Just been on a school trip and boy,you should have seen the crap that emerged form the lunch boxes....

[moondog]

Fruit Shoots,cheese strings,those cartons of 'meat'(sorry,industrial slurry) and cheese,weird yoghurts that don't need to be refrigerated and have a 'best before' date of 2018.
The healthiest thing was probably a plastic bread sandwich with some sort of processed chicken slice in it.

When I see their little shining faces and strong bodies,exuding energy ,and then see what they are fuelling themselves with,I want to take said cheese strings and garotte their parents.

Don't despair, ladies...

DS2 (my faddy eater, now 13) has become very keen on both cooking and baking; went to a car show yesterday and was most impressed with a food demo/tasting (proper food); and has chosen for his one school trip at secondary (my kids only get one each, can't afford any more) a foodie trip to Italy with more demos/tastings/farm visits etc.

He's still not a good eater but enjoys what he does like and gets more adventurous all the time.

Exactly, Carmenere - get the habits right now and even if they veer from it under peer pressure for a bit, at least they'll know what to do later.

That's excellent Janh. My dss is a bit like that. He came to live with me when he was 14 as a non vegetable eating vegetarian who had grown up on potato waffles and margherita pizzas.
He is now 17, has grown about a foot and can cook his own chickpea curries and vegetartian fajitas! [proud emoticon]. He sees cooking as a cool thing to do well and it will serve him for the rest of his(and his kids) life!

Have you taught him, Carmenere, or has he taught himself? Veggie cooking has got to be the hardest kind so well done!

I have taught him how and now he has a really well balanced diet (as well as loads of crap he buys himself)Basically his mum is fairly unenlightened and diddn't mind him being veggie but diddn't make any effort to balance his diet with pulses or anything. So he lived on readymeals.

Parpety parp parpety parp parp par parp

I love the idea that we're teaching our children to have a healthy attitude to food. I think I do reasonably well except that I don't lead by example and eat all sorts of rubbish - so that's the next thing to tackle (will it ever end).

I'm not entirely sure how much influence we as parents have, my three are all different. DD1 will eat most things including crap given half a chance, but also fruit, veg etc. DD2 will always eat the veg on her plate first and the whole fruit bowl in one go, so much so that I now have to ration fruit!!! DD1 will only eat one or two veggy's ie. carrots, peas and cucumber and only then once he's realised that I do mean it when I say he can't have pudding.

They've all had the same sorts of food and the same parents, but different approaches.

glassofwine, your kids sound exactly like mine!

DD1 was a fab eater from the start and still is (at 24); DD2 is a fruit bat, also used to have to be rationed or would empty the fruit bowl whch was not good for her (there is such a thing as too much fruit) but generally nowadays (at uni) doesn't eat enough or well enough; DS1 was choosy as a kid but would eat good stuff if pressurised.

DS2 as previously stated was Mr Picky from about 2 (great before that though, it was a blow when he turned!)

I wouldn't call anyone smug who minds about their kids food, of course not - or even who minds about other pples. My point was to label ohters as not caring and the food 'industrial slurry' and want to 'garotte their parents'. Seems a bit ott to me - their are other things involved in parenting, many more, which show how you care. I don't like the assumption because maybe you don't have the money or the time or the KNOWLEDGE - you somehow don't care. I don't think that naturally follows. If you have all of those things (of which that latter is probably the most important) good for you, but don't make assumptions about somebody elses parenting if they don't.

I think it's ludicrous to imply that because we want our children to eat healthy food, and want to discuss this, that we are neglecting them morally etc. Teaching children your own values is a doddle compared to buying something healthy from a supermarket.

Modern food is a minefield in many ways - you have to pick your way through conflicting advice from different 'experts', dodge all the obnoxious advertising and promotions aimed at getting your children to eat crap, juggle with your aspirations versus peer pressure, etc etc etc. It's not as simple as choosing good quality ingredients and cooking something great with them, anymore, or it doesn't seem that way, anyway. You can't just follow your instincts, because we're all being so manipulated into buying things, which are barely food at all, to allegedly make our children feel happy and normal, and to 'treat' ourselves.

I think the level of discussion on here about food is a reflection of the confusion and concern inspired in the modern parent about food. It is hard to avoid the shite they add to our food these days - it shouldn't be, but it is.

Agree F&Z - I think that is something of what I wanted to say - its far far more complex than just food so I don't think its easy to make these judgements. Its not just about food.

It hardly means thats what they eat every day does it?

I used to be a bit sneary when I saw kids in pushchairs with Greggs pasties. Now, knowing how how impossible it is to find anywhere for a sit down meal, me and DS have a gregg's cheese pasty. I also give him rice cakes, grapes, raisins, etc. And he generally lives on a very healthy veggie diet.

