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Wen
Leviathen
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Location: Deanburn
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| Posted: Sun Sep 09, 2007 11:00 pm Post subject: Council and healthy eating |
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I find there are very few places, even as a choosing adult, where natural (possibly organic) foods and drinks are easily available. Children get little chance to taste them, let alone choose them as a healthy option.
Vending machines in council properties tend to sell the usual chocolate, crisps and fizzy drinks. Would it be better for them to take the lead on healthy eating and be offering packs of apricots, small boxes of raisins, organic wholemeal biscuits, packets of sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, little sesame seed biscuits, small cartons of fruit juice, plain water, even flavoured waters but low sugar?
The children have the choice of buying crisps and cola at a lot of shops en route. They are currently unlikely to have other choices to buy really nourishing snacks. So freedom of choice is maintained, and the children get to see and experience that there is a whole other concept of what healthy eating means and feels like.
It is said that the situation for children in Scotland is pretty drastic. Here's an idea for Midlothian to be a flagship council in the work that needs doing on that, which is the re-education of a whole population.
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Spry
Great Selkie o' Sule Skerry
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| Posted: Mon Sep 10, 2007 12:11 pm Post subject: |
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Given the choice between chocolate, crisps and fizzy drinks on the one hand, and packs of dried fruit, seeds, wholemeal biscuits and healthy drinks on the other, I think most kids would plump for the former UNLESS they had been brought up from an early age to appreciate the healthy options.
My own grandchildren come into this last category and, do you know, they're not all that keen on sweets!
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SueDOnym
Kelpie
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| Posted: Mon Sep 10, 2007 2:22 pm Post subject: |
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Sadly, spry, that is very true. Think of the case in England where the council introduced a new healthy menu for school dinners, only to mothers up in arms in outrage, who then resorted to going to the local chippy and passing chips through the gates to their little darlings at lunchtime.
To be fair, in Midlothian, there have been big strides in introducing healthier menus in schools, with incentives for those pupils who choose the healthier options. I know, because my own daughter won an iPod at her school!
You can only do so much though, and unfortunately, no matter how healthy the food on offer is, there will always be some for whom the lure of the local chippy or bakers is too much! |
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Wen
Leviathen
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 9:46 am Post subject: |
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I'm sure you've both got a point.
I was simply recognising that most children never have the chance to know what it feels like when you're eating mainly wholefoods and fruit rather than sweets. It would be good to find a way to get them that choice. Your granchildren, Spry, and my children, knew that difference. Sure, they opted for some sweets - among other things, they've got to fit in with their mates, but at home they usually chose healthier stuff.
Plenty of adults have never had that choice too. To get that stuff I generally have to go into Edinburgh or Peebles.
I was looking for a way to offer choices, and, to use some PC words, end impoverishment of diet, which inevitably impacts opportunity - in terms of attention span, behaviours, drowsiness.
I still think it's a wacky but basically good idea. How many of our councillors would acknowledge that there might have been better ways to have fed their children, that might lead to their grandchildren being fed better? It's a very personal and hard-hitting issue at that level. Getting the changes means having that discussion at a small level, then the bigger ones.
PS I still like the odd chocolate bar and sweetie myself. I have a choice, though.
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SueDOnym
Kelpie
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 10:41 am Post subject: |
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It's a good idea, Wen, and you are right. Sadly, research has shown that children in many areas are unable to recognise even basic fruits and vegetables. Some had no idea that chips were made from potatoes, and probably the only vegetables they ever ate were baked beans!
Efforts are being made locally to try to change that, though. I know in Midlothian we have initiatives in which primary school children get free fruit every week, and tasting sessions are regularly held when children can sample different fruits, for instance.
My mother-in-law used to work as a butcher in our local co-op, and regularly saw parents buying large quantities of tinned soup, for example. She told quite a few of them that it would be much cheaper to make their own soup, and couldn't believe that so many had no idea how to do so!
I grew up watching my mother cooking meals from scratch and learned as I went along, and my children have done the same. However, I suppose that if you're brought up on takeaways and ready meals, you won't know how to do it for yourself.
How we go about changing that, I have no idea! |
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soup
Kelpie
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 10:43 am Post subject: |
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Feeling Smug bit.
Eldest's parents night; teachers were surprised that our youngest was eating an orange all the other (younger) siblings had been bribed /silenced with sweeties our's was the only one who was eating fruit.
Since they were babies we haven't treated sweets as treets so they don't think of them as rewards. Yes they like sugar as much as the next bairn (they are hardly bairns; 14 and 13) but they don't seem to associate sweets with rewards.
