Was watching this programme with interest and it got me thinking. Why is it so difficult to eat healthily?

I try everything to keep my diet healthy, i can't stand chocolate, crisps and sweets, i love veg, have this thing for roasted root veggies, like my fruit smoothies. Yet im still failing to eat as healthily as i should.

Does anyone else have the same problem?

And as for the programme, that poor bloke is trying so hard for these ungrateful kids if it were me id be crying! Isn't it terrible that some kids have no idea what broccoli is? Time to bring back sunday lunch i think lol!

Time to bring back 'proper' school dinners, which everyone ate together, using (horrors!) real cutlery! No more finger food (that's for toddlers). Meals with real food - if you're doing a meat main course you can have a vegetarian alternative for those who don't eat meat - but that would be as far as the choice should go.

Proper nutrition is vital if these children, who'll be the ones looking after all of us when we're old, are to become healthy adults.

What interests me are the supposed figures for obese children... there is one child in a village school of 200 here who is overweight. The rest are all healthy. They play out every day, have lots of fresh air and PE. I'm not sure its quite as bad as its made out overall...

That said, you can imagine the hidden problems that those schools in that programme are causing. They should be ashamed of themselves for serving up such junk. My dogs eat better than those kids. Infact, Willis would turn his nose up at chopped chicken bit burgers.

The proportion of overweight children is about the same here too, Chloe. But then, the Boy watched some of those programmes with me and said that the food at the schools here is nothing like as bad as those on TV. He quite likes junk food, but he thought that food looked vile, and quite fancied trying what Jamie'd prepared.

Did you see the one where the child was too scared to try a strawberry? That was the same programme where a nurse said that they have 'bunged-up' children in hospital who eat so little roughage they haven't had a poo for 6 weeks. It's terrifying. It's not just their school diet that's terrible - their home diet is just as bad.

Yeah, I watched the one where these kids go home from school and have a kit kat and a can of coke for dinner Its terrible. Schools and the government need to take more responsibility for the food when the kids are at school! The kids know no better :(

Yes, if they're eating so badly at home then it's even more important that their school dinner is healthy - in so many cases it's the only chance for decent nutrition they get. One piece of fruit a day, plus milk (yes, it's all still available for schoolchildren, free - but the school has to apply for it) would be a start.

But how to ensure they actually eat it?

I'll be interested to see what happens after he shows them how their chicken burgers are made next week...Ironically, education is the only way to turn it round. Those kids are old enough to have a good biology lesson explaining the effects of eating such junk.

And schools should be starting Reception children on decent food so they know no different!

I don't think I would blame the schools and government I think they are just responding to the fact that these children will not contemplate real food,  I think it is a mothers responsibility to introduce these foods into childrens diets long before they start school and then the schools should continue their good work by providing a healthy diet.  I also think we should all be prepared to pay whatever taxes necessary to increase the expenditure on the meal to a little more than 37p

I would definitely blame the Govt for ignoring the problem and not providing strict guidelines. And I would blame the relevant authority for not spending the money properly.

The Govt and the school should pay for the staff - it shouldn't come out of the dinner money. I was paying £15.50 a week for school dinners for my 2 - only £3.70 of that is going to food.

Well I'm sure you know kids better than me cos I don't have any :) but isn't there a danger that if the Government did produce guidelines and real food was presented to these kids that they would just go hungry or pick at the potato bits, for fear of broccoli poisoning :) before dashing home for a few pre-tea bags of crisps. I think the horse has got to go before the cart and the mums are the horses.

Well, being pedantic :) I actually wrote: "Schools and the government need to take more responsibility for the food when the kids are at school" with the emphasis being on the "are at school" bit :D :D

And yes, the parents should certainly take more responsibility at home.

Well being very pedantic :D not in the post I replied to you didn't.  I'd forgotten all that had gone before I'm afraid :)

Just a thought - but wouldn't the standard of school meals rocket upwards if teachers had to eat the same food as the children? That's how it was at the schools I went to ...

We do !! - at the school I teach at, eating with the kids is part of their education as we teach 'self help' skills as part of mealtimes ( we are special school). I do think that children need to have fruit and veg as part of their diet from the word go, so many of them arrive at school and refuse point blank to taste anything that isn't orange and covered in breadcrumbs :(- schools do not have the time or staff to pander to their whims there is only 30 minutes for food to be served, eaten and cleared away before the next sitting comes in and most of that 30  minutes is taken up with helping them to handle their cutlery properly so that they don't eat with their hands all the time.  We also have a breakfast club for those kids who arrive at school having had no breakfast ( and you'ld be surprised how many this can be - parents are often rushing to get to work and 'opt out' of having a battle at breakfast time by leaving it down to us.

