Calling all parents: Please Help Me; Opinions on Childrens diets for research ass please!!!!with cherry on top!!!!

[foxd]

I have a research ass due in on mon so furiously typing away this weekend to get it completed.

My research question has been: What are the factors preventing children eating balanced diets? and What can be realistically acheived taking into consideration modern lifestyles?

Pleae could you spare a few minutes and give your opinion and points of view that anyone has about this topic.
Also have just read an article from the Daily mail archives stating that in a poll 80% of readers believed parents were responsible for the rising childhood obesity epidemic? does anyone have any points of view regarding this?

It would be much appreciated and I promise to buy every one a drink who posts a message, in the 'Come into my bar' thread tonite.

tm,well yes....It's rather like the 'my grandmother smoked 80 fags a day and lived 'til she was 90' story that is trotted out. Generally speaking however,good food gives everyone a boost.

www,sounds great. Love to know what other people have in their cupboards.

Have to tell you that in dd's old nursery,the cook was a young (handsome!) French guy moonlighting from a job at a nice country hotel.
The food was wonderful,all cooked from scratch. He rustled up cakes every day as well.

I would often be found in the kitchen before going to work,ostensibly polishing up my French....

Then he left and it all got a bit too sausage 'n chips for my liking....

It's easy enough (!) for parents to regulate their kids' food intake when they are feeding them, but once you get childcare insitiutions involved, forget it. My younger child goes to day nursery 2 days/week and whilst in all other respects it's fab, the food is dubious on some days. I'm frequently told he has had fish fingers, crisps (! at 1 year old), jam sandwiches etc. I'm not too bothered because he's only there 2 days and he eats healthily the rest of the time but it he was there full time I would be very concerned and probably kick up a bit more of a stink.

Trouble is once they get used to eating the crap (which, let's be honest, tastes great to kids) and then start school, they will gravitate to the nuggets and twizzlers on ther menu because a) they're used to it and more significantly b) the other kids go for it and at that age they are all a bit like sheep, following each other in choosing food. This is my experience with DS1, even though he knows the difference between healthy food and crap, it's hard to tell some days what is what. The other day he came home from school and said he'd had 'chicken jungle' - what is that? he had no idea.

I think all parents can do is make sure that children have as healthy a diet as possible when they are responsible for feeding them and hope for the best at school/nursery - and of course voice their concernes/get involved in lobbying for change if they have the time and inclination.

Wordsmith, that's why my ds has a packed lunch (and always has done) and why I took him out of the nursery he was in at 15mos where tea was white bread jam sandwiches. I agree, the influence of other people does make it a lot harder, as Caligula, I think, said earlier in this thread. I am slightly thwarted by ex mil, who sees ds every other weekend. When he's there he gets Coke, crisps, chocolate and all manner of crap. They're vegetarians so no bollock burgers but it's still a pretty atrocious diet. And I have asked them not to do it but they still do . Ds came home from there with a jar of Nutella in his bag last night and when I exclaimed he said 'I know, I said you wouldn't let me have it but daddy put it in anyway.' We get on me and my ex dh in a lot of ways but this does drive me mad.

Reading all this with interest as I am expecting my first baby in October. My DH and I are constantly amazed when we go to the supermarket and see the amount of junk that people buy. A quick burst of mental arithmetic shows that it is way cheaper to avoid ready meals etc. We are lucky enough to have a veg garden so eat seasonally as far as veg goes. I also make my own bread (in the breadmachine) which only takes a couple of minutes to prepare - and it can do pizza dough, pitta bread etc etc. I also make my own yogurt. All the meals I make are from scratch and it does not take as long as people think to do this and I have the added benefit of knowing EXACTLY what is in the food that I am eating. Often I will cook double batches (doesn't take much longer) and freeze for a "ready meal" when we are short on time.

