Has afternoon tea food for a child changed significantly?

[DeepBalonz]

I’ve just moved back to the UK. DS (4) has a play date with the neighbour’s son. As a 90s kid I was given fish fingers and beans, dinosaurs and peas etc as tea at friends’ houses.

Is that kind of food still the done thing or has it all gone a bit posh along with most other things?

Too early for dinner but still a decent time since lunch so fruit and peanut butter probably won’t be enough.

Here it would have been some fruit or cheese crackers, or half a toastie or hummus and veggie dippers or something baked.

They ate three meals as will these children

I’d just do sandwiches or cheese on toast with some cucumber , carrot bits , fruit and a yoghurt or jelly .

The kid isn't staying for supper. It's going for supper at its grandparents at 6.

I'd be grateful whatever you fed mine, but if she said no to you providing dinner then I wouldn't give them fish fingers etc.

My friends when they've had my two in similar situations have given them beans on toast. I tend to play it safe as well and offer a sandwich and some fruit, or a toasted bagel and a yoghurt or something like that.

I'm genuinely bemused about all these pre-schoolers who happily get through 6.5 hours on a single piece of fruit.

My 6 year old can do that now. In pre-school no chance!

The issue here isn't op - it's the parent taking a 4 year old out for dinner after 6pm when they ate lunch at 11.30am.

3pm pack of crisps.

5.50pm something sugary, send them home with a bounce.

Fish fingers, bean, dinosaurs, and peas....DINOSAURS???? 😂

I’m not from the UK, but wth is a toasted pancake? How do you make it? And how would you put it in the toaster? 😅

It?!

Packaged pancakes, closer to American style than crepes. Just pop in the toaster like bread to warm up.

If they've had lunch and they are planning tea. I'd have some choice of light bites - fruit, breadsticks and humous, maybe a little sweet thing (a small slice of cake or a kitkat). That being said, I'd ask the mum honestly. Kids eat very differently at that age. If you'd fed my child 2-3 fish fingers and beans, the he wouldn't have wanted tea out. Probably triple the food he needed between lunch and tea!

Chicken or potato, I'm presuming 😂.

I seem to remember a lot more odd-shaped, beige concoctions with indeterminate fillings floating round in the 80s and 90s than there are nowadays. The Jamie Oliver effect, maybe.

Surely you mean, "less common"?

I have read all OP's comments but not all the other replies so apologies if I am repeating.

I think the type of food you are serving is spot on, but if they are having lunch at nursery and your neighbour has told you they have supper plans with grandparents, then sitting them down to a plateful of food that a polite child will finish may fill him up and spoil his family's evening plans.

If I am feeding DC's friends mid afternoon I normally cook a pizza and possibly a bowl of potato wedges, or humous and carrot sticks (as well as the pizza), so if they are hungry they can eat, but if they are not they don't feel obliged to.

Crepes are a good call, if you have a crepe pan. Fill with grated or cream cheese or Nutella and pear, or serve the old fashioned way with a little dusting of sugar and lemon.

Oh you know what I mean! Come on Barb!

Genuinely can’t recall what I ate as child at my home or friends - which is a bit weird but I digress…I remember something chip like called alphabeties, and my gosh I loved Heinz spaghetti hoops. Slush Puppies for a treat…. Memory lane….
Kids having a snacky tea before a full supper or a full tea with no supper seems to make sense. Pending what age groups kids may be, tend to go for steamed or grilled veg with some kind of grains and a salady thing - green leaves or something and a yoghurt for after for supper and a salad & grains of a light tea.

And for goodness sake, check for allergies. They didn't seem to exist when I was a kid in the 70s and 80s, but when I was preparing food for DS's birthday party this year we had different kids that couldn't eat gluten, lactose, milk protein (which apparently is a different allergy to lactose), nuts, eggs and processed sugar. 😱

My autocorrect 🤣 🤣 I couldn't remember sex and put it kid🤣

@DeepBalonz a few fish fingers/chicken nuggets, beans & hand full of chips is perfectly fine.
Mine would have no problem wolfing it down and later having their actual evening meal.

I HOPE they mean chicken or potato, otherwise I want to know what specialist butcher this is! 😂

If the mother has said that the child is eating again when they get home then I would do a couple of sandwiches with a few bits of veg sticks / fruit on the side and maybe a yogurt or cake / biscuit.

If you are feeding them at 3.00 pm then it's still quite a long time til the play date ends at 6.00.

Three or four table spoons of beans and three fishfingers... thats quite a lot, half a 400g can!

British Heart Foundation suggests 3 fish fingers is an adult portion. (Birdseye suggest four).

Nowt wrong with hot food at all, not sure where I said there was. Just don't understand why hot food seems to be better than, provide more energy than, cold food. It doesn't have any bearing on the nutritional or energy value at all.

Yes I do, people overfeed their kids. Kids don't need to snack hourly. One snack between 12 and 6 around 3pm is fine

If the mum has declined a meal then I think what you’re suggesting is too much. That is what my 5 year old would eat for his evening meal. He definitely wouldn’t be able to eat another meal after.

I'd probably go for some fruit or crackers, something very snacky and nothing cooked.