Do you eat meals with your dc?

[CloudAtlas]

Mine are still very small, oldest is 2.2, and I don't normally eat meals with them during the week. I don't fancy what they eat for lunch, and if they're having something like salmon, it seems a bit decadent for me to have the same iykwim. I tend to grab a cheese sandwich or toast when they go down for their sleep. They eat their dinner at 5pm, OH not back from work until much later so we eat together then.
Been thinking about it, and think I should make more of an effort to eat lunch with them.

What do you do?

Actually I think you'll find that it's only 1 or 2 people who are finding this thread 'so irritating'. So irritating in fact that they feel the need to keep coming back to it and attacking other people. I wonder if you can point me in the direction of where exactly people have been 'smug' and 'self-righteous'. This bearing in mind the original poster was asking if other Mnetters ate with their dcs and considering whether she should be 'making more of an effort'. With this in mind it seems completely appropriate for people to respond to those issues exactly. I really do wonder why some people (and really we're talking about 1 or 2) have a problem with that.

hurricane it is not 1 or 2 there is a whole thread about smug threads maybe you should wander over and read it

Again, perhaps you'd like to point out exactly where I have been 'smug'. As far as I can see all of the assumptions, personal attacks and insults (and there are quite a few) have come from elsewhere. Funny how talking about food makes some people so angry. Wonder why...

ok here is an example from your very first post do you not think it is a bit patronising

Find it really weird and quite worrying that some people eat different things from their dcs. Why?

Either you are saying that the children deserve to eat healthily and a variety and you don't or the other way around. It's a very dangerous route to think that there's such a thing as 'children's food' (and this makes parents vulnerable to marketing and spending more money than they need to not to mention the inconvenience of cooking 2 meals and setting and clearing the table twice).

Nope, sorry, I'm not seeing smug. It's very clear that this is my personal view (or are we not allowed to express our opinoins any more) and I have actually asked why some people eat different things from their dcs out of genuine interest. The bit underneath is common sense surely? What am I missing? I don't think anyone has responded by saying they think it IS a good idea to have 'children's food' and 'adults' food' and I don't see how anyone can argue that the idea of 'children's food' has generated a multi-million pound industry which exploits parents (especially the most vulnerable) and actually makes them feel more anxious and less in control of what their children eat.

tbh hurricane you think you are right and I think you are being smug so I am walking away as we are never going to see eye to eye on this

By the way, on this subject, do people agree with me that the 'children's menu' should be completely banned? Nothing wrong with smaller portions and nothing wrong with low salt or milder versions of adults food for children but 9 times out of 10 the children's menu consists of chips and burgers oh and a few peas thrown in to make it 'healthy'. Or is this just me being smug again?

Right andie. I've noticed this about some people on this thread. They can't come up with any valid arguments against eating together as a family or any of the other common sense advice which nutritionists and health professionals give that I've mentioned so they resort to personal attacks and nastiness.

i've only read the last few posts but wanted to say that by and large i don't understand why people eat different food from their kids. and like aviatrix (and i suspect hurricane, who seems unnaccountably to be taking a beating on this thread) i think that children's menus are unhelpful and silly and more proof about how utterly bonkers we are about food in this country.

Hurricane, what sort of thing do you mean by 'children's food' (your post of 19:48:28)?

When our DCs eat at a separate time and different food from us eg because we are going to have spicy curry or going out for a meal and leaving them with the babysitter, they eat the same kind of food that we eat on other occasions eg soft boiled egg and soldiers

I agree; I can't see the point in children's menus. Why can't children just be offered a half portion of whatever is on the menu?

i don't understand why everyone's taking this to the nth degree, it's perfectly obvious that if you're all eating the same thing at the same time there's no issue, whether that's egg and soldiers or curry. look up and press on the Annabel Karmel button, that's children's food. all cut out shapes and squiggly eyes, and then there's her own ready made meals, for people who can't face making her recipes.
all hurricane's saying, it seems to me, is why give yourself the bother?

Aha, a whole new world to me.

Although I have to confess that when it's feasible I do arrange my DCs food into pretty patterns and shapes that will appeal. After all when I go to a gourmet restaurant, I appreciate the art that goes into the presentation. Draw the line at making fish pie look sexy though!

OK, I don't think its great for parents to be eating DIFFERENT food from their kids on a regular basis. As has been said many times on this thread by lots of posters, its important for children to see their parents eating and enjoying a range of healthy foods. This is one obvious advantage of eating together. They look up to us for what is right and what is normal more than any one else (God help them!). I heard a nutritionist on the radio who was part of that recent programme for obese kids in London (can't remember the name of it) who said that the parents he was working with frequently complained that their kids didn't eat vegetables then when he asked them if THEY ate vegetables they said they didn't.