Hello NG

harpsi, so agree with your message of 11.22pm - it's all about a healthy attitude to food - exactly.

I really don't buy this simple equation between good food = good, healthy children. If only life was that simple. Children are not little machines all run better by 'x' degree if fed superior fuel.

There's a boy I've known since he was 8 who has grown up on the most outrageously unhealthy packed lunch diet - a faddy eater - mostly eating chocolate bars and squash for lunch. Never a hint of fruit or vegetable. He was the best behaved boy in my son's class, nicknamd 'guardian angel' slim, bright and focussed. He is now doing very well at grammar school.

My two sons both have similar diets and both have good appetites. We do lots of meat and 2 veg meals, home cooked stuff most days, but I don't stress about then having junk food in moderation. My youngest son (6) is not overweight at all. My oldest son (12) has a completely different body shape and is larger than average. He is constantly getting judged for it at school - people surmise he has a very unhealthy diet - and it makes me very cross. An example: at parents evening I talked to his PE teacher. He was saying how eager he is to do sport and how he spends every spare minute at playtime running around with a ball.

Then ds and I was submitted to a little lecture on healthy eating. The PE teacher turned to my son and advised him to get by on a small salad and water during the day, learn to ignore his hunger pangs as he obviously had a slow metabolism and understand he could not eat as much as his friends. I was quietly livid. This is not what you say to a growing and very active child IMO. It is food obsession gone mad. I don't want a teacher - someone my son looks up to - using his authority to tell my son to go on a strict diet that makes him hungry. Healthy eating is one thing, but this is going too far. I hasten to add, my son does choose a lot of sandwiches, fruit pots and salads for lunch - with the odd bowl of chips.

I made it clear I was not taking on board the teacher's comments and said that in our family, quite a few adults had been plump children, then the weight fell off naturally as they hit puberty.

I could give other examples of judgemental attitudes my son had encountered - it makes me really sad and angry.

A few weeks later, when my son was

Franny, who said that anyone was "neglecting them morally"? that's a bit of a leap isn't it? what I was saying is that food/nutrition is one part of parenting, and it is important (imo) to keep it in perspective and balance with other aspects.
and I fear that teaching children our own values isn't a doddle in anyone's book, imo, given all the outside influences that affect them every day.

This post, HC:

"Before nutrition I put things like:

*be firm, consistent and fair with my children
*ensure they reach their potential
*try not to vent my frustration on them
*instill some moral values"

Because of course, those of us banging on about Fruit Shoots don't give a toss about all that ethics crap

Ds loves them, big sesame seed ones, or orange and apple ones. To him they're just 'biscuits'.

lol fio

Tigermoth,what happened to your post???
Hunker,you do make me larf,and yes,you are so right about the layers of meaning within the context of eating.
The comments on the BigMoFos thread by some very perceptive and intelleigent women bear witness to one aspect of that.

I will look up the 'Rituals of Eating' book.

As a flipside to the 'food must be processed crap to appeal to kids' argument,I also hate the middle class fetishisation of food.

'Ah yes,Tatiana and I have installed an antique 30K Tuscan bread oven in our designer kitchen.
My olive oil comes from a 800 year old Albanian grove too.'

Somehow,peasant food has become the food of the rich.That is fucking weird too.

I love the attitude in Turkey.They bloody love food,and show a Turk or a Kurd a patch of grass and they will have a mangal (bbq( or samovar going before you can say 'Long live Ataturk'
Everyone cooks,everyone has an opinion.
But once the meal is finished,they are up and off.

Carmenere has some nice lunch box ideas but I would have neither the time nor patience.The evening meal is the oneinto which I direct most energy.
What's the matter with a
sandwich?

Yesterday my dd had a cheese and pickle roll,strawberries,diluted apple juice and two squares of G&B chocolate.

Novelty foods always appeal.
I do understand that.
As a kid,those little Kellogs boxes of cereals had us thinking we'd died and gone to heaven.

It is possible to buy food that is commercial and free from rubbish, they are usually the old established brands that have been around forever.

I don't do preservatives, colourings, artifical anything yet I still find it possible to buy jam, biscuits, cordial, chocolate, crisps, cereal without having to buy organic stuff from a health food shop.

I think that most of us on this thread feel fairly similiar in so far as what really is important when feeding our children is achieveing a balance of mostly healthy food and the occasional bit of processed crap. As I said before we are all doing are best.

Moondog -I agree nothing wrong with a sandwich at all, thoses ideas are just for parents whose kids don't eat their school sandwiches.