This is exactly how I intend to continue once our baby is on to solid foods. I will shortly be registered as a childminder and will begin minding kids once my own baby is around 6 months ie when my maternity money runs out. I will have a healthy eating policy for all my minded children and will actively encourage all the kids to join in. Older kids will (hopefully) enjoy planting stuff in our garden and seeing and eating the results.

And by the way - I am not some health freak. This all started from being really skint years ago and working out how to eat cheaply on a budget. The healthy meals were a welcome side effect of the restricted budget.

I disagree about kids actually liking the Chicken smiles, Whale Dippers etc anyway - ds and dd detest them and love the Roast dinner, curry that the Cook makes from scratch and Bolognaise they have. They hate the processed reconstituted c**p that is served up and hence only have them one day a week - plus I could not live with myself knowing what rubbish is served up - some days are better than others but mainly their menu is 'could do better' Lets hope the new guidelines starting Sept 06 will help.

My dd actually put on weight on British school dinners when we moved here from the US! She was having them every day until then. In the US she was having soup, roll and fruit, or jacket potato with a choice of fillings and yoghurt, type meals. Who would have thought it

I found the recipes for and made some of Jamies School dinner recipes, which they both love! Just wish the school would actually serve them up, then they could have dinners every day

I would ditto much of the above.
My dd goes to nursery full time and I am very happy with the food - all cooked on the premises, lunches vary from vegetable bake and rice, chicken casserole and potatoes, spaghetti bol to fishpie - all with veg, followed by a milky pudding, crumble and custard or similar. Afternoon snacks include tomato and lentil soups, couscous and vegetables, always followed by copious amounts of fruit. If a child refuses their lunch they can only have toast and fruit as an alternative.

It is like so many things these days, if there isn't a precedence set at home on things like diet, behaviour, etc, how can we expect our children not to follow the crowd if they don't know any better. Schools, childminders, nurseries etc have there place too in this, don't get me wrong and great they are too in many ways, but why take on the role of parent if you are just going to hand over responsiblity to someone else and then complain when you don't like what is happening.

I'm also one of those people who can go on and on about kids' food,but I'll try and sum it up:
People eat rubbish food, because it's cheap, easy and available (and marketed to them). 'Proper' food takes more effort - why bother?
Here's a question:
Why are vegetables (and fruit) seen by most people as somehing good for you, but not as something tasty? If you have to insist that children eat them, you've lost half the battle - they should be having them because they like them!

I'm also one of those people who can go on and on about kids' food,but I'll try and sum it up:
People eat rubbish food, because it's cheap, easy and available (and marketed to them). 'Proper' food takes more effort - why bother?
Here's a question:
Why are vegetables (and fruit) seen by most people as somehing good for you, but not as something tasty? If you have to insist that children eat them, you've lost half the battle - they should be having them because they like them!

IMO, it's down to parents and their lack of knowledge about basic nutrition; their belief in the idea that anything advertised on the TV Must be ok for their kids as 'they wouldn't be selling poison' and also parents' lack of basic cooking skills. 'Being too busy' is an excuse often used but once some cooking basics are learned then a nutritious meal takes next to no time to prepare.

vess,I agree with your vegetables point. I look at a lot of the vegetables that people try to get their kids to eat and am not surprised that they refuse. I would!!
Frozen mixed veg,overboiled carrots,boiled to buggery runner beans,with no sauce or flavouring. Similarly,huge indegestible hunks of raw broccoli and the like are too much for a child to face.

My dd wouldn't eat the above,but she will happily tuck into vegetables in curries,stews and omelettes,

Yes about the veg! Dd has alwasy loved veg but recetly has been only keen on raw stuff and less keen on cooked. MIL (who dd eats with regularly) told me that dd had definitely @gone off' carrots. When I saw dd eating raw carrots at a BBQ the other day I said 'we like raw carrots don't we?' and she replid 'oh yes, but we don't like hot and salty ones like at nanny's do we?'!! MIL will put her veg on to cook about 3 days before dinner is served (slight exaggeration but you get the picture) - yuk

lol at the three day thing-I have relatives like that. By marriage of course!