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Original poster

The Processed Food Industry.......what EXACTLY are they trying to feed to the nation?

129 replies

PuffTheMagicDragon · 10/03/2005 10:01

I've posted this on a food thread, although my thinking was sparked by the trailer for next week's "School Dinners" programme by Jamie Oliver.

He will be showing children what goes into their "non Jamie" school dinners. I saw a few seconds of it, which involved pouring a pink sludge (some kind of "meat" product) into a big bucket. The kids clearly weren't impressed.

Whilst ingredients have to be listed on packaging, it can be difficult to visualise them eg "reformed meat".

Should supermarkets etc be required, by law, to show photographs of the main basic ingredients in highly processed foods?

OP posts:
scampadoodle · 10/03/2005 17:19

I went to look at an inner London primary school (for ds1) the other day & I asked the -rather diffident head - about their shool lunches. She said "Oh, we're part of that healthy meals initiative thing [I'm paraphrasing!] but those potato smiley faces always seem to make an appearance!" & I thought (but didn't say "But you're the head, why on earth can't you do some thing about it???!"

hunkermunker · 10/03/2005 17:28

Another depressing HV story, this time from when I was little - HV said to my mum "Don't despise junk food!" in merrily patronising tones. Er...why not?!

hunkermunker · 10/03/2005 17:28

Smiley faces aren't magic, ffs! They don't just appear! Totally agree, Scampadoodle (love your chatname, btw!).

hunkermunker · 10/03/2005 17:30

If they must have a choice (and I don't think they should have junk at all in schools), perhaps the choice should initially be limited to 'if you eat junk as your main meal, you must eat a piece of fruit. If you eat a decent main meal, you may have a cake for pudding'.

But the cake can't be that strangely-textured pink sponge.

iota · 10/03/2005 17:34

Had a look at the Turkey Twizzlers on BOGOF in Tescos today.

Ye Gods!

Check out the list of ingredients - our old friend hydrogenated Vegetable oil puts in an appeareance amongst all the other gunk.

hunkermunker · 10/03/2005 17:35

Maybe they should be called transfatty twizzlers?

GeorginaA · 10/03/2005 18:03

I'd like to hope that the reason that they're on BOGOFF is out of panic with dwindling sales after the airing of Jamie's Dinners, but knowing how long it takes for promotions to set up, I know I'm sadly wrong

hunkermunker · 10/03/2005 18:12

I haven't had a reply from Tesco about not putting this crap on bogof yet. Will post it when (if?!) I do.

Original poster
PuffTheMagicDragon · 10/03/2005 18:18

more food for thought

OP posts:
sweetkitty · 10/03/2005 18:26

Bozza I'm not getting at people who feed their kids BOB pasta shapes every so often I just despair that was all the HV could suggest.

I'm sad to admit I'm a junk food lover as well and love pasta shapes I'm a total sugar junkie but trying to change.

hunkermunker · 10/03/2005 18:55

Just had this reply from Tesco:

Thank you for your email.

All comments and suggestions we receive are passed to each relevant Head Office department for their attention. As I am sure you will understand, we cannot implement every suggestion we receive.

However, I can assure you that we do pay attention to our customers as our aim is to provide the best possible service all round. Therefore, your help on this occasion is very much appreciated.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

**

Think it needs more people to email them...don't you?!

Original poster
PuffTheMagicDragon · 10/03/2005 19:02

will email

OP posts:
GeorginaA · 10/03/2005 19:06

Sounds like an automated response email to me

Bozza · 10/03/2005 20:44

Sweetkitty yes I realised that. I don't think its worth the argument with my MIL but it irritates me that this is actually a sign of her love for DS - that she wants to feed him Bob shapes and buy him a 12 pack of buns when he goes for tea. And georgina I definitely do roll my eyes, but the parkin made me feel guilty for doing that....

I can see I am going to have to find out what goes on at DS's school. Although don't actually know for definite that he has got a place.

Potty1 · 11/03/2005 10:30

Dh took ds2 to school this morning (secondary) and parked on the industrial estate 400 yards from school was a burger van! A good sized queue of children was forming presumably spending their dinner money - at 8.30 am!

GeorginaA · 11/03/2005 10:41

Now that is why I like the pre-pay system or card system - no cash to take to school with them (rules out one form of bullying too).

We used to have to pay for the term's food up front and then were issued with a colour-coded lunch pass. So much less hassle.

sweetkitty · 11/03/2005 15:01

In our secondary school (I'm not kidding) only the poorest kids that had free school dinners actually ate them the rest of us went to the local chip shop and had a chip roll, twix and can or fizzy drink for our lunch every day for about 6 years

Oh and the best selling meal was chips and cheese which I believe started very close to our school (no one had heard of chips and cheese outside Scotland before I moved 8 years ago).

Potty1 · 11/03/2005 15:27

We did too sweetkitty - but not at 8.30 in the morning

I've had a bit of a moan to a guy at the council who has said he will check if the burger van is licensed.

ks · 11/03/2005 15:32

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Janh · 11/03/2005 15:37

I used to get chips and cheese in a cafe in Brighton in 1969 (and very nice it was too )

Mirage · 12/03/2005 07:32

I had a newsletter from Tesco,as part of their Mother & Baby club.There were a lot of money off vouchers for cereal enclosed.When I checked on the type of cereal that they were valid for-it was only the highly sugared,coloured novelty stuff.I was pretty disgusted.

At Christmas,the Mums & Tots group that my friend & I go to,announced that for their annual party,they wouldn't be doing sandwiches,cakes ect,as it was too much trouble & that instead,all the kids would get a free 'happymeal'.One of the reasons they gave was that'lots of kids don't like sandwiches ect,but they all like McDonalds'.As my dd & friends dd were 14 & 13 months respectively,there was no way we were feeding them junk food,so we took sandwiches for them.The reaction from the other mums were astounding.They all wanted to know why our kids weren't allowed chips & nuggets,whilst happily feeding fries to their 6 month old babies.We were made to feel like we were depriving our dd's

WideWebWitch · 12/03/2005 07:41

Mirage, I'm disgusted but not surprised. It's awful.

trustme · 12/03/2005 07:45

Yuk, yuk, Mirage to feeding Mccrap to such little ones.

SueW · 12/03/2005 07:56

Our school has chips on Fridays only (and everyone loves it as their weekly treat) but I recently heard that a mum had been giving her daughter dinner money so she could go offsite and get something 'decent' as her DD had told her that it was chips/pizzas/junk every day.

Instead of checking with school, mum has merrily been doling out dosh and goodness knows what her DD has been doing with it. Mum has now been put right wrt to the fresh meat and veg delivered and prepared daily, daily jacket potato bar, selection of salads and rolls, etc. I expect her daughter's not too happy though at drying up of extra pocket money.

SueW · 12/03/2005 07:57

BTW, doesn't even Jamie like the occasional non-healthy splurge? I'm sure in one of his cookbooks he says if you're going to have a cooked breakfast do it once a month and properly - fry the bacon, eggs, etc. And he has a passion for fishfinger sarnies too I think.

But, as someone said earlier - everything in moderation.