Anyone elses school sent a "contract" home for parents of children who have packed lunches

[neverforget]

cause ours just have! Never heard of anything like this before.

Yes, you do the middle class stuff, eggs and blueberries for breakfast, wholemeal bread, organic sodding cheese, homemade fish pie peas and brocolli and pear crumble for dinner, and it's still not good enough!
It enough to make you want to resign as a parent. The bar is now just too blooming high.

A little bit of smoked mackerel mixed with nat yog is delicious as dip or sandwich filling. Ah, bring on the food police, about time this was done I think.

Well if the school wants contracts send in a letter stating you are banning christams chocolates and demand the school donate all there chocolate and buscuits to old peoples homes. You dont want the staff getting ill from eating the wrongs sorts of foods ,

DS lives on smoked salmon sandwiches - does that count??

Am really that they suggested peanut butter as a filling. When I was teaching a little girl had a horrible reaction when a child on her table had a peanut butter sandwich.

Back up the staffroom comments though - everyone had to bring in cakes on their birthday which was fairly regular! Just remembered that the support staff for some reason always bought these doughnuts from Iceland that were frozen with jam and cream in the middle...... mmmmmm

And you shall know us by our trail of tasty crumbs... (famous quote re teachers)

The peanut thing is really quite scary. What on earth are they thinking?

Mad, unenforceable, overly-didactic and nutritionally unsound IMO. Why on earth do they think children have to have non-dairy protein at the same time as a piece of cheese or yoghurt, for instance? What makes them think 'cheese sandwich bad, Shippams meat paste good'?

And if they think there are lots of parents who don't have a clue about healthy foods, why are they giving salmon as the only example of an oily fish?

And families on a tight budget for whom, let's face it, salmon is hardly going to be high on their shopping list for themselves, let alone giving it to the kids to reject.

Very surprised about the peanut butter. Most schools these days are nut free.

Also no good for vegetarians - no fish at all!

Remember that when given a contract you are prefectly entitled to make any amendments, sign the changes, sign at the bottom where asked to, and then return it. If I was asked to sign such a contract this is what I would do. It shows you are putting some thought into what you are feeding them, you just have different thoughts to them.

Whoever put it together doesn't have much experience of feeding the average child though. You can't expect every meal to be balanced, if you manage to get a balance across the days food intake I think you have done well.

I would reply to the letter, asking them to sign up to my nutritional rules so that DD can have school dinner.

1- No aspartame
2- no white bread
3- veg has to be worked into the main meal so that it cannot be picked out (for example by grating the carrot into the bolognaise sause)
4- organic fruit and veg only
5- no prcessed animal parts. Only meat. Can be white or dark, and doesn not have to be organic.
6- serve pudding only on Fridays. Pudding is a treat and not something to be expected at every meal. (organic pre/pro biotic yogurt can be served at every meal)
7- And last but not least, cease all bake sales and stop handing out candy as prizes at the summer fete, Christmas fete, and every other school sponsored funct. Because until you do this, your no chocolate and no crisp rule is disgraceful hypocracy. Is chocolate more healthful at 3:15 then it is at 12:00 noon?

i would refuse

I always send in a healthy lunch but it is the principle

if they care that much tell them to provide an organic, nutritious cooked meal instead

Also feeling at the peanut butter. Even our local dance school has a sign up now asking people please not to bring anything with nuts in. And given how horrible peanut allergic reactions can be, quite rightly. I would write a very strongly worded letter back to the school.

We had a letter asking us not to bring in certain things- fine! But laying down in detail how many times in a 3 week period children have to have various things- do they suppose they only eat the one meal a day ? If we're having pilchards for supper, why do I have to send in a portion of token pilchard in the school lunch box just to show the dinner ladies that hey! my child can eat fish? And what about the children who are allergic to fish? The vegetarians? Am usually in favour of healthy eating, but this is just control freakery.

My guess is they have outlined the government's new requirements for school dinners to the parents who pack lunches so that they can turn around and say all of their students are in line with the new "healthy" meals as outlined by the twonks in parliament.

But, this is definitely nanny state gone too far.

Our school is nut free, and I personally hate it. Selfishly I admit. But, my kids love peanut butter, it is good for them, and it doesn't require refrigeration like sandwich meat does. But, of course, I comply with the policy.

Oh, and an idea for salmon in the lunch box (if anyone wants one) is to make a cold past salad with it and stick that in the lunch box with a frozen drink (which will thaw by lunchtime).