Clean plates rule for DC.. just why?

[Cappuccino5]

At the weekend 16yo DD and I stayed at my cousin’s house for a big family get together. We’d had a number of meals together (all lovely & home cooked by said cousin!) when over Sunday lunch she made the observation to me that DD never finishes her plate, and that her own children were strictly trained not to leave any food uneaten from a young age. I’d understand her discontent if she was leaving large amounts of leftovers every time, but she genuinely doesn’t. At the lunch in question she’d simply just left a small bit of chicken on her plate. She doesn’t have a particularly small appetite and she’s not fussy, she simply just eats to hunger (like we all should!!). AIBU to think that in this day and age ‘clean plates’ is a ridiculous rule to have?

My mum spent some time in Ethiopia as an adult.

the rule there is that you leave a small amount on your plate to show the host provided the right amount of food.

she didn’t realise this and cleared her plate - which was the signal to the host to provide more food!

these things are cultural.

‘A bite of this won’t take a difference’, ‘’it’s only 2 more pieces’ and you end up with a person with a lifetime of weight battles due to this conditioning.

I think I’d have been tempted to make a comment along the lines that my children have been strictly trained to demonstrate good manners and not to comment on what someone else has eaten or hasn’t…..

My mother was someone like that and it really messed up my eating tbh, having to keep eating when I was full or occasionally a meal I hated just being served again and again until I ate it, one of the most satisfying moments as a teen, was throwing one of those meals (an egg sandwich) out my bedroom window.)

i never get the waste arguement either, it’s wasteful and bad for your health to eat just for the sake of eating at that point when you’re full.

YANBU. If your DD was asking for whole servings of food then not eating them then it would be worth a gentle word with her. But we don't actually reduce food waste whatsoever by forcing anyone to shove down the last few bites on the plate - there is absolutely no difference in how wasteful it is to toss a few bites of food into the bin or dog bowl vs a person who doesn't need or want any more food choking it down out of guilt. All forcing children to clean their plates does is inhibit children from developing healthy attitudes toward food and the ability to listen to their body's cues.

If a child is in the habit of wasting large amounts of food then that can be addressed by changing what is offered, how food is served, and encouraging taking smaller portions (while making additional ones easily available with zero shame) and pausing for a short while to allow the stomach and brain to communicate before taking more. That's far more effective on all fronts than a blanket rule about clearing plates.

BTW, if children are refusing food and you think they're "holding out for pudding" then give them their helping of pudding with their meal and let them eat it first if they want. It lowers the value of the sweets and encourages them to experience other foods as something besides the less pleasant task they have to get through as fast as possible to reach a reward.

Your dh is asking for trouble. It’s far more important that your daughter should find meal times enjoyable than that she should eat every morsel. Her lifelong relationship with food is being established right now - let it be a positive one.

I agree.

And as an aside, we did this with our DC when they were 1-2yrs old, and I think it helped with them trying new foods. They’d been given the main meal, with a banana alongside that would have been “pudding”, and they knew they had something they liked, and it took the pressure off the main meal which might be something new that they weren’t sure of.

We did the same - everyone serves themselves and eats what they have taken. If you want more you can have it but it teaches not to be greedy by taking too much and then leaving some of it.

As for comminicating with other parents in the family or close friends, I think a brief "we don't have that rule in our family" is ok. If anyone pushes I usually say something along the lines of
"Figuring out how to parent around food and mealtimes feels like a minefield sometimes and every kid is different. I'd never claim to have The One Right Way or tell others how to feed their families, but DH and I have found an approach that we feel good about and that includes encouraging our DC to stop eating when they're full. Of course we don't want to waste food so perhaps DD can have slightly smaller portions to start with. I could help plate so it isn't another thing for you to manage."

I, too, don’t know how to achieve this. If it were up to my twins, they would only eat chocolate and chips.

Yes it's ridiculous. I don't agree with it..food is good, offer healthy food and let the eat what and how much they want..( obviously it's different if there is a bigger issue )

The clean plate rule is silly/dangerous. I was brought up like this and it doesn't build a healthy relationship with food. I no longer think like this and my DC do not have to clear their plate although I do still struggle with food waste!

My DF had that rule, I wasn’t allowed to leave the table until I’d eaten everything. I once sat there for 18 hours.

You can’t always tell! If you took a bit too much would you force it down?!

It’s a ridiculous rule! eat until you have had enough and sod people dictating how much other people should eat!
even if she had served herself she is allowed to leave food. Eating all your food just to appease others and look polite is a hell no! My kids are taught to eat until they have had enough, I let their bodies tell them when to stop.

I think in the 80 and 90s this was a common rule, maybe due to boomers parenting who grew up in the shadow of rationing?

It's not something we do.

No so much better to over eat, get obesity, diabetes, heart disease and then obesity related cancer and die early than it is to scrape a bit of food into the compost bin to fertilise fields 😆

Yanbu

i don’t agree with her attitude. I remember being humiliated on a residential holiday as a dc when I’d didn’t want to eat something and almost being forced to eat it. My dm never forced me to eat stuff I didn’t want to and I tried not to do it with my own dc

I always leave food on my plate

To eat with what?

Seriously, one small piece of chicken??

And it it was a roast and it was mine, it would be smothered in gravy, therefore disgusting later.

Don't have too much and then leave it (I am guilty of this myself on occasions!) you can always have seconds, but never force yourself to finish what's on your plate if you're not hungry either.

It's good to encourage realistic portions from early on, and try not to introduce any negative feelings around food and eating.

Thankfully I have never had a clean plate rule imposed on me. I never eat beyond “full”; if that means leaving a single forkful of food on my plate I will. Most food isn’t served in forkfuls, I might leave quarter of a slice of chicken, or half a potato, so what? I was never made to clear my plate as a child and I never made mine clear their plates. I don’t have a big appetite (heaven knows why I’m fat) so I almost never finish a restaurant portion. The food waste argument is spurious, is it better to have half a roast potato lurking in a Tupperware in the fridge rather than halve someone force it down when they don’t want it?

My partner drives me mad always leving like 3 peas drives me mad as means I have to cross the kitchen n scrape the plate not just sling it in the dishwasher when clearly isn't a full up issue lol

Your DH is wrong. Give her the majority of what you know she'll eat and one small thing she's not keen on/is new

And give her less so she's able to ask for more if you don't know how to judge her portions

Let him clear it away?