As far as 'children's food' goes I'm not talking about the odd time when you give your kids beans on toast before going out for a nice curry or fancy meal with your partner which we certainly do now and again and would do more often if we could ever get a babysitter. What I'm talking about is the families who give their kids a constant diet of bland and often very nutrient poor and fat and sugar rich food starting with the baby food from jars (which doesn't taste the same as real food, costs a fortune and is bad for the environment and is most likely to be bought by those who can least afford it) and progressing to white bread, mashed potato, macaroni cheese, chips and pizza. Before anyone starts I'm not saying that this is what Mumsnetters do (but we all know that Mumsnetters are not generally representative) but this is incredibly common. These same parents then wonder why their kids won't eat broccoli or don't like spicy foods. They assume kids will only eat bland nursery food so they give it to them and then the kids only like that sort of food.

Yes, babies and young children naturally prefer sweet and bland tastes (and who wouldn't opt for chips and chocolate pudding over cabbage and an apple if we could get away with it?) but it's our job to expose them to new tastes.

I wonder what all those parents who say children don't like spicy foods think the kids eat in India and Pakistan!!

I have come across soo many kids who have refused food before even tasting it just because its unfamiliar - some of my neices and nephews for example wouldn't touch asparagus or blueberries for example (I mean literally wouldn't touch them).

My eldest dc (5) is just starting to enjoy spicy foods after we've kept on trying her with them so we're going to take them to a curry house. For the first visit we'll just order a whole bunch of starters, dips and popodums and naan breads and some mango lassi to drink. I wouldn't be at all surprised if dc2 is wary at first and dd1 is a bit picky but because they're used to being exposed to new tastes I have absolutely no doubt that next time we take them they'll eat a bit more. And just being in a curry house and sitting at the table I think will be valuable for them. Dc2 often plays up when we go out to eat and for precisely this reason I really want to keep taking her out to eat until she gets used to it.

Yes, Aitch and Otherside and a lot of people don't realize how exploitative the market in children's food is and often how unhealthy. They'll happily pay a fortune for pasta in the shape of rabbits and 'children's yoghurts' which are often just more sugary and more expensive versions of adult food.

i have ds 3yo and dd 10mo.

dh and i usually eat with ds, dd joins in about half the time.

at breakfast we sit at the table but all eat different foods.

at lunch either i will eat with ds or he eats alone.

we always eat together at dinner - well about 99% of the time - we are all around the table and eat the same thing.

OK, I see what you mean now, particularly rabbit shaped pasta. (Funny to think that this means some people would eat a rabbit shaped thing but not eat rabbit)

I am half Indian and we ate Indian food at home a couple of times a week in the 1970s but I still didn't enjoy anything spicy until I was a teenager. Would eat the rice, raitas and a couple of the milder curries on the family repertoire.

My cousin who was brought up in India and is a cookery writer was giving me some examples of what her children like. From what she was saying I gather it is quite common in India for young children and infants to be given relatively bland stuff but of course bland in India still contains some spices, so is a lot more flavoursome than white bread, mash pots etc.

i think children have more taste buds functioning than we do (ahem, i saw it on nina and the neurons) so they can have difficulty with some things. hot, hot spices, for example, dd can't do, but i don't really like that myself and tend to prefer warm aromatic curries with lots of cumin, cloves and coriander etc.
dd's fine with those, loves them in fact.
having said that, she has always loved very strong cheeses etc from 6 months.

I'm sure that's true Aitch (and especially if nina and the neurons says so ). I know that my dc1 is quite weird because she's drawn to strong tastes. She loves pickled onions and olives and I caught her making a piccalli and tomato sandwich the other day What I thought was even weirder is that I used to do the same thing at her age (eat whole jars of pickled onions and piccallie on bread) and now I can't stand pickled onions.

CloudAtlas, have you tried lunch with your DCs yet?

Oh my goodness, we really have lost the power of debate in this country.

Of course you believe you are right if you have an opinion. That's what an opinion is. If someone feels threatened by someone else's opinion, that is hardly the fault of the person merely expressing the opinion, but symptomatic of an insecurity within the person feeling slighted.

For someone to say "You hold such and such a view, therefore you are a complete idiot", is a vastly different proposition from someone simply stating their own opinion. If we hold true to our opinions, and are able to argue our corner without losing our temper, that is where debates become interesting. All this mud slinging and offence-taking is so counter-productive.

Oh, and banning "kids' menus"? I'm right there with you, Hurricane. They are an abomination and an affront to sensible diet guidelines.

On adults' versus children's food - generally we eat the same thing as our children, but I would go bonkers if we always did or felt we always had to. There are things that the children just don't appreciate and/or that are quite expensive - sea urchins, Dover sole, black pudding, fresh anchovies - that my partner and I love to eat. On the occasions we eat those things I give the children something they love, like pasta and homemade tomato sauce, that my partner and I just find boring.