My Children wont eat school dinners - still on packed lunches in September

[destroyerOFdandelions]

Hi, My 1st son is turning 6 next week (youngest in his class) and moving into year 2. My middle child is 4 and starting school in the same class. It's a v.small primary school and years Reception 1 and 2 are in the same classroom.

Basically i have signed them up for school dinners, but they refuse to have them. My eldest has had them on occasion before, and he says he doesn't like people watching him go up to get his food. Also the times he did go for fish fingers for example, he didn't eat them as they had 'brown' bits in them and there wasn't any tomato sauce. So basically he's Mr grumpy at hometime and ravenous for tea at 3.30.
He says he will have a hot dinner or the Jacket Potato alternative if i go in and eat with him, but i also have a 11 month old and obviously paying £2.60 a day for my meal is out of the question.
My 4 year old doesn't want to have a hot dinner either, he's been going over with his packed lunch from playgroup and joining the main school children in the hall and is still refusing to try most new foods i offer him, even if the ingredients of which he eats separately.

They each have their own identical packed lunches every day - one philadelphia, one laughing cow sandwiches plus their preferred other bits and bobs. I have never sent them with crisps but other parents do, i send fruit based snacks like humzingers and a cake bar, cheesestring, yogurt tubes, bottle of squash etc so i can see why the school dinner alternative would leave them hungry, thinking about how many calories they would ultimately consume.

Just annoyed that i am missing out on not getting any free food for them. If i did make them have a hot lunch i'm sure i'd be doing tea early and then that leads to supper later on before bed so i'd be feeding them twice in the evening so not sure it would save me any money if i did force it on days when the menu is suitable.............

Does anyone else have this lunchtime problem?

I had two fussy eaters. When they started school I signed them up for school dinners - no negotiation or discussion - and I now have 2 far far less fussy eaters. There are a few things on the menu they're not keen on but on those days they will eat the bits they like and have a piece of bread and extra salad and fruit.

Top things parents need to know about school food

Ds had a ham roll/sandwich, an apple/orange/some strawberries, a cheese triangle, a Lidl fruit fromage frais and a carton of fruit juice for almost every single day at primary school. One day a week he had pasta'n'pesto.

He occasionally took school meals but complained at the queuing and that some days there was very little left

At least I knew what he was eating.

At secondary, for the first year the kids are not allowed out, so it is packed lunch or school meals. He took the school meals but as soon as he moved into 2nd year he stopped. Part of the problem, he says, is that the school meals are tasteless: no added salt and no sugar .

He makes up his own packed lunches now (his own version of a subway roll) and buys a pasta meal off the school premises once a week as a treat (I give him the lunch money, so it is up to him whether he spends it on lunches or goes to the effort of making his own a sneaky way of getting him in to the kitchen )

Personally, I am horrified at the guidelines we got sent by Cordia (who run Glasgow's lunch service) when ds was in primary school: telling us to put low-fat products in to packed lunches - for primary school kids - yet filling the "cakes" that they sold with concentrated apple juice

But there again, I am one of those Bad mums who thinks that full fat milk, at 4% is actually a low fat product which includes more of its (fat soluble) benefits, cooks most things from scratch with a modicum of salt and who actually enjoys putting real butter onto her food.

Mrz that poster is shocking , one or more portions or fruit or veg a day is that it? Deep fried food may be served two out of five days, oily fish once every three weeks etc etc . Do they really think they are healthy.

What happens after the free period if parents struggle to afford school meals? The cost soon mounts up if you have to pay for more than one. Mine never had school meals, they did not want them do I do not know much about the free school meals policy. Just wondering what happens to those who would just be outside the FSM category. I really hope that however is in government will sort this.

The free period lasts throughout Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 for all children, those currently eligible for FSM will still be eligible for them in years 3 to 6.
Unfortuntely for those just outside the FSM criteria, this hasn't changed. But there will always be someone just outside, there has to be a cut off point somewhere ( whether the current criteria are appropriate is another matter!)

My kids school are having to build a bigger kitchen to deal with the demand for free lunches for 300 children!! Up until July only children who are entitled to free school meals can get a hot meal as the school is so big they don't have the room or facilities. There fore from September till January the KS1 children who are entitled to free school meals are going to be provided with a packed lunch and as an adult the choices are amazing but to a child they are far too exotic:- cucumber and smoked salmon on multigrain bread with a melon and strawberry fruit medley, unsalted cheese and wheat shapes!!!! Way way too exotic for 5 and 6 yr olds a plain ham roll, a yogurt, piece of fruit and a plain biscuit would suffice!!!!

