My kids wanted the chicken nuggets

Posted on 23 November, 2016

Last week, my family and I had dinner at a very small RSL bowls club in a little town near Canberra.

Stuck to the wall near our table was a tattered, very roughly put together, A3 size kids menu. For $7.50 you could feed your kids one of four items. All of those items were deep fried. Not one vegetable. One of those items was nuggets and chips. I can’t remember the rest. Mostly because my kids (six and eight years old), who can both read now, within seconds of being seated and seeing the kids menu, decided on the nuggets and bellowed their request for all to hear.

You know, just in case the whole restaurant wanted to know too.

I was cool with the kids choosing that. There wasn’t much else to choose from, for one and two, they don’t eat this kind of food often. A normal meal for them is vegetable rich and minimally processed. One club meal of fried foods on a random occasion  doesn’t bother me in the slightest.

Healthy eating is all about long-term dietary patterns and the accumulation of these eating habits over time. Individual foods and nutrients consumed at one moment in time doesn’t mean much without the context of a person’s long-term eating pattern.

The interesting thing is, recent research suggests that children are eating food away from home (from takeaways and restaurants) more than ever before. Research also shows that eating food like this is associated with weight gain. So even though a plate of chicken nuggets and chips on a kids menu doesn’t make me irate, there’s definitely a need for more options. I wonder what my kids would choose if they were given a wider range of choices, especially healthier ones?

What do you think? As a parent do you care about the availability of healthy food options on a kids menu? Should healthy options be available or is eating out a treat and you don’t care? I’d love to know!

To answer this question, I’m conducting formal research in collaboration with the Canberra Southern Cross Club and with help from the University of Canberra. I’d love as many Canberra-based parents to fill out a quick, 10-minute, online survey and share their opinions. It doesn’t matter whether you care about healthy eating or not, I want your thoughts!

For more information about the project click here.

To take the survey now click here.