I also think that a lot of behavioural problems are caused by the dreadful diet some children have - it's like pumping them full of chemicals and expecting them to sit still and concentrate - truly my dogs have a healthier diet that many of my class do :rolleyes:

Yvonne

there is at least one obese child in each of my childrens classes at school all girls! i feel so sorry for them on sports days and when they dress up etc. i am overweight myself but my kids are all a perfect weight as i dont allow them to eat out of boredom. they are allowed to eat when they are hungry and are always offered a full fruit bowl

I wonder if obesity is more common in urban areas than rural ones? Just thinking along the lines of how much more traffic etc there is in towns and cities, so children are more likely to be kept indoors.

I remember sitting aged 3/4/5 with a bowl of cauliflower and a few pork chop bones, gorging myself!
Back then it was normal practice to have a decent cooked dinner 5 nights a week, chips being too much hassle with that great big chip pan!
Its all gone mad! I didnt know what pizza was until i was 10, never had a macdonalds or KFC till that age either. Untill then it was meat. veg and rice pudding.

Its like those additives, the beef flavouring, that cause cancer. How many of those do you think are crammed into the rubbish the schools are feeding?

When did people turn round and decide that this was acceptable? It amazes me that people cannot be bothered to chop a few veggies and flick the switch on the steamer!

to many conveinence meals and takeways around not to mention all the advertising.kids dont realy stand much chance with all the junk food.Take schools for instance my daughter has a choice of bacon rolls for breakfast snack break where she can buy greasy burgers then dinner lots of unhealthy on menue then all the vending machines selling chocolate and fizzy drinks.

I wonder if its the older secondary schools that pander more to demand than primary?

I have a 5 year old niece who will not eat school dinners. She much prefers her bag of carrot and cucumber, ham sandwich on brown bread, fresh orange juice and her banana.

When i was last visiting i asked her why she didnt like school dinner and she said it smelled funny lol.
I don't blame her though.
Even the veg is all dried up and awful. How are they supposed to sit down and enjoy their meal?

My kids take their own lunches in after starting to watch that series! Ham sandwiches, a yoghurt, cheese, Apple and Banana and usually a mini roll as a treat. With weak ribena to drink.

We eat MacD's probably once every 2 months (anyone watch Super Size Me? ) and NO KFC EVER!

I saw the end of the programme. Is it true what he said, that this is the first generation of children that will possibly die before their parents ?. What an awful thought.
val

I wouldnt be surprised in the slightest if these children didnt see 30. I only hope when i have children i dont fall into the trap of feeding chips one day a week, then oh another day wont hurt, just coz the kids want them.

Being overweight isn't the only health problem caused by eating an unhealthy diet. Lots of slim children eat a very unbalanced diet. I really admire what Jamie Oliver is trying to do and would love to see a return to more traditional school meals (with plates and cutlery!). I agree that it's not just the children that need to be educated.

Love him or hate him, Jamie Oliver is more likely to catch the imagination of children than an MP in a suit !. I really hope that this is the start of a real success story for the youngsters in this country.
Where did it start to downhill though ?. I'm 41 (just hanging on to it !) but I'm amazed that children of my friends are allowed to eat so badly, I know my friends didn't. I wasn't asked as a very young child what I wanted to eat, I just ate what was put on my plate (except roast pork, I found a chewy pipe one day and it put me off for ever !). It does strike me as odd when I hear parents asking 4 year olds what they want for dinner rather than just giving them their dinner. 
I did hear Jamie Oliver say the other day when interviewed that children can be given choices just as long as they are healthy ones !. Sounds too simple !.
Val

Feeding kids (and dogs) :P is an art but also a minefield.

I started early making all of my daughters meals from scratch and it's paid off. She's the only one of her friends who doesn't like M'cdonalds or any of the other popular fast food outlets, she says they taste of plastic :P. Her friends have their Birthday parties in these places for god sake :rolleyes: I have to feed her before she goes.

I dread her friends coming round to play as they won't eat the "alien food" on their plates, anything that is green or is of the veg variety goes in the dogs afterwards. Her favourite dish at the moment is fresh Tuna with lime & chilli salsa.

