Jamie's School dinners

MrsTinks

Jamies school dinners, super nanny, teen tamer... all of them in every program at some point or other address the diets. Especially Supernanny... the amount of children who refuse to eat proper food and only eat junk at that early an age is frightening. To be honest I often can't help thinking "well hunni you're stuffing your kid full of chemicals and junk and you can't work out why they are unfit but hyper active? YOU'RE FEEDING THEM NOTHING BUT REFINED SUGAR!"

I actually watch it from a different interest perspective. I find the methods of convincing kids and teenagers to change/behave/eat properly VERY interesting and I think Jamie has hit the nail on the head with getting them involved with making some of the food...

honey

sickofhavingnomoney wrote:

Does anyone know if its repeated at all through the week. I missed it but would really like to watch it.

I've had a look and I don't think it is

FrugalJo

Sorry I'm digressing, but I wonder if the same parents would be happy if the dinner ladies wheeled the school dinners through the canteen and served from shopping trollies, imagine the uproar ...

rainbowrisin

Queenie wrote:

I can't completely agree with that statement. I do agree that parents are responsible for making sure their children eat properly and to lead by example, but to say that advertising etc., isn't to blame is a complete nonsense.

If advertising wasn't successful, why do companies plough so much money into it? Where did the phrase: "The power of advertising" come from? Supermarkets *do* have a tendancy to offer BOGOF's and deals on the cheap, processed, c.rap foods and very little in healthy range! Peer pressure is an interesting one because in my experience, although children are deemed the one's to be the victims of it, in actual fact, more often than not, it's the parents themselves who, perhaps through guilt (?) are more susceptable to peer pressure on their children's behalves.

Many children of the war years who went on to be parents didn't want their children to feel the deprivations they did through rationing and the like and wanted them to have more (more being misunderstood as somehow better). Around the same time, TV became more popular within the home and advertising was now being thrust in your face on a scale never known before. Add to the mix todays culture where both parents should be out working and are made to feel guilty if you don't (even if you are *not* relying on state benefits!) then it follows that time becomes yet another challenge.

I'm not saying it's not do-able, we have a whole community of OS'ers here who do it day in day out whether SAHM's, single, working, the whole mix. What I am saying is, to make a sweeping statement like without considering all angles does sound a little naive.

I have fond memories of my school dinners albeit stick to your ribs foods, even bought their recipe book from the school fete. My eldest children we subjected to the first changed in school dinners (they went to my former primary school so I know) and by the time my youngest 2 went for school dinners at Primary, well, I was so appalled, I sent them with packed lunches. Peer pressure? Yes, there was a point where some of the more spiteful children asked couldn't we afford crisps, caprisun's or choccy bars, is they why they had to have homemade things :rolleyes: but, because I talk to my children, they withstood it proudly and actually told the girls "My mum loves us and gives us healthy food cos she wants us to live forever" :rotfl:
:think: It did brook the comment when Jamie's first programme was aired: "Wow, your mum must love you a LOT!" :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:
Like I say, it's the parents who are prone to the peer pressure more often than not.

Some interesting points Queenie. I don't think advertising is to blame, despite your claim that my view is complete nonsense. The logic of paying over the odds for a pile of rubbish because someone from an advertising agency tells me I should defeats me, and I think defeats a lot of other people as well. Yes, supermarkets do offer BOGOF on processed foods, but they're still way over priced for what they are, even at BOGOF prices. I honestly don't think that people are so stupid as to fall for it - clearly my naivity coming through eh? I think most people are intelligent and able to make informed choices about things in life, including what they eat and what they feed their children.
If people choose not to make sensible choices then that is their perogative, but to then blame advertising for "making them do it" I think patronises their intelligence.
w.r.t peer pressure, perhaps you have different experiences to me - certainly my experience of peer parent pressure is that there is huge pressure to feed the littlies healthy stuff, as well as make sure they do lots of activities, read lots of stories etc. I haven't once encountered a parent belittling me or the littlies because we don't eat rubbish. The usual view I encounter is that rubbish is cheap to feed children, and that providing fresh fruit and veg and home cooking is the more expensive and therefore preferable option.
Yes, maybe I am naive in thinking people should take responsiblity for their actions instead of blaming everyone other than themselves. If that's the case then so be it.

kiwichick

tine wrote:

. To be honest I often can't help thinking "well hunni you're stuffing your kid full of chemicals and junk and you can't work out why they are unfit but hyper active? YOU'RE FEEDING THEM NOTHING BUT REFINED SUGAR!

