To be slightly horrified now by what I ate as a kid in the 80s?

[NotWantingToBeRude]

Breakfast was a bowl of either Coco Pops, Frosties or Sugar Puffs. (At least they didn't sell Froot Loops over here I suppose).

Packed lunch in my My Little Pony or Care Bears lunchbox was a sandwich (usually some form of processed meat, occasionally even jam), a pack of crisps, a chocolate bar and a juice box (Ribena or Um Bongo). Never any fruit.

Snack on arriving home from school would be not crisps and chocolate, possibly a Pepperami. Sometimes we’d stop off for pic ‘n’ mix.

Dinner included a full dessert every single night, usually with custard or cream.

Is it just me or would this not be considered so acceptable now?

We did as well but with jam too. Possibly not breakfast but more like a dessert

I was a 71 baby and supermarkets had only really just started in the late 70's/early 80's. My mother always cooked from scratch but packed lunch would probably be a sandwich or sometimes soup in a flask, penguin/club biscuits and an apple. When we were older, we'd go to a nearby shop and have half a loaf (cob) and a packet of pickled onion monster munch. Eat the middle of the loaf and then tip crisps in for a massive crusty, crispy thing... So nice but terrible health wise.

I couldn't agree more.
As I said upthread however, today's parents (or on MN at least) seem to be absolutely convinced their parenting is the point at which the line is drawn and nothing will ever change because they have got everything right and those who have gone before have got everything wrong.
They are wrong of course and things will change. They always do.
As a 1990s and early 2000s parent, I am amazed at the amount of micromanaging of children's diets that goes on nowadays - especially as it will all go out of the window when they become teenagers anyway. Because, despite the fact their toddlers 'love veggies' and their six-year-old refuses sweets in favour of fruit and nursery has been told one slice of birthday cake once in a blue moon isn't necessary, parents cannot control their child for ever.

Hah. My dad worked at a greengrocers so we had loads of fruit and veg! Was always cornflakes for breakfast, but we did sprinkle sugar on top of them 😬 Packed lunch was always a sandwich (cheese and tomato or cheese salad were good), crisps, fruit, yoghurt, little chocolate bar (Gold bars were my favourite). Tea was usually home cooked but treats included crispy pancakes or pizza-rolls. Lots of home baking and home made puddings Dad would bring g home all the fruit that was going off and had to be used up, so lots of apple pies and freshly squeezed orange juice.
I was a skinny thing and we were always outside playing, walking the dog etc.
80s food in itself wasn’t bad, but companies have improved the food they put on the shelves and food standards/legislations have changed things.

Lmao, that's what I eat now and I'm 28 🫠💀

Do you make your kids poach eggs with avocado on brown toast for breakfast? Or put salmon dinner in there lunch box just curious

Is there not a middle ground between chocolate, crisps and squash, and fruit / veg?

Some plain biscuits would be better than chocolate

Maybe cheese and crackers or some cold meat instead of crisps

We had mostly healthy dinners at home and I had school dinners too.

My breakfasts were always topped with sugar and I must have snacked a lot too, as I had a mouthful of fillings by the time I hit my teens.

I've done both.

What are you curious about?

I was born in 98 with my mum being a kid of the 70's. Mum grew up poor working class and they had just enough to get by, and my mum never really learned to cook herself. And she went back to uni when I was a baby. So other than a roast, it was most processed/ packaged food growing up for me. I've taught myself a few meals to cook, and now I have my own kids I really wish I was more capable of cooking healthier. It's become a strange comfort in eating food I know is terrible for me and not doing me or the kids any favours. I know in theory how to do it, but growing up eating how I have has made it harder to be adventurous with food.
Also my four year old asks for a pudding every night still, I guess some things never change!

Your not the original poster so my curiosity isn't with you.