Just as an aside having read Sue's post youngest eats raw carrots that his mum is preparing for stew/mince etc he also eats raw potato (sick puppy) and doesn't feel at all "hard done by" indeed he seems to look on the vegetables as a treat.
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SueDOnym
Kelpie
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 10:51 am Post subject: |
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Funnily enough, my son also loves raw carrots (but isn't too keen on the cooked variety). He's helped me chop up veg for soup since he was very little, and always used to scoff half of it before it found its way into the soup pan! |
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Spry
Great Selkie o' Sule Skerry
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 1:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Wen wrote: |
| How many of our councillors would acknowledge that there might have been better ways to have fed their children, that might lead to their grandchildren being fed better? |
Good point. We're back to what was discussed on another thread. How do you break the continuity of parents bringing their kids up badly and their kids bringing their kids up badly and ------------ |
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SueDOnym
Kelpie
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 2:09 pm Post subject: |
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That's the most important thing, though, isn't it? If you've been brought up in a household which rarely if ever saw fresh, home cooked food, or fruit and vegetables, then chances are you're going to go on to feed your children the same. Schools can only do so much to try to break that cycle, and I honestly don't know what the answer might be.
Although, interestingly, I recently read an article with a young actress (can't remember her name) who said she was brought up in exactly that kind of environment, but as she entered her teens, she realised she wanted to be fit and healthy, so from around 13 or 14, started buying and cooking all her own meals! Can't see that many Scottish teens following her example though...... |
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Spry
Great Selkie o' Sule Skerry
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 2:21 pm Post subject: |
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See all this talk about nosh? For my lunch today, I had a salad with stuff from the garden -- tomatoes, lettuce, cucumber, chicory, red pepper plus some nuts and seeds and mixed with a touch of a light French dressing. I thought I was doing well until I came on here and read about horror food.
Now I'm going over to Greggs for a couple of Scotch pies! |
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Wen
Leviathen
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 2:46 pm Post subject: |
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I think the issue is very emotive for many people, too. There are still plenty of us, myself included, who associate cooking for your family with loving them.
Once you challenge the premise of how many puddings? or how many cakes? or what sort of cakes? you are touching a soft spot. We all will be defensive that we did the best by ours, but no-one defines what that is for us.
As a couple my husband and I went for food with minimal tampering (ie fresh and wholefoods, where possible), as little food with white, refined sugar and white, refined flour, as possible and I'd long ago stopped cooking with salt. Outsiders still find it odd that I never peel potatoes (too lazy!).
As babies, my ex-husband would puree down fresh fruit and vegetables for them.
I hope Spry enjoyed his pies - I quite like their pastys, as an occasional bite.
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SueDOnym
Kelpie
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 2:56 pm Post subject: |
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It is a very emotive issue, and I think, for a certain generation, we were brought up being told to "clean our plates" at every meal time. I know I had to eat what was put in front of me or suffer the consequences. On more than one occasion, I simply couldn't eat it - liver springs to mind! - and suffered having the plate put down for me again at the next meal. I vowed then and there never to inflict that torture on my own children!
However, maybe we've gone too far the other way these days. I know many families where several meals are cooked (I use that term loosely!) each time, because one child won't eat fish fingers, while another won't have any vegetables, and mum and dad eat something else entirely. No wonder those households end up resorting to fast food in many cases! |
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Wen
Leviathen
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 6:25 pm Post subject: |
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Sue, I suspect you're right. I can remember at school that not eating all your dinner meant standing at the end of the hall and a lecture about starving children in India. Theoretically, three times and you could be caned. I never knew of anyone who was. But that's how seriously it was viewed as a behaviour.
| Wen wrote: |
| As babies, my ex-husband would puree down fresh fruit and vegetables for them. |
Thought I'd clarify this. In those olden days, Soup, we had far fewer gadgets. He had invested in a Mouilinex thing that included a liquidizer and it was the equivalent of his gadget to play with. Lots of experimentation in our kitchen as to what would/wouldn't liquidize well. And we tested the products too before feeding them to a little one.
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SueDOnym
Kelpie
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 6:31 pm Post subject: |
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As an aside to this, my friend is a foster carer who has looked after dozens of children over the years. She had one lad, around 13, and was amazed when she discovered he didn't know how to use a knife and fork. It turned out he'd never eaten a proper meal, having survived on rolls, sandwiches or chippies! And this is the 21st century!!! |
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soup
Kelpie
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| Posted: Tue Sep 11, 2007 7:39 pm Post subject: |
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I am not that young Wen. "In the olden days" indeed.
(where is the HARUUMMPPPHHH !!!! smiley)
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