She loves chocolate, chips, cola but hates crisps, everything in moderation is my motto, and I don't really need to police her eating habits as she herself has the right balance. No food is banned in my house.

But I do agree, good nutrition should start in the home and should be followed by schools. Look at discipline, but that could start another thread on it's own. ;)

lol i agree, bring back veggies and the rod lololol

Hi

I started my sons foody habits off, from when He was being weaned. Everything he ate, was fresh vegtables, with meats containing lots of iron and fresh fruits. He is 5 now, and he has a good diet. He isnt a faddy eater, he loves his vegtables and fruit. He does have an occasional happy meal etc. I dont limit his sweets etc. Cause he does not gorge. In fact ive just thrown a load away which where left over from christmas. Which he'll never eat. He likes his 20p mixes. But always leaves half. He will eat most thinks you put in front of him.

I think it does pay off starting them early, and introducing them to a wide variety of foods.

There was a little boy, who lived next door. Who often came for his tea. I used to dread it. Cause he wouldnt eat anything. Often enough when i was cooking, i would have to scour my cupboards to find something that he liked. He would only ever eat chips, toast, cereal crisps and sweets. The worse think was his parents where not in the least bit concerned about his eating habits. I remmeber i cooked a roast once, the works and all he ate where the roasties. no veg. Now my son will eat his veg, then potatoes, and leave any meat. (takes to long to chew.)

J only put him on school dinners, cause i wanted to make sure he was getting something, as he had just started school. After easter though it will good old fashioned cheese butties fruit etc.

I think bad eating habits stem from when they are babies. IO know loads of  mums who feed there babies everything heinz, even there drinks. whats wrong with water. If you look at the ingredients on these things. You wouldnt feed them to your dogs. There again its easy, open the jar heat it up. bingo baby fed, And so the cycle begins

Alix

My kids school is really trying with the healthy eating bit. I do however think they are taking it a wee bit too far. My eldest is at the developing stage and things are starting to grow in all the right places, but she came home worried that she was going to get fat as she didn't eat healthily enough, told me she was going to eat only fruit and veg and nothing else. I of course became instantly on alert and though oh god don't let this be the start of Anorexia and tried my best to persaude her that she needed more than just fruit and veg to keep healthy. I do admit that she could do with taking more exercise as she isn't the skinniest child on the block but she is by no means obese. I try to make sure they have at least their 5 portions of fruit and veg and we eat lots of salads, pasta and rice, we all try to sit down together for our evening meal as I feel this not only encourages good eating habits but also good behaviour. My kids both take packed lunches which include a ham or chicken sandwich, a couple of peices of fruit a bottle of flavoured water that I make myself form the concentrated stuff a yoghurt and they have a pack of crisps for their playtime. What really worried me was the fact they they had to keep a food diary and she was terrified to write down that she had crisps as she thought she was going to get into bother. We eventually came to an agreement that I would get out the exercise video thats been lurking in the bottom of my cupboard for ages :D carry on eating how she is and see how things go.

I remember when i was at school, we had proper dinners, different every day, and no choices as far as i remember! We either liked it or went without - luckily i really enjoyed most of the secondary school dinners (pork and pineapple curry comes to mind, was i the only teenager who enjoyed that? !) and at home, my sister and i ate with mum and dad. We ate the same as them, we didn't have special children's meals. I couldn't believe Jamie's programme, when i saw all the children eating off little plastic things with sections!!! What was that all about?  

One thing i dreaded at primary school was salad days <g> - the beetroot juice went into everything and i literallly felt very sick. Also we were made to drink full fat milk - fair enough, that's good - but the teachers left it in the sun and it was foul by break time. I hated it, and felt sick every day but i wasn't let off! Sadly it contributed to me not eating much dairy stuff as i grew older which hasn't helped my bone health. I think it's important that as far as possible the children learn to enjoy and appreciate what is cooked for them, or given them, because putting them off something could backfire...however, their diets couldn't really be much worse than what they are having at the moment, could they...

Lindsay
X

I am a lunchtime supervisor in a secondary school and our school has won awards for the lunches. However, the chips and burgers are preferred by the girls. The canteen sells more chips and cheese and pizza than it does the specials that they put on every day.

Mel - do they do chips every day?

Yup afraid so ..thats what the girls demand unfortunately. Yesterday, the main lunch was turkey, potatoes and roasted veg. They made 16 ..yes 16 potions of that in a school of 700 girls! They sold all 16 portions this time so they may do more next time. Today it was pork ratatouille (sp?) and noodles ...Friday is the most popular day as they do scampi or fish ..and chips!

