Childrens diet...

securityguy

Any wrote: »

Not too worried about the sugar. I wouldn't eat unsweetened porridge if I had to die. And sweetening it with honey - good move.

Why? It's sugar (fructose and glucose), that's all. Yeah, it plays on the "oh, it's so natural, not like refined sugar" thing, but that's just romanticism: if you ate a quarter of a pound a honey, you'd get about 1% of the RDA for a few vitamins that you aren't short of anyway. The rest is just fructose and glucose, just like white sugar.

Any

pigpen wrote: »

refined sugar is actually addictive! They add it to foods to make you crave more of that food so you buy more and their profits are boosted.. That was figured out a LONG time ago! It is apparently more addictive than cocaine!!

Fruit and vegetables also have these bizarre things called vitamins and minerals which the processed sugars don't.

So yes.. sugars from fruit/milk etc are better than refined sugar.

PRECISELY!!!!
Saying you have sugar AND fruit sugar is bad is in my opinion quite frankly ridiculous. And yes, refined sugar is not ideal (no idea where you got that I did from), but I for one am not going to play the holier then thou and pretend I don't have some refined sugar in our diets too, as well as honey and fruit.

SuzieSue

You should dilute fresh fruit juice (at least 50:50 but preferable 25:75 or more) as it contains a lot of sugar. If you do it gradually they won't notice and will soon prefer it to undiluted juice.

securityguy

pigpen wrote: »

Fruit and vegetables also have these bizarre things called vitamins and minerals which the processed sugars don't.

Very few people are at risk of scurvy, and in any event there's plenty of Vitamin C in broccoli, and very few minerals in fruit. Replacing fruit with green vegetables will improve almost any diet: more minerals, more vitamins, much less sugar.

If you're waving around conspiracy theories about refined sugar, you might note that the push to have fruit juice counted as part of five a day came from the fruit juice industry. The difference between fresh fruit juice and ribena from concentrate is pretty minimal: the main ingredient of both is sugar (which we could all use less of) and the only beneficial ingredient is vitamin C (which perhaps a few of us need more of, but should be getting from other sources).

And "they" who add it to foods are presumably adding it to processed foods: they aren't breaking into my house and squirting sugar into my saucepans. If you're eating a large amount of processed food, it's the salt that is really addictive: children, in particular, get used to the vivid flavours of high-salt food and then don't like eating home-cooked equivalents. I find shop bread, for example, almost inedible because of the huge amount of salt it contains.

paulineb_2

As has been said before, sugar and salt gets added to a lot of processed foods, things like baked beans and tomato soup/sauce will be full of sugar and salt unless you eat low salt and sugar beans

When I think back to what my diet was like as a kid, it was absolutely rubbish. I don't think I ate a single vegetable till I was about 16 and not for my mums lack of trying, actually I did eat beetroot at school dinners but took me a long time to eat it as an adult. And when I did get a school dinner, everything in those days was cake and custard. School meals seem to be a lot healthier now.

I only ate white bread as well, my mum kept trying to get me to eat wholemeal, I wouldn't do it.

Which is odd now, because I rarely eat white and apart from celery which I don't like I eat veggies just about every day in life.

Looking at that diet, Id lose the jam from the toast and as someone else said, even go for half and half.

Beans on toast, go for the low salt/low sugar beans

Evening meal, Id add more veg to the evening meal, depending on what your kids like

Pudding, make it a fruit salad with plain yoghurt.

And a good way to get fruit and veg down fussy eaters is to make smoothies. I bought a hand held blender in Tesco for 6 quid and I make soup with it, I also make smoothies, you can sneak in fruit and veg in the same smoothie.

mummyroysof3

I have children who are fussy eaters and the only veg they like are carrots, peas sweetcorn and broccoli. The eldest 2 will also eat lettuce and cucumber. I would love to increase their veg intake but I don't know how

pigpen

actually malnutrition is a massive problem for most people in developed countries.. such as this is supposed to be..

And while I am a great conspiracy theorist it is a proven fact that refined sugar is addictive chemical combination.. it doesn't occur naturally and is therefore not as good for us as sugars that do.. it isn't difficult to comprehend really. It is added to yoghurts and baked beans and bread and things people take for granted and which you wouldn't really think would contain it therefore yes, the companies who manufacture food are sneaking it in your foods.

Salt is a naturally occurring toxic substance and if you eat too much you get ill and die a very nasty painful death.. it is actually impossible to OD on salt, your body just makes you vomit to get rid of it.. not quite the same as sugar..

I don't eat bread in any form.. it is just horrible.. and I don't like homemade bread any better than shop bought stuff.. it is all vile. If I am absolutely ravenous I can just about stomach a couple of slices of toast with a few helpings of gaviscon to wash it down. I find shop bread salty and sweet at the same time.. and the baking powder in cakes makes those inedible too..

I think I do live on dust!! lol

Prothet_of_Doom

This is MONEY saving expert, so we need to know the cost.

Dunroamin

Apart from diluting the juice, there doesn't seem to be much water in here. It also seems very sweet to me, there doesn't appear to be much in the way of savoury food there either.

mummyroysof3

herand wrote: »

Eh it's not rocket science,

Introduce a range of vegetables into their diet, make sure a good amount is present each meal and prompt them to eat the majority/all of it.

Blend vegetables in soups, always mix vegetables so it's not just a case of peas on the plate but a mixture of say peas, peppers, sweetcorn, carrots etc.

Well I can put it on the plate but I can't force them to eat it.