Not to want DD1's friend to gollop down two litres of freshly squeezed orange juice during an afternoon's play date?

[MrsSchadenfreude]

Why can't she drink squash like the others? Or water?

I'd be tempted to phone her mum and mention how very thirsty she was. If she's knocked back that much orange juice and is diabetic she will be through the roof sky high now as juice is packed with carbs.

Symptoms include: incredible thirst, lots of weeing, bed wetting in later stages, pear drops smell on breath, stomach pain, unexplained weight loss, grumpiness, lethargy.

TBH I would have said something like, 'you're welcome to have one glass but I'm saving the rest for later', regardless of whether her mother was there or not, and have done in the past. Yes she was being rude but it is your kitchen and you can say no.

I think the child was very greedy, and it's also not healthy!

My dd likes her orange juice, (she's not keen on squash), but she always has her juice dilted with water 50/50.

Although in somebody else's house I would insist my dd drank water only, after two glasses of fruit juice!

???? Sorry but why not SAY something? I wouldn't let a child help herself to anything in my fridge, in the same way that I wouldn't let her draw on the walls. What on earth was stopping you from saying "Where's your manners?" or just a plain "NO"?

I agree with other posters, I wouldn't have found it too difficult to just say, pleasantly, "oh goodness, I think you've had enough OJ now, how about some water before your tummy starts hurting". If she'd argued, I'd have said, "well, I'm sorry but that's all the OJ we have and I'd rather you didn't drink it all!"

But blame the mother not the child. My sons' friends wouldn't dream of helping themselves like that.

I usually get extra stuff in when I know people are coming over. If you didn't want her to drink all of the juice you should have told her that was all you've got for the family.

I would ask the mother if the child was ok, act concerned as "she did drink a lot of juice than was normal for a child" etc etc . Might make the Mum think

Sounds like she might be short on vitamin C for a start. You'd think she wouldn't be physically able to drink that much liquid so quickly unless she was getting something essential from it nutritionally.

blimey, a few threads recently show how precious people can be about food and drink!

we buy juice when we go shopping, and how no issues when people come up if they help themselves.

Oh having read the rest of the thread I think she sounds foul actually. Get her on her own next time (if there is a next time) and tell her in no uncertain terms that she is not to help herself to stuff from your fridge. That makes me cross.

"a few threads recently show how precious people can be about food and drink"

Perhaps you can afford to give the whole neighbourhood as much juice as they like but I can't.

no, I cant afford to feed the whole street, who can? but there seems to be a run of threads recently about somebody taking more juice than socially acceptable, or eating an extra slice of ham, or taking another biscuit etc. I dont get why people sit and watch it happen and then moan about it. Its only juice, and if it were pissing the OP off, she should have said something to the mother at the time.

The only person in my house who can get stuff out of the fridge without asking is me.

Ds (4) would always ask at home and at friends if he wanted something. Normal manners. If he had a friend who didn't they would be stopped and told.

I hope we don't get a post later saying "My child went to a friend's house, drank 2L of OJ and now has tummy trouble!"....

would be funny though

not that I am a pedant...but surely that isn't exactly freshly squeezed...freshly squeezed is when you express it yerself, ya know....
but tbh, I think yabu to let her have that much....

How many oranges does it take to make 2 litres of OJ I wonder?

When I do it myself I use a minimum of 2 large ones to make a small glass. I suppose if shop bought, they use the pith and all sorts so it would be even more acidic. I think she is likely to be quite unwell.

a lot....tbh, I would not make such a large amount in one go...as with standing the nutrients get lost anyway....so...it ends up no better than shop bought....

I wouldn't allow a visiting child to pour her own drink. You are the hostess so surely you should fix the drinks? Then you are in control of what is offered.

I would have said, "please don't help yourself from the fridge, Ellie - I will get you a drink - what would you like?"

If you didn't want this child to drink 2l of OJ it is nonsensical of you to stand and watch her do it imo!!!

Anyone know how many calories there are in 2L of OJ? 880 Whatever the manners/diabetes issues going on, that is a lot of essentially empty calories to be consuming.

Since when was fresh orange juice 'empty calories'?? I know it's laden with sugar, and clearly two litres is an abnormal and silly amount for anyone to drink in a sitting - but some posts in this thread do make me think that fruit juice is vilified in a way it never used to be.

Can't understand why OP didn't step in, rather than watch, paralysed with horror.

I think nobody vilified juice in the 70s, because it was an expensive treat. As soon as I had my own children, I quickly wised up to the fact that they would eat nothing and drink litres of juice at meals, if juice was available. Leading to the term "juice monster"

Agree, I would not expect a visiting child to help themselves to food. I would have said "let me pour that for you", whisked it out of her hand, and hidden it somewhere else after the 2nd glass.

NotMyElfToday, i was thinking the same. Many threads about 'MY biscuits, MY food etc'. I was reading the other thread and a poster hides food in her bedroom, so the AP doesn't eat it. Now this one. Maybe the credit crunch will make us to fight with each other over slice of bread.

Mind you i can be very mean, budgeting, meal planning, lots pulses etc BUt when i have guests , they can eat and eat. and drink

It's empty calories because it fills a hole without providing anything much in the way of nutrients except sugar and vitamin C; from 2L of OJ most of it will be flushed out of your system anyway. It has no fibre (unless, I suppose you have the 'bitty' sort, but even then it's not much). Eat an orange!

I'm not vilifying OJ; but it is not a 'health drink'.

excerpt from lentil-weaving Grauniad article
Sweetened soft drinks are not just the obvious ones - Coke, Pepsi and 7Up (each with more than 13 teaspoons of sugar per 500ml bottle, according to a Which? report last summer). A 170ml serving of (diluted) orange squash contains 2 teaspoons of sugar, while the same amount of orange juice contains three - not added, but as fructose. "If you give kids two litres of apple juice a day," says Professor Martin Wiseman, medical and scientific adviser to the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF), "it is not much different from giving them two litres of Coke from an obesity point of view." The WCRF's advice is to drink no more than one 150ml glass of juice a day - because the sugar in it promotes obesity, identified as a leading cause of some types of cancer and singled out by Sir Michael Marmot in his warning last month.

avenginggerbil...hm...I agree shop bought juice is not the health juice people think it is (a s basically by the time it comes to the customer it is dead, iykwim...however, truely freshly expressed juice is healthy, and whilst it is lacking fiber, it does have vital nutrients in a very easy accessable form and the vitamins and minerals will be able to pass into our system much easier...so, truely fresh juice immediately consumed is healthy (but of course you still hve to ensure that you don't overconsume it....but that is a different debate)