I can remember school dinners, I have particularly fond memories of Semolina and Prunes :D I did try to make it myself years ago as I loved it so much at school but I'm afraid it just didn't taste the same :D

Does anyone remember the custard - always lumpy and usually cold by the time we got it to the table? <g>

Lindsay
X

Ours was always in various colours - pink and chocolate - and sometimes green - eeeeuch

I still love cold custard. :) :)

Me too JG ...AND I love the skin on it :D :D :D

I worked as a dinner supervisor at my local first school about 12 years ago when I was down South.  The meals were cooked fresh every day and it was real food.  We ate it and so did the teachers.  There was very little waste and only a handful took in a packed lunch.  There was no choice of menu what was cooked was what you got except for those with a special dietry need.  At Christmas we did the whole thing and not one child refused to have a meal that day! 

Sue

I went through MY first Christmas lunch at school last year ..BOY was I cream crackered afterwards :p :p. We had to do it in 2 sittings and there were 3 courses :) The Teachers helped to serve as well as clear up and the dining hall had Christmas music blaring out for the full 2 hours :D :D

Hiya agin
my sons school does profess to be healthy, but half of it is still processed chicken bits, ober cooked veg.

He came home last week, with a piece of fruit. Which i took of him and promptly put in the bin. cause, it looked like it was the supermarkets cast off.

Alix

The problem is with this Jamie Oliver thing, They are using all these fancy recipies. If they were to roast a few dozen chickens and do a variety of veg it might be accepted a little better. How they manage to get all those pizza bases made, topped, cooked etc etc is beyond me!

I too believe eating habbits begin from weaning. I personally could not feed a baby those horrible meals from a jar three times a day. The colourings in there dont bare thinking about (although the apple and blueberry desert is a wonderful shade and im planning to get it colour matched for the lounge).
What is wrong with cooking a joint of beef, pork and a chicken and making up your own "ready meals" that can be frozen? My friend did that for all three of her children and she knew exactly what was going in it. It took her lass than 4 hours to do and her babies were fed for 3 weeks at a time. Its still good home cooked food and fits in with a busy lifestyle.

it is also very cheap, cooking, mashing liquidising etc. babies meals and freezing them etc.

I remeber us going camping, when morgan was 5 months old. The heinz foods made me shudder. But i compromised with the organic range. cant remember whats its called. But it cost us a fortune to feed him for those 2 weeks we where away.

Alix

well you can get three for £1 in farmfoods at the moment, so if you're really skint i suppose its better than nothing.

The thing is, why spend £30 a month on crap when you can spend £15 a month on really healthy food and the rest on fresh fruit for deserts and snacks.

After having three root fillings, one falling out and leading to having a crown, i do not see any need for drinks either. Water is healthy enough, ok so its boring, but they got the fruit there you can juice for a little variety twice a day!

I cannot understand why people are so lazy and careless when it cdomes to feeding their kids!

Can I recommend that you wait until you have children before suggesting that people are 'so lazy and careless when it cdomes to feeding their kids!'

I was quite happy to give mine ready made food when they were babies, when I didn't have time to make them something 'better'. My eldest is about to graduate from Cambridge, hasn't got any fillings in his teeth and is 6' 3" and weighs 9 1/2 stone - so I don't think that it has done him any harm - despite my carelessness :D :D

Daisy

Ditto Daisy. My kids had ready made food occasionally - especially puddings - and they loved them!

The rotten teeth was due to soft drinks, diluted juices etc etc.

I really see no difference in the processed foods served up for school meals and the processed foods people feed babies. Too many colourings, too many additives, not good for them. ;)

Maby you had no option, and for that im sorry. I appreciate not everyone has four hours a month spare to prepare food for their families. :(
It probably does no harm, its probably good enough for them along side formula milk (which i was raised on as i have an intolerance to lactose and was fed Soya formula). Im no dietition but i know that freshly prepared foods are better for children, hence the school dinners uproar. This post was about the evils of processed foods which baby foods come under being processed.
sorry if i caused offence, didnt mean to :D

> I appreciate not everyone has four hours a month spare to prepare food for their families.

Good heavens, I would think most people prepare food for over an hour every day, not just four hours a month!

JG i ment the home made baby food as opposed to the tinned puree you get from boots lol

Ah I see! :D Still needs doing every day though - or it did when my boy was a baby, because I cooked fresh every day for us and his portion was pureed.
:)