At least one portion of fruit and one of vegetables. Fish finger type stuff no more than twice a week. Are we looking at the same poster, Soon ?

Oily fish a minimum of once every three weeks - that's something I'd prefer to be improved upon - but then how many packed lunches contain a nice bit of mackerel?

I have a fussy eater, to the extent that all the teachers and other staff know him (he's finished reception), with many having had meetings with me, agreed how to handle him, and one has referred him to a psychologist.

So much sympathy to OP for that. However I've had him on school meals throughout, as he coped with nursery mealtimes, and slowly is trying more things even though half the time he eats his slice of bread and nothing else.

I figure he won't starve if he gets a bit of banana at break and then toast at after school club or dinner at home, and he is usually eating plain rice, potato, battered fish, sponge cake and the odd yoghurt at school, sometimes even pizza or a bit of meat.

If he's going to eat new food, it'll be at lunchtime when he's alert. This way I can save supper time for his favourite meals, but also means school can reinforce table manners, cutlery use, etc. And introduce new foods.

I suspect almost no KS1 kids will have packed lunches come Sept as most parents couldn't afford it (65% FSM already) so there may be peer pressure to have school meals.

agree with everything tricot said. I am in same position with my ds and his packed lunch has been approved by his dietician. Wish things were different and ds didnt have a food phobia but he does so it will be packed lunches for a long while yet.

You have no idea what it is like until you have experience of a child who will not eat.

Just got our menu and the milk on option is "milk drink" so I'm guessing flavoured milk ie milk shake.

Yep one portion of veg on option per day- that is shite when you consider they should be eating 10.

The fruit is contained in stodgy puddings and cakes eg pineapple in upside down pineapple cake eg what 4 segments at best.

Yep fruit bowl on offer but let's face it it will serve as a decoration.No kid will pick bullet pears if toffee crisp crunch,choc cracknel,custard biscuit etc are on offer.

Massively carb heavy eg mac cheese followed by pineapple cake and custard.The veg being starchy peas or sweetcorn(they get a spoonful).

Fsm end at £16k(the cut off is way too low) so those ks2 kids just over will go hungry whilst the wealthy Tarquins in KS1 who don't need a free meal will chuck their single spoonfuls of veg into the bin.

Truly shit policy.

seagull you have made me feel much better about my ds having packed lunch every day.

Sounds like as a mum you don't want to be made redundant and like controlling what your kids eat , there is usually enough of a selection and the food is normally healthier than a humzinger and a laughing Cow cheese.

What is wrong with Laughing Cow cheese?

Oh yawn. .... healthy eating is about variety and balance. Few people achieve this through packed lunches (note I'm not claiming its impossible)

Kids don't get fat from drinking full fat milk but equally it doesn't make a massive difference if they have semi skimmed. I don't even know which dd's school uses and I couldn't care less

and my dd often chooses fruit over the puddings

I hope that the school lunches can be improved at your school OP, then your kids might enjoy school lunches too. Any chance of speaking to the head / raising the issue of the quality of the food. maybe get a petition going from other parents. There's no reason why school lunch has to be horrible

My ds is going into year 1 (dd starting reception) of a new last year free school. Packed lunch isn't an option at the school. everyone including all the staff eat the hot lunch. I'm very fortunate that the food is excellent - the school cook, makes everything fresh on site and is a parent of a 4 and 5 year old herself (also in the school) so understands what children find appealing etc.

This time last year I was so so worried. DS was a very fussy eater - he'd had packed lunches at pre school and didn't like anything remotely healthy. It's amazing the difference in him now. I think because no child has a packed lunch makes it easier, they get a choice every day and a lot of children eat 2nds or even 3rds at lunch time. no -one goes hungry as there's always the option of bread on the table.

I'm very thankful for the school dinners - especially as they're going to be free this year! I think he'd still be fussy now if he'd had packed lunches as he is really bad at trying new things at home but seems happy to at school and will now eat things at home that he's tried and liked at school.

"i'd rather know exactly what had been eaten from his lunchbox, and then cook at hot dinner when we get in. "

I'm not sure what your problem is? Why don't you just continue with packed lunches?