Gwyneth Paltrow and avoiding carbs for kids - what do you think?

[JaneGMumsnet]

Hi,

You may have read news stories today about Gwynneth Paltrow avoiding carbs for the whole family, including her children aged eight and six:

"Sometimes when my family is not eating pasta, bread or processed grains like white rice, we're left with that specific hunger that comes with avoiding carbs."

We'd be interested to hear what you think about this story.

Does your own diet influence the way you feed your children?

Thanks,

MNHQ

Exotic, what is in the cake if there's no sugar, egg or fat?

I'm intrigued

dates, dried fruit, wholemeal flour, ground almonds, mixed spice, orange juice and water.
I go running-I need some carbs.

Ground almonds have fat in them, dried fruit & OJ have "natural"sugars.

Gosh-some people are so literal! It is a cake without the traditional use of fat and sugar. You are supposed to have a balanced diet with some of each food group.

Sound very tasty!

Thank you exotic, sounds lovely.

There are certainly some foods you don't need at all and never do you any good at all. If you just look at what man ate for 2 million years that gives you a pretty good idea of what you should be eating, not modern junk. Substitutes like cola without sugar but including aspartame can often be worse than the original.

If foods make you smile, they do you good! Everything in moderation...

Oh xenia don't be such a kill joy.

You won't live forever just because you don't drink champagne or eat lemon tart!

"You won't live forever just because you don't drink champagne or eat lemon tart!"

(and, Xenia, if you want a nice man in your life, enjoying good food together is indispensable! Just saying...)

Sadly I am off both champagne and lemon tart at the moment .

I am going on holiday at Easter and the world needs to see rather less of me in a bikini!!!

A life devoid of champagne and/or lemon tart would be a life bereft of joy.

I always imagine Xenia drinks champagne at every meal

I don't think anyone in this thread is really advocating a life lived entirely without champagne and lemon tart (or whatever floats your boat) - just an acknowledgement of the fact that we are living in a food environment where sugar, for example, is everywhere, in everything and since it's really, really fucking bad for you with no nutritional value whatsoever, it's not actually crazy to try and avoid it whenever possible.

It is perfectly possible to eat luxuriously, joyfully, even hedonistically without ingesting tonnes of sugar or other processed carbs. Honest. I eat chocolate and drink booze on a pretty-much day basis - I just choose the stuff that, as far as budget will allow, isn't full of rubbish.

Oh, and there's nothing wrong with fat at all (sorry am on phone, can't see who made the ground almonds comment)

I think xenia is tee total ^shudders^

With the exception of my friend who has a medical reason for not eating certain foods (coeliac), my two friends who are just a pain in the bottom (only fairly recently) and cut everything out have not been invited to any dinners or get-togethers involving food recently because of their hissy fits and general awkwardness. Everyone in our group is pretty fed up of them both.

That specific hunger..... Humm, not sure I like the sound of that!

Gwennie is well known for being a little excessive in her lifestyle: extreme diets and exercise regimes: and, in the industry she works, it's to be expected that how you look on the outside is more important.
Also her dad died of cancer, so she's probably following every latest fad to avoid cancer as well.

I feel for her as she's obviously not well educated and informed, and seems to have little to say for herself: it's all the latest fad, be it clothes, lifestyle choices, or food. She's chasing her own tail.

She seems to swing around a lot with her opinions: a few years ago she wouldn't go out in the sun, now she's all leathery with sun damage because she was getting osteoporosis from her wacky lifestyle.

Taken with a pinch of salt, so to speak, avoiding refines carbs and sugar is a good thing, but depriving your kids of a major food group seems abusive!

Time will tell I suppose how her kids will turn out with such a mother (as it will tell with us all).
In an industry where there seems to be so little sense, it doesn't bode well for her kids if she's so controlling now.

You think it's child abuse not to feed your kids processed food?

Wow. Just wow. Only in the UK.

She isn't cutting out a major food group, fgs.

Bonsoir - I see your croissant and cappuccino and I raise you buttery scrambled eggs, full-fat Greek yoghurt with blueberries and a cafe creme

Eating is a social activity and if you have a diet so extreme that you can't eat out in a restaurant or at a friend's house you need to rethink (unless you have medical reasons). I don't eat cake as a general thing, but if I went to someone's house ,and I saw that they had made one specially, then of course I would have a piece -I wouldn't bore them to death with my eating habits.
My DCs had a balanced diet most of the time so if they went to a fast food chain for a party it was no big deal and I didn't have a hissy fit if they came out of school with sweets on someone's birthday. (It won't be long until the killjoy Easter egg posts turn up!)
I have seen the children of strictly controlling parents and in every case they are able to stand there looking as if 'butter wouldn't melt....' while she proses on about how they don't eat crisps etc and yet you know that they are the ones that can't get enough when her back is turned!

I am low carbing and reading up about it I am shocked at what sugar and carbs do to the body.

It has changed my way of how I eat and therefore how my children eat.

I would not give them a huge plate of pasta now or white toast as I understand better what it does to the body.

Fizzy drinks are now banned here and we encourage more water and milk drinking.

The amount of sugar in everyday foods is shocking so we are more conscious of this and read labels more.

Since LC ing I fill up on protein and fat and am not even tempted by biscuits or sugar now. Before I started this way of eating i was at weightwatchers eating low fat crap and then a whole packet of biscuits at 4pm. Doesnt happen now.

Go Gwyneth I say!!