I don't know when you were growing up OP. But if you don't mind reading my version here goes:
We were born in the early to mid sixties in North Wales on a farm.
Sunday was a roast dinner, usually lamb or beef, occasionally pork - this is what Daddy bred. A roast chicken was a rare thing - a treat (and expensive back then).
Monday would be left over roast with homemade chips (fried potatoes),with chutney or pickles.
Tuesday the last of the Sunday roast made into a pie (homemade pastry).
Wedsnesday would be sausages with onion gravy and mash.
Thursday chops of some kind with veggies etc
Friday maybe Liver and onions and potatoes.
Saturday - it was wash day for Mammy - school uniforms for three of us. So a big pan of homemade soup for lunch. In the evening we would visit an elderly widowed farmer friend. We would pick up fish & chips, mushy peas/curry sauce and spend the evening with him.
Everything home bred or grown. Apart from Saturday evening!

Could have been worse my mum gave us Weetabix, all bran or shreddies. The minute I left home I invested in a huge box of frostie. deeelicious.

I remember eating the first tiny McCain pizzas in the middle 80s. They were heaven. We would get half each and it was served with salad.

Death date 😳

Poaching is too much of a faff in the mornings. Fried is much easier. And Salmon dinner would be previous night’s leftovers.

But, essentially, yes. Why?

Anyway, I’m a 70s kid. My breakfast was cornflakes. Lunch was a white bread sandwich and an orange drink. After school snack, white bread toast. Meat and 3 veg for dinner. My kids eat much healthier than I did. But a lot of the stuff I used to eat was marketed as healthy. Advertising standards have changed.

lol. My parents allowed me to take a glass of lemonade to bed each night instead of water.

I still pile up Milo in a tall glass every so often.

Yet as a parent, I wouldn’t give our DC any sugary soft drinks and 1 to this day still doesn’t drink them.

the joys of being an adult I guess…

I gave my kids gallons of sunny delight in the 90s thinking it was healthy. 🙊

My mum insisted we drink orange juice with breakfast every day (not sunny d though, that was too expensive) which I hated but swallowed down. Only realised as an adult how bad that was for my teeth, no wonder they're in shit condition.

Thinking back, fruit and veg were a really big part of our diet because we had a big garden which mum used part of for growing vegetables, we had a blackcurrant bush (which mum would make juice out of each year, which again, I hated) and two apple trees (eating apples and cooking apples) and there were a lot of brambles in our garden for blackberries. In the summer weekends were often spent visiting PYO farms to pick berries or sweetcorn (mum was so efficient at picking one of the farmers used her as an example to the lazy young men he was employing to pick ). And our holidays in Lapland we'd spend a lot of time picking bilberries and cloudberries (and fishing so we could eat extremely fresh fish) and eating fresh peas in the pod from markets as snacks (which my children also view as a lovely summer treat, even my teenager!)
At Christmas we'd always get exotic fruit in our stockings which was a lovely treat - one year I got a whole mango to myself and I was overjoyed.

@Natsku My mum insisted we drink orange juice with breakfast every day (not sunny d though, that was too expensive) which I hated but swallowed down.

We always had orange juice in the fridge but it was my mum's - apparently it was too expensive for us kids to drink. We could have extremely diluted squash or water. Same with wholemeal/seeded bread. That was mum's special, expensive food (and she only ever bought it right after pay day). We got cheap white bread for our packed lunches.

I used to buy the 3p white loaves from Asda with my pocket money as I loved white toast as a snack but we rarely had that kind of bread, it was nearly always "proper" bread. I guess we always want what we don't get, whether it's the fancy stuff or the cheapo stuff.

I spend so much on bread now though even for the children, just spent nearly a fiver on 4 bread rolls for me and DD (but that's gluten free prices for you 😞)

a saturday treat was a white crusty loaf,
well dm said it was a treat
i couldnt really care less!

The kind of people are the ones that can't be asked with the arguments and meltdowns if you try to get them to eat something else and are just thankful that they are eating anything at all.

Meh, you’re alive so it can’t be that bad…unless you’re posting from the beyond? In which case, what’s the internet like there?

You and tones of others. Honestly, don’t feel bad. It was the times we lived in.

Now even freshly squeezed organic orange juice is something we’re encouraged only to have in moderation as it shoots up blood sugar. Not great for teeth either.