner

Lol cereal is hardly 'ultra processed' food. And no this applesauce isn't sugary at all - they are special apples grown in the colon of the Dalai lama

It is from the tertiary group of processed foods which are arguably the most dodgy because we're so used to them as part of our diet and they don't 'feel' processed.

I was thinking that the op was being a bit precious until she said she was in the US. Food standards seem woeful over there so I don't blame her!

Op how about porridge with some cold Berry compote (berries have a lower gi and are considered slightly less bonkers on the sugar front.)

Carbs are sugars but not all carbs are bad as long as they're complex, slow release/low gi and you g children need carbs for growth so porridge and Berry compote would be fine.

@MrsSkylerWhite

(And why do oats need to be cut, anyway?)

Steel cut oats are less processed than rolled oats or porridge oats. They need a longer cooking time because the pieces are bigger. They're cut because leaving the oats whole would be too big. Rolled oats are heated and pressed (rolled, I guess) to make them flat. Porridge oats are chopped up even more.

What a lot of pearl clutching.

Yes I get there are better breakfast foods than cereal. But this obsession about sugar, knowing the sugar content of every type of cereal and monitoring every meal your child has is enough to give hang ups for life!

I’ve always been relaxed about food, everything in moderation. My dc eat ok, some days better than others. Maturity plays a part, my dc became more interested in healthy eating with maturity. I like to see my dc eat a wide range of foods without constantly obsessing what’s healthy or not.

Wow

@bendmeoverbackwards

What a lot of pearl clutching.

Yes I get there are better breakfast foods than cereal. But this obsession about sugar, knowing the sugar content of every type of cereal and monitoring every meal your child has is enough to give hang ups for life!

I’ve always been relaxed about food, everything in moderation. My dc eat ok, some days better than others. Maturity plays a part, my dc became more interested in healthy eating with maturity. I like to see my dc eat a wide range of foods without constantly obsessing what’s healthy or not.

I know the sugar content of cereals because I have to check the ingredients and nutritional value of everything my child eats due to allergies. I find it interesting that some people think that some cereals are healthier than others when they're not really, by their own definition of healthy. It must be good marketing or something. It's just funny seeing people clutch pearls over "sugary" cereals and then say shreddies are OK.

My dd eats coco pops sometimes, sometimes ready brek (it's great for kids who can't have cow milk because it has loads of added calcium), sometimes "real" porridge, sometimes toast, eggs, pancakes. Most breakfast food is pretty beige and bland and often involves a lot of sugar. A lot of people need that first thing on a morning, I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing.

@Pigeonpocket of course you have to be extremely careful with allergies. But it seems that some parents are obsessed over every food stuff. Say a cereal has 15% sugar; well 85% is other stuff often whole grains and vitamins. Sugar is everywhere, I don’t know why cereals are demonised more than other foods. You don’t hear people objecting to baked beans for example, yet they contain sugar.

It’s just food at the end of the day. The way some people talk you’d think children were being fed sweets and chocolate all day long. Children pick up on parents’ attitudes very easily, it’s certainly not good for them to grow up with such strict attitudes.

@Peridotty

Yes I’m British but living in the US. I’m very suspicious of the foods here especially processed foods including cereal. I was brought up on U.K. cereal which is fine. I don’t want to touch US cereals though.

Might have been helpful to include that info in your OP, given Mumsnet is predominately a U.K. site.

US food is considerably sweeter overall (and the cheese is shit) so having a hundred replies suggesting Weetabix before you tell us you're in the United States of Sugar is going to skew things.