to be concerned about the food at nursery?

[HensMum]

DS is 14 months and has been at nursery 3 days a week for 2 months. Generally, I'm really happy with it. The staff are lovely and look after him really well and he seems to be settling in fine.
However, I'm getting more and more concerned about the food he gets there but I honestly don't know if I'm being a bit PFB about it.
He gets a snack mid morning, lunch (a cooked meal and pudding) and a kind of afternoon tea mid-afternoon (sandwich or something on toast kind of affair). I'm generally happy with snack and lunch but afternoon tea bothers me. The other day he had jam sandwich and raisins. Not only that but he had 6 squares of sandwich, i.e. a round and a half! The thing that really bothered me that day was that the other kids had tuna sandwiches - jam was the vegetarian option.
Yesterday was the Christmas party. DS has had a nasty cold and been off his food so they had trouble getting him to eat anything all day. He did eat some party food, and they also gave him some chocolate. Am I being unreasonable to be a bit pissed off that they gave him sweets without asking us first?
I'm considering having a word with them asking them to limit the amount of "junk" he has there but I don't know whether I'm over-reacting. It's only 3 days a week and we make sure he eats really well at home.

As long as he is getting plenty of nutritional food for his breakfast and main meal (and you already said he does) a jam sanwich for snack is hardly worth worrying about

Sorry to go against the tide of opinion here but I would not be happy. If the child was a bit older then it would be different but at 14 months there is just no need for all that refined sugar, kids do not need any refined sugar for energy, the natural sugars present in nutritous foods are sufficient. No probs with portion size as they are letting his appetite guide him. Its not the end of the world, just completely unnecessary. I was shocked to see the menu plan for the nursery my LO is booked to attend, puddings twice a day (the likes of chocolate fudge cake and vanilla sponge and custard). I am requesting no puddings (fruit instead) until she is old enough to realise that everyone else is getting something different - then we will think again. Thank goodness she only has to go twice a week, wish I could be a SAHM

YANBU. I wouldn't really be happy about my 14 month old having chocolate.

And while I wouldn't mind them having the occasional jam sandwich, it's a poor vegetarian alternative to a tuna sandwich. The tuna sandwich contains plenty of protein and is filling.
Jam sandwich and raisins is a meal composed almost entirely of sugar and will cause his blood sugar level to rise rapidly then crash making for a rather hungry and cranky baby.

It's poor practice for a nursery imho.

My DTS attended nursery 3 days a week from the age of 7 months. They are now 4yo and despite being given chocolate cake, biscuits etc ocassionally, they are healthy with a full set of teeth.

As far as I was concerned, as long as 90% of what they ate was nutrionally balanced, I was not bothered about the junk that they had from time to time.

You need to chill out and if it really bothers you, have a word with them.

Just to add, that they did not start receiving junky stuff until they went into the lower pre-school class (age 3yo) because more parents brought in cakes and biscuits to celebrate birthdays.

Sorry I think YABU.

If you are so unhappy about him having chocolate you will have to tell them "no chocolate" and if they then give it to him you will have good cause to complain.

As for the Jam sandwich..it sounds like an occassional treat. Maybe you could suggest some difference veggie options.

I don't think there;s much wrong with jam now and again, but I don't think it's an acceptable alternative to tuna. If they were all having jam sandwiches it'd be different, presuming it's only occasionally.

I'm with cheezcurl. Jam sandwiches have no place on a nursery menu unless at a party, IMO. And I'd not be happy at all about chocolate at 14 months. No-one needs refined sugar, especially not little ones.

I did exactly the same thing as yoyu cheezcurl re puddings. He got to 22 months before noticing that he had fruit and others didn't. By then I was happy for him to have the same as the others.

Yay Notanexcitingname! I been counting on getting away with it until she is around 2 so you give me hope... after that I am happy for her to partake with the others while at nursery.

my ds eats a healthy dinner and has fruit for snacks and weetabix and banana for breakfast
So when he comes home from school and asks for toast and marmalade for tea I really don't mind

I had a similar situation when ds was 16 months, but in this situation he was given jam on toast for breakfast and jam sandwiches for tea (with my packed lunch I'd made for him for lunch which also had bread). They did this two days in a row. I complained and the next day came in to find they had given him crackers (as in cream crackers) for breakfast and for tea they gave him 2 rusks mashed up with milk!!!(they had obviously made jam sandwiches and forgot about my ds not being 'allowed' them).

Anyway I hit the roof and told them this was clearly not acceptable. At 16 months rusk mushed in milk is not exactly a filling tea (for someone who would happily eat a cheese roll, a yoghurt and a banana and still want more!). I did ask them what wes wrong with cereal for breakfast and what was wrong with cheese or banana sandwiches. I think the leader of the baby room had been away for a few days and after the complaints (we weren't the only ones!) they revised the menu to make it more acceptable but still not perfect. I still have some times when I see the day's menu on his sheet and think "" but I only say something if it is really not good. Luckily they are otherwise a lovely nursery!

I think the OP isn't BU at all in the slightest. People may sometimes differ on what they give their chidren, and this is fine within limits, BUT I would say that a nursery has to adhere to the 'Every child Matters' documentation and one of the major areas of this is about "staying healthy". Even if you want your child to have chocolate, or squash, or jam, I don't think it belongs in a baby or young toddler's nursery menu tbh as they are being given money to give your child a better standard of diet. I am not perfect in any way but did not give ds more than a tiny bit of chocolate until very recently (and even now it's just his advent calendar), so if they gave him it at 14 months without asking then YANBU to be a bit peeved.

By the way, I am not saying that people are being overly permissive to give their child chocolate, jam etc (as I do sometimes) but more that it's the nursery's job to do better iykwim (so that we can give him rubbish treat him when we have him!

This reminds me of when I took DD to nursery after I had done a night shift. They asked her if she wanted marmite or jam on toast whilst I was settling her and she said "jam, please". Now she doesn't like jam, I don't mind if she has it occasionally, so in my befuddled tiredness I said "You don't eat jam, A!", which the nursery worker clearly took as me protesting at jam being offered. She told me not to worry as it wasn't really jam, it was fruit puree which they put on toast for them.

I said not to worry that I didn't mind if she did eat jam, I wasn't being all precious first born about it. Then I realised that I really needed to go to bed as I speaking in RL to someone as if they were on mumsnet. And I got a very funny look. Ahem.

What were you doing sending in your DC with a very nasty cold ?????

YABU.

I visited a nursery recently and was struck by a sign on the wall which basically said that jam sandwiches did not have nutritional value and should not be offered to the toddlers.

I found it a bit strange that they felt the need to have this sign- can't they just not buy jam? It was almost as though the sign was there for parents' benefit.

Anyway, jam. If occasional I wouldn't mind, if regular I would. TBH weren't we all raised on jam? I was as a seventies kid. No fancy hummus then, no....

Can't get excited. YABU.

He's HAD a nasty cold, Chandon. He's not completely better but well enough to go to nursery. If I kept him home every time he was less than 100% healthy, he'd never go to nursery and I'd never go to work so back at you.
AlexanderPandasMum, I feel the same as you I think. I don't mind him having chocolate/jam etc as treats, I just don't really feel it's the nursery's place to give them to him.