To not understand adult food vs kids food?

[SofandaCox]

I meet up occasionally with my old baby group. Our babies are 3 now. We met up yesterday for lunch and there’s a few in the group that are firmly in the adult foods are separate to kids food camp and I find it so bizarre. They make really weird comments like “why would you give that to a child” “my child would never eat that” “I wouldn’t waste that on a child” etc. my child has a long list of allergies and I’ve had gastric surgery so can’t much so we usually share a meal. The offending meal? Calamari. Basically chicken nuggets but wish squid. They acted like I had just purchased my toddler a fillet mignon with champagne and lobster tail. Which, again, don’t see the issue if that’s what he wanted! Has anyone experienced this? And also just to be so rude as to sit there and actually make comments about it. I’ve had judgey thoughts about them feeding their 3 year old jarred baby food but I’ve kept that to myself. It’s making me not want to meet up with them anymore but it would be a shame for my son as he enjoys spending time with the others toddlers.

Pigs are smarter than dogs does this mean we cant eat bacon anymore?

I agree with OP around having separate child and adult food being silly.

But @Buddhistcauliflower this isn't really a helpful approach to promote. I would starve as a child if there wasn't something I could eat; I simply wouldn't eat it and it was super distressing being made to.

My mum exposed us to a wide variety of flavoured foods from different cultures from very young, but by 3-4, both me and my brother had gone into a fussy phase. She made me a simple meal alongside the main family meal because at least I'd eat it and my mum didn't want to battle over food. A chicken grill and peas or something, super easy and little effort. I'm really glad she never forced me into sitting crying at the table while I picked at the main meal I hated. As a result, I became a teenager and then an adult who eats a wide variety of food and my relationship with food wasn't damaged.

Adults get to choose what they like to eat, it's not really fair that kids just get what they get when adults don't do that themselves. Just a point to make.

Only in Britain and America. Europe and the rest of the world feed their children the same food as the adults.

I personally do not do "children's food". When we eat out, we never order from the children's menu as it is often UPF muck. Bland and nutrionally dead.

Lots of adults eat deep fried UPF though, it's very well saying children should eat the same as adults, but a lot of adults are hideously unhealthy. I'm curious where these days the children's menus differ a lot from the adults bar portion sizes though? I've only ever seen it at places where deep fried and invariably beige is all over the adults menu too?

How fraught this whole thing but I can say it is most definitely NOT just a British cultural thing. The stories about “kids food” in the US I could tell you would completely hijack the thread. Just this year I took DD17 (17!!!) to visit an aunt in Maryland and she was going to make dinner for us. She was deeply concerned DD wouldn’t eat the crab cakes she was planning to make and was insistent I knew there would be an alternative if DD didn’t like them. DD scarfed her (very generous and fabulously tasty) portion and my aunt was astonished DD liked them. She has younger grandchildren herself who wouldn’t touch them with a barge pole so she is used to having to make “kids meals” and “adults meals”.

I first realised that for us this child-feeding thing wasn’t as hard as I’d been led to believe when DH and I took DS when he was 10 months old to a restaurant in Connecticut and I’d neglected to pack a jar for him. DH and I both ordered a scrumptious lobster pie and fed him bites of that and he loved it.

In contrast, I will never forget my brother snatching a piece of grapefruit from his 2 year old saying “you’re not going to like that!” I wanted to shake him - maybe she wouldn’t like it but isn’t that her decision to make?

A lot of what was taught to us weaning parents in mid-2000s was “feed them what you’re eating, they won’t starve”. I suppose that’s only true for an NT child - when you have a child who isn’t then you do have to worry about them starving themselves and that can be terrifying. That’s quite different than feeding a normal 3 year old from a jar,

It is definitely more common to have kids' meals in the UK and US than for example France, Italy or Taiwan. I'm in France, just checked our 5 closest restaurants (I'm not in a super touristic area) - none of them have children's menus. Now, I also know from experience from when DC1 was an incredibly fussy toddler that they are indeed also happy to serve kids plain pasta or chicken goujouns, if you ask - but it is not assumed that children should by default eat different food.

My DS is 14 now, but I fed him everything, I didn't want him to just have the "kids food". He tried everything we offered, except he turned down a whole pickle (understandable as they look a bit strange). Second child though has ARFID so despite trying she has her 5 chosen beige foods for the time being.

Have you tried cooking things in a different way. I can’t stand frozen brocolli but I’ll have fresh if it’s still crunchy

Frozen veg is generally grim.

I am absolutely sick and tired of kids menu's consisting of only chicken nuggets, pizza and fish fingers! I'm glad 3 of my 4 are older now and eat from the adult menu! My kids liked all that stuff but why the only options! Just ignore her and let her carry on feeding her 3 year old tasteless mush 🤦‍♀️ she'll be raising a seriously fussy eater if she doesn't start giving him proper tastes and textures, meanwhile, your child will grow up with an educated palate. Meet with them next time and if she comments, ask why she isn't feeding her child proper food 🤷‍♀️

You’ve got to watch for the possibility of choking with some foods but otherwise my 3 children mostly ate what we ate .
There were many times though when a quick meal was needed for the 2 younger ones and the older one ate with us a bit later so I’d sometimes need to do 2 separate quick meals .
We have likes and dislikes too within the family which is perfectly normal .
One dislikes mushrooms 🍄‍🟫 and aubergine 🍆 another one won’t touch anything with coriander in it , a third doesn’t much like creamier sauces .

Unless you grow it yourself, frozen veg is generally fresher than "fresh" veg.

Yes, horrible devitalised stuff.

@DogInATent , I grow my own, or at least a fair bit of it.
Fresher it maybe but I don't like frozen veg.

Yes my youngest is autistic and for an autistic child , really quite unfussy .
Doesn’t like mushrooms, aubergine or cooked courgette because of texture issues .
also doesn’t like if I were to top a lasagne with cheese 🤔 so I make lasagne ( any variety really ) but leave off the cheese on top .
enjoys curry as long as not too spicy ( I don’t like chilli heat myself anyway )
happy with noodle and rice dishes and potato based dishes .

One of mine in particular was very sensitive to strong flavours when he was younger but it was a shame the children's menus only seemed to have nuggets and pizza, etc. They both loved calamari but won't eat it now, funnily enough!

Not really on topic but my 3 year old used to ask for jars, which he only ever had if we were out and about, mostly I cooked from scratch. But he ate what the rest of the family ate the rest of the time and yes I got a lot of comments and surprise that he would eat normal food.