To think that free breakfast at school is a bad idea due to the quality?

[Mushypeass]

Firstly, I fully agree with the principle of free breakfast for all pupils. My reservation comes from the quality of food that is often served up in UK school canteens. Obviously a poor quality breakfast is better than no breakfast at all but AIBU that it could encourage children to eat even more UPFs? For example, children who have may had a relatively healthy breakfast at home may now opt eat UPFs at school with their pals instead.

Seocondly, why is the food so poor in so many schools? How can other countries manage to provide their youth with nutritious and healthy meals but we can’t?

One thing I'd want to know about the free breakfast in the UK, is will they provide breakfast for children with dietary needs? Are they going to be providing gluten free bread and cereal?

But what if the option is white bread with jam OR a child goes without breakfast?
I'd sure as hell pick one of these so called poor quality turn your nose up at breakfasts than a child going hungry.

They will probably have to, although That that’s just gonna divert funds so that everybody gets less overall

One thing that’s not been mentioned though is that the supermarkets are really good. We’ve got a donation trolley at the end of the checkout for the local schools breakfast club and Tesco’s match the donations.

They would have to.

Though my son would be cheap because his dietary needs means he must eat the evil white bread and not the wholemeal bread!

Literally no one has suggested avo on toast for breakfast at breakfast club. No one.

i posted that’s what i feed my own children as one of their breakfasts.

but I think you kniw that.

I totally agree, that would be a great breakfast.

It shouldn’t be a choice we have to make.

white bread and jam is shocking nutrition wise, it shouldn’t be an option.

Cereal may be processed but it's not the end of the world it's fortified with loads of vitamins like iron and vitamin d which a lot of people don't realise they're deficient in.

Personally I think the free breakfast and free lunches should just be for families with low incomes making it free for everyone is just a waste of money. At the moment the income limit is only 7k it should be raised to something like 25k but families on 100k getting free lunch in reception to year 2? What a waste of money that could be spent improving the food

The breakfast club at our school doesn’t have cooking facilities. It has a toaster and that’s it. Staffing levels and facilities needed to produce continuous hot porridge over an hour period is much greater than that popping bread in the toaster or pouring cereal so with the paltry funding from the government you can see why schools opt for this option.

I get it and I have the same reservations. People.seem.to think "healthy" options include ultra processed fake bread and cereal and the only alternative would be a salad.

Unfortunately of course the schools can't serve anything else since in the UK it's nearly impossible to buy proper food without shite in it. If you want something plain and simple (and actually healthy) you have to pay £££, if you can even find it. It's backwards.

The food and drug companies obviously know this and will be thrilled to have half the population on mounjaro in a few years time!

My kids know about chocolate cereal as I eat it what do you want me to do give them a carrot why I sit their with a bowl of coco pops. That would be mean.

Good nutrition for my children is one of my top priorities, it’s the base for so many things.
we are very much 80/20 and we are not 100% virtuous by any means (last night we had curry ready meals , although on Friday I made fish puttanesca).

breakfast is a really important meal and I would never eat choc cereal myself, but if I really wanted it, I’d eat it away from the children and give them a healthy breakfast.

make light of it if it makes you feel better, but you are doing your children a huge disservice. And the fact you know you are and continue to do it is even worse.

I would say that as an odd treat, it’s ok, but I actually don’t think it is. It’s totally un necessary.

Thin nutelka on whole meal with sliced banana as a Friday treat is 100% better (as long as the other 6 days are healthy and varied….with variation bring the key).

I mean @ThisDandyWriter I asked this question:

OP out of interest what do you deem an awful UPF breakfast example that they may serve? And what do you usually give your kids at home for breakfast?

And you replied this:

Eggs on whole meal , avo on whole meal, peanut butter on wholemeal, porridge with a teaspoon of Nutella on a Friday, weetabix. Always with fruits.
different everyday as variety is so important. These things take minutes to prepare.

So no it’s not clear to me or other posters what you suggest schools give children

I can't help feeling that this holier-than-thou micromanaging of children's diet will backfire when they are older, although I am sure you will disagree with me.
My 'children' are 30, 21 and 18, so i have seen lots of changing fads about the best food but - honestly - the people who had the most restricted diets as children are the ones who went haywire as teens when they first had some independence.
I really struggle to understand the middle-class hand-wringing angst over foods that are essentially perfectly normal choices for the vast majority of families.
Now I am sure you will say your children don't like chocolate/inhale fruit/are wide-eyed at the unhealthy choices their friends make, but really, wait.

I don't want my kids growing up thinking their are good foods and bad foods. Food is food and everything in moderation. My children are a healthy weight and eat everything without issue.

But there are good foods and bad foods! This is the problem. ‘Good foods’ should make up 90% of our diets. And ‘bad foods’ less than 10%. This is what we should be teaching our kids.

If we tell our kids all foods are equal, and that a chocolate bar is the same as an apple, which are they going to choose?

Feeding kids is only 50% the point of the free breakfast club policy. The other 50% is about enabling parents to get to work without additional cost of wraparound childcare in the morning.

In my area of Wales, free breakfast clubs are provided at all primary schools. Over half of parents using the provision drop and go on to work. My kids often eat before they go but if there isn't time at least they got something at school. This also destigmatised the club for those parents who genuinely struggle with food costs and helped reduce numbers of pupils arriving late.

Those of you who are sneering at the idea should check your privilege.

And my experience has shown that NY restricting 'bad foods', children crave them more.
I have told the story many times on here about the toddler at a group I went to who mum massively restricted what she ate who was regularly found secretly stashing food under the table and eating leftovers from other's plates. Her mum thought she was exemplary too.
The child is now 20 and obese.

Absolutely. I’m a headteacher and I think it’s hard for anyone who doesn’t work in a school to truly understand. As always, schools will do their very best to work with this scheme and provide food, staff and equipment with the funding that will be provided. It’s highly unlikely that it will cover some of the foods suggested in this thread, but a slice of toast with jam is fine, and will allow a child to start the day having being fed and cared for.

You are right to be fair but no one will want to hear it, when my kids were younger I was jobless and young (under 25s get a pot less benefits then over 25s) so not many people broker than me except maybe people paying off debts idk. Cereal is only 80p if you don't buy Kellogg's and milk is cheap.
Anyone not feeding their kids breakfast is neglecting them sadly the people I know like this aren't getting their kids to school in time for actual school let alone a breakfast club that starts an hour earlier

I do understand what you mean OP. Something is better than nothing ofc but it is sad our standards are so low.
On people saying children won't have healthy options I think if children got used to it they would. My son's nursery has porridge, fruit, no snacks, proper meals, no puddings and water or milk. At home he constantly asks for ice cream but he just accepts that is what they have at nursery.

But they are the choices that many people have to make, whether you like it or not. And to say that it should only be good nutritious food or nothing will ultimately be leaving people with nothing.

Overreaction. Even oats turn to sugar in your body. Non issue

The UK is destitute, overrun with those who aren’t net contributors to tax, meaning they remove more in services (schools, hospitals, binmen and doctors) than they put back. So no, I don’t think a gastro fresh fruit menu for state school free breakfasts is incoming, regardless of what Starmer promised at the elections. Free breakfasts is just another example of a Labour policy improperly implemented and funded.