I have a friend like this, she was taken quietly to one side last week by the head teacher at her daughters nursery and told that they thought her DD might have a hyperactivity problem. Turns out that the poor kids had been given 2 jam doughnuts for breakfast that day!!!

kiwichick

rainbowrisin wrote:

Yes, supermarkets do offer BOGOF on processed foods, but they're still way over priced for what they are, even at BOGOF prices. I honestly don't think that people are so stupid as to fall for it

In my friends case it not that shes "falling for it" it that she was never taught how to cook. She feels comfortable giving her kids processed stuff as she knows what to do with it and more importantly to her its cheap. They struggle to get by on a very low wage and buy what they can when they see it on offers like BOGOF.

rainbowrisin

kiwichick wrote:

In my friends case it not that shes "falling for it" it that she was never taught how to cook. She feels comfortable giving her kids processed stuff as she knows what to do with it and more importantly to her its cheap. They struggle to get by on a very low wage and buy what they can when they see it on offers like BOGOF.

That makes me feel sad TBH. Has she had a look at local classes in your area? There seem to be loads where I am for healthy eating cookery, basic cookery and so on. Quite often the HV knows of a healthy eating class. Many councils now have health promotion units which include healthy eating - sometimes with a community nutritionist. I know community nutritionists have real difficulty reaching people and would really love to help.
Hope some of that helps.

thriftlady_2

seraphina wrote:

Yes, that woman complaining that there was pasta and rice every day got my goat too :mad: . I bet if there had been potatoes and bread every day she wouldn't have batted an eyelid - and I bet she's been giving her kids sandwiches every day.

I'm not sure about this...surely bread and potatoes are part of a healthy diet ? I try to vary the carbohydrate element of meals through the week to include wholemeal bread, potatoes, rice, pasta and maybe couscous, bulghar or barley and oats. I'd be a bit fed up with pasta or rice every day.

MimiF

I actually felt quite teary when I watched this last night and saw what some of those kids were having for their lunches. This is a subject I am passionate about, feeding the next generation and teaching them about food and nutrition and to love and appreciate good food. I do think feeding children a constant diet of rubbish and ignoring all the advice which is widely given is akin to cruelty, I'm afraid.

DD forgot her packed lunch yesterday, she's only 4 and just started Reception.She had to have a school dinner and was given a school packed lunch, it was a white bread with ham, a cookie and some water!!! Was fuming when she told me, that is in no way a balanced meal. :mad:

The kids only have sweets once a week, they call it Saturday sweets. This isn't set in stone, they may have the odd treat outside of that but on the whole it's just once a week.

Am seriously considering joining the PTA this year in order to try and bring some of these issues to the fore as there seems to be a general apathy amongst the parents on this subject (and many others), don't know where I'm going to find the time but needs must I think.

Jamie's on the very top of mine and DH's fantasy dinner party list, loved his comment to Tony Blair about "our boys in Iraq".

MimiF

TNG

rainbowrisin wrote:

I think most people are intelligent and able to make informed choices about things in life, including what they eat and what they feed their children.
If people choose not to make sensible choices then that is their perogative, but to then blame advertising for "making them do it" I think patronises their intelligence.

I think there is a contradiction there, rainbowrisin. Either people are intelligent and make informed decisions OR they choose not to make sensible choices, surely?

If people are intelligent and make informed decisions, how are the fast food corporations still in business? Surely No intelligent person, in posession of all the facts, would choose to feed their kids cr4p.

Believe me, people ARE that stupid. They DO fall for it