To think this is actually a rather nice daily menu for a toddler?

[Ilovetocookandbake]

Breakfast - cheerios with milk

Snack - pear

Lunch - tuna, avocado and sweetcorn toasted sandwich

Dinner - homemade chicken curry
pudding - yoghurt

That’s fine surely?!

Carbs are not ‘basically sugar’

Sugar is a carbohydrate sure but bread is only ‘sugar’ if there are three food types, sugar, fat and protein and it makes no difference at all what format those things are in. which is not the case

Eg I would probably not give my toddler chunks of dripping as a snack. But I would avodaco. avocado is basically a fat dontcha know!

Defrost a few blueberries and stir them into natural yoghurt - they'll turn the yoghurt a pretty colour. Mine used to eat natural yoghurt with peaches chopped up in it.

I’d be surprised if you can get a portion of some of those in a sandwich though. It’s good variety though don’t get me wrong. Just might not each equal a full portion. We did homemade pizza the other day, hers had various veg on it but combined it was still not much more than 1 portion.

My DD is a veg fiend though- we have to lob carrot, cucumber, pepper and (raw!) mushrooms at her liberally all day. Or peas, sweetcorn and broccoli. Given the opportunity she takes frozen peas to eat straight out the freezer.

How old is your MIL, and was she joking? Mine sometimes makes a "oh, poor deprived little thing" comment as a joke if she thinks DC is getting particularly luxury ingredients - she's nearly 80 and hadn't seen an avocado until she was an adult, and still thinks raisins in rice pudding is decadent.

I’ll probably sound like an arse but I’m actually OK with the peppa pig crap.

Mine doesn’t have a great appetite so I do have to limit snacks. Even veg.

She will 100% mean you're a big meanie giving him no cake. Bonus points if she keeps asking if he is drinking tea yet, another generational obsession for all the over 50s I know.

I think its fine and also depends on the child. I have one child awaiting assessment for ASD and another who seems to like most foods but obviously sees my eldest eating her more rigid choices which aren't always the most nutritious.

3 year old with suspected ASD is usually:

Breakfast: bowl of cheerios with no milk most days and some days a bit of milk. Smoothie (to try get some fruit in her as very restricted with fruits/veg due to texture).

Snack: apple peeled

Lunch: bread and butter, sometimes a bit of ham or cheese depending on mood, wotsits, melty buttons

Dinner: broccoli and/or carrots every meal. Protein usually fish fingers or fish cakes or nuggets. Sometimes chips or plain pasta in there somewhere. Apple juice.

Hot chocolate.

She often will not eat all of her dinner. On nursery days they offer her the options but she often will not even try and she ends up with crackers and an apple or plain pasta.

My 1 year old who is more adventurous is along the lines of:

Breakfast: banana. Toast and scrambled eggs. Water.

Snacks during morning: melty buttons, cereal bar, apple.

Lunch: cheese sandwich or pasta and sauce and fruit. Water.

Dinner: varies. Today was fish pie, broccoli, grapes, sausages, water. Then extra sausages were because after his dinner he came and wanted our sausages.

I do try not to restrict my youngest because my daughter is very restricted but then we end up with multiple meals between us all.

Over 50s? Goodness me. I'm 62 and I can't imagine asking the parents of a toddler if the child is drinking tea yet.

Oh my days yes😆 I've got a 14mo ds and I'm constantly asked if he's drinking tea yet. When I say no they look so sad, like he's not getting all his vitamins 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Carbs are not sugar. Sugar is carbs not the other way round. Also sugar in whole fruit and veg is fine - it's refined sugar that's the issue. So the yogurt and the Cheerios are the only sugary things. I think that's better than the average toddler diet. If wanting to do better i'd add a couple more fruit or veg portions.

It’s really strange - maybe she did mean lack of treats or maybe horrified at the cheerios!

He has gone off eggs recently which rules a lot of my ‘breakfast menu’ out. If anyone has any good ideas for breakfasts for toddlers then feel free to share.

Can confirm, I was that child with that parent and I went MENTAL the second I left home.

I spent about a decade absolutely unable to regulate my sugar/processed carb intake.

It's calmed down now, but she still comments on everything I eat, and I still have issues around food.

My friends who were allowed cereal and sweets and white bread are all slim now because they had a balance.

Ignore the people suggesting adding protein etc with cheese cubes etc

Most western diets contain more protein than we need, its terrifically rare to be short of it.

