School lunches - reception - please help!

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Our DC will start reception in September, currently he is going to the nursery.

I am trying to figure out what is best - school lunches vs packed lunch.

I really don't want to go to the school lunches route (despite them being for free) as the quality won't be as good as a packed lunch. It will be full of sugars, processed bread, meat, fried things, frozen things, ready made chips, pasta and potatoes, puddings etc. which are not the best for a kid to have them every day. Once a while I get it but pudding every day? Why?

On the other hand if I go with the packed lunch I read everywhere that it's such a faff and a huge commitment and it will kill me. However, we all cook for ourselves once a day, don't we? I mean either when we come back home from work, or whenever it suits us. Most adults eat home cooked food every day either for lunch or dinner (some privileged for both). So, why not saving a small portion of whatever we are having for ourselves the day before and make a packed lunch with that plus some salad, fruit on the side? What is the faff about that?

It's an honest question as I think I am missing something!

AIBU - You clearly don't understand how hard that is
AINBU - It's not too hard , I think you are right

I think you might have to rethink your attitude to food once your child starts school.
At my child’s school, anyone having a homemade packed lunch has to eat it in a separate hall to those who are having a school dinner. As the reception lunches are free, they all eat them. So at my child’s school, enforcing a packed lunch would mean they ate alone every day.
When it’s a child’s birthday, they are allowed to bring in sweets to share - which because of the class size means there’s a birthday most weeks.
The school PTA do lots of food based activities too. My daughter has just won some kind of Easter raffle prize which is mostly chocolate.
The class with the best attendance each week get rewarded with a class prize - it’s nearly always food.
The teachers recently did some kind of maths treasure hunt during school hours - the prize was chocolate coins for all children to share.
Your child will attend birthday parties most weekends (reception seem to invite the whole class) and the party food is mostly sausage rolls, pizza and cake.
They’ll be invited on play dates and will be given tea at other children’s houses too.
If you’re going to keep up such strict diet restrictions at school, your child is going to be ostricized quite quickly.

Diabetic kids don’t need to follow a special diet, they just eat a normal diet the same as anyone else

The menu for our local school is really not great so we've already made the decision to stick with the packed lunch our son is taking to his childminders. He's not the best eater at dinner time so I'd rather know he was at least having a balanced breakfast and lunch even if he ends up ignoring most of his dinner 🙄🤦🏻‍♀️

My husband makes it in a little Monbento box every morning and it takes about ten minutes. Son has:

Cheese, tuna mayo or roast chicken on brown seeded bread.

Banana, apple or grapes.

Malt loaf.

Cucumber and tomato.

They tend not to fry things (oven chips/wedges) and don’t add salt (even when they should) or sugar to school meals. Also, portions are minuscule, calibrated for calorific needs of small children. As already said desserts are often yoghurt or fruit. It’s not ideal but won’t harm your child if they eat a balanced diet at home. The social aspect of eating (the same food) together with friends using cutlery is good - pack lunchers sit separately often.

You are making massive assumptions. Also don’t be surprised if your child starts to reject your super clean healthy packed lunch and whinge for what their fellow pack lunch kids have - bearing in mind the ones on pack lunches are often the fussy eaters who won’t try new stuff on school menu. They will be asking for cheese strings, nutella filled brioches, teddy bear processed meat (bleugh) and all manner of other “undesirable” foods.

have you actually seen the school menu? Personally can't see why you'd turn down a free lunch. i think your kid would be in the tiny minority with a packed lunch. and would you eat cold leftovers? If not, why do you think your kid would.

Same here :-)

There are a whole bunch of rules about what goes into a school lunch at that age and to be frank it's much better than your prejudices are assuming.

I've just looked at the menu for our nearest primary school. ;

• bean chilli with rice and vegetable sticks followed by homemade courgette cake with chocolate chips
• chicken jambalaya with vegetable sticks and natural yoghurt and berries
• homemade chicken goujons with peas, sweetcorn and carrots followed by homemade apple pie and homemade custard
• homemade salmon fishcakes with wedges and sweetcorn followed by real juice jelly

This is in one of the most econ0omcially deprived areas of England.

The advantages of school lunches as I see it is that due to seeing other children eat around her your DS is more likely to try new things and to broaden her palate.

I think you have hangups around food tbh.

Your fear of food, needing to strictly control your child’s diet and obsession with “healthiness” really isn’t normal OP. I mean the very fact you’ve said your child “doesn’t miss out” because you occasionally let him have a tuna sandwich is barking mad.

You've clearly made a decision so I'm unsure what you're wanting from this thread. You sound bonkers though, your child might not have food issues now but he certainly will if he grows up thinking a slice of ham or a fork of tuna is going to do any harm!