Your menu is great. Milk with breakfast, tuna with lunch, chicken. Fruit & veg, its absolutely fine & its not high sugar either. So there's one processed item in there (cheerios), ffs it won't kill them, toddlers are often incredibly picky and resort to sweet foods & starchy cabs at a drop of a hat.

I reckon she thinks it’s boring and too healthy. It isn’t, it’s fine. Ask her what she meant when you see her next.

Carbs are basically sugar - so the cheerios and bread are both sugar.

God there's a lot of thickos on tonight.

Children need carbs. Carbs include fibre and are an important source of energy. We need glucose, its what our brains run on. Bread is not "sugar". Neither is a pear, or sweetcorn.

Our bodies can metabolise pretty well anything into sugar, including protein.... its called gluconeogenesis.

That’s a good menu for a toddler, I’d have tried to cram eggs in as well but if they don’t eat them they’d be better off with cheerios. Unless MIL is a dietician/Olympian I suspect she may have meant where’s the treats/fun stuff. Perhaps she found it performative? Not that you’re intending to show off but an astonishing amount of kids are allergic to anything that isn’t processed shite. Either way it’s probably best filed under ‘a thing a person said .’ Mine were adventurous and ate most fish and veg and sauces and spices, surpassing most adults we know. At the time my MIL seemed to find it a personal slight. Now they’re big and healthy and taller than her she’s never done boasting about how they’ll eat all sorts 😂

Mine will only eat banana flavour Weetabix, will absolutely refuse anything else

We’re lucky at the moment @noooooooo . I’m conscious it could change any day. Plus, he doesn’t really eat a lot, although that’s got its advantages too. It’s why I don’t really offer many snacks because he won’t eat at mealtimes.

How old is your DS? Mine won't eat anything apart from porridge at dinner time because he has his dinner at lunch time at nursery.

His day seems to be:

1.5 weetabix with milk, fruit served mostly never eaten. Sometimes peanut butter on toast. He used to eat eggs but now refuses every form of it

snack - yoghurt/ liga/ fruit pouch/ baby bel/ bread sticks/ fruit pieces/ dry cheerios

Lunch - stew/ pasta/ curry/ big enough portion

Snack again

Dinner - baby porridge

Cup of milk

Looks like a good variety of food, flavours and textures. If your MIL is like mine, she probably (like so many in the UK) expects small children to eat bland, beige food; quite when the children are expected to progress onto more adventurous food I'm not sure. DD23 started off on home made baby food and then progressed onto beige food; when she was 2 I took a step back and realised that I was creating work for myself, so she was, in general, given what we were eating. DD20 has always had issues with textures (she won't eat onion or mushroom) and isn't a big fan of meat, although I discovered that she loved beans, so when she was small I removed the meat from her meals and replaced it with mixed beans.
DD20 is still at home but DD23 has moved out. They both enjoy cooking for themselves and will happily make couscous, fajitas, salmon, bean chilli, etc.

I'm wondering if your MIL actually meant the opposite, as in where are the treats and that's a bit too healthy 😂
Only going on what my parent and I laws would think is what a toddler should eat!
I think it sounds great, my toddler eats worse I'd say. Own brand cheerios (aka 'hoops') or rice krispie shapes here most days 😁

I wish you were preparing my food in a daily basis 🤣

Have to say, my chicken curry was niiiiice. And very easy.

Just chuck some paprika, massala and cumin in with some chicken breast and Greek yoghurt, add a bit of chopped onion and garlic and tomato puree and chicken stock cube and voila. I may have eaten too much

@pontipinemum , mines started to refuse eggs recently which is annoying as they were a bit of a breakfast staple here. He will eat porridge but takes forever, I mean I can feel the seasons changing as he eats it. So went for cheerios as wanted to leave the house and make some vague plans for my future. I might horrify the sugar police and do homemade blueberry muffins for tomorrow. (He’s 2 and 3/4.)

@Ilovetocookandbake that curry sounds lovely. I have a pressure cooker, I made a dry curry rice the other night. Just saute the chicken, add the rice/ water/ veg/ chicken stock and a large spoon of curry powder. We all like it

What do you think of my sons regular day above? Yours sounds more varied. I am already struggling to get him to eat things he loved at the beginning. Such as broccoli, spinach, eggs, loads of thing. He just drops them over the side for the dog