Unless it’s a very unusual school no food will be fried it will all be cooked in a big oven or on the hob. Ours aren’t particularly delicious but almost everything including bread and cakes/biscuits are made fresh daily. Fresh fruit and salad is available too. Mains include chilli, chicken, meatballs, macaroni cheese and pizza served with boiled veg and rice or potatoes most days. The ingredients aren’t the most lush for sure and it’s as allergen friendly as possible so basic but on the whole it’s fairly nutritious.

Do you know if the meals are cooked by an in-house cook who's employed by the school or an external contractor?
If its the latter, they're obliged to provide you with full nutritional info plus ingredients if you email and request.
Menus are often written to appeal to the children so if you're concerned with UPF foods being supplied the language may imply this but the reality might be different.
If the cook is an employee of the school, they're much more likely to be using fresh ingredients and cooking from scratch, negating the need for emulsifiers/preservatives etc.
Worth doing some more investigating rather than taking the menu at face value.

we do a mix, my child will eat mostly anything so I did school dinners, he loves it. But then some of his new friends had packed lunches so he wanted that instead. He has 1 packed lunch a week and then the rest school meals.

Your child may make friends with school dinner children and want to eat with them.

maybe a mix will work where you select the dinners you are happy with and then ones you aren’t so packed lunches.

i was so happy to get away from packed lunches when they started school lol

Do you think parents who can't afford pack lunches are bad parents because they let their children eat the free school dinners?

My daughter has school lunch every day. She eats about 3 bites and then she's off out to play. If I send a packed lunch, she eats 1/3 of a sandwich and a strawberry then she's off out to play so I can't really worry too much about what's she's eating because hardly any of it actually goes in to her belly 🙈.

Although none of the food is fried, even if it is chicken goujons, they are oven baked, 100% chicken breast in breadcrumbs, served with 2 salad/veg options and a carb - usually mash or pasta, sometimes garlic bread. None of it is 'bad' food. It's just normal food. I've never heard anyone ban tuna for their kid due to mercury. Puddings are low sugar balanced options, a couple of times a week, the rest of the time is fruit and plain yoghurt. There is also soup and roll option every day, or a sandwich/roll or wrap with egg, tuna, cheese, ham or chicken. But I notice you're scared of bread too so that's maybe not an option either.

Does your child want to eat the same food they had for tea the night before, but cold. Every day?

I don’t really understand the problem with school dinners? Pasta or potatoes or rice most days for children is a good thing? Lots of carbs. Pudding at school is also low sugar, lots of good fats in like milk and butter? Custards also have dairy which children should be having lots of.
I say this kindly but I think your relationship with food and what children should be eating might be a bit off. And this is coming from someone that is quite strict with my child having no sugary foods and to eat lots of fruit and veg etc.

Sorry but I have to say, you seem to have a very unhealthy obsession with food. I worry it will affect your kids.

Same here. I'm Scotland too.
Daughter chooses on the morning of which is her preference.

You are overthinking it and as long as you're making healthy and suitable choices for other meals then let your child choose their preference. I personally hate making a packed lunch but it's life now and I wish my daughter would eat some of the meals on offer. P1 I think she had a cheese toastie every day 🤦🏼‍♀️

They can choose in the morning in our English school. Mine had a ham wrap everyday. 😂

@PotatoFan that's why I said OR a special diet. I was just giving examples where the parents wouldn't want them to have puddings every day. But there doesn't need to be a medical reason.

Just give your kid a packed lunch until / if a day comes when you can't be arsed then stop.

We largely avoid UPFs at home and have done for decades - much longer than the current new craze for it. But I'm very relaxed out and about / with friends/ play dates whatever. I try to mostly buy organic too - but you cant control every little thing. I get why you care. You just have to do what works your family and not worry about others choices.

I promise you kids tend to eat FA at school anyway so they won't be getting too many emulsifiers in.

Plain potato/ pasta exist because there are plenty of kids who won't eat anything and then the afternoon becomes a write off. My school tried to get rid of them to encourage a more varied diet and had to bring them back.

Pudding is yoghurt and fruit though - except Fridays.

The menu won't be what you think it is.

Pizza will be low salt, with vegetables etc. blended in the sauce.
Chips etc. will be oven cooked, not fried.
Cakes will be low sugar and will have hidden vegetables.

And so on. Yes, it says "pizza" or "cake" or "chips" but it won't be the same as the food you get in supermarkets. The portions are tiny and it's all "healthy" etc.

Just do what you think is best, both my kids have packed lunches as they’re not really into big gravy meals and pies so it was an easy choice. It would be lovely not having to faff about making lunches though!

Buy a little thermos pot. Then you can do fried rice, pasta, noodles, chunky soups, re-heated left overs.
Or little bento boxes - humus, veg sticks, olives, hallumi.

School dinners are rank at our school. Pizza, fish fingers, beans, chips, baked potato everyday. My kids hate them.

If you plan on sending your child with cold leftovers from the night before that aren't usually eaten cold, you'll probably find school calling you with safeguarding concerns.