On not eating vegetables

[Pepper Pig Profile]

I’m quite sure not all American parents eschew vegetables but this is a bit alarming.

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2019/s ... thy-eating

[Stokey Sue Profile]

I think it happens here too, to some extent - there are undoubtedly teens out there whose main calorific intake is in the form of meals from fried chicken shops, pizza takeaways, Greggs and the Iceland or supermarket equivalent dishes (having said which, I am sometimes impressed in the Iceland queue by who is buying varied healthy foods and involving their children in choosing them)

I worked with a somewhat irritating young woman years ago who "didn't eat vegetables" (apart from some forms of spud) - everything went down with rice, but at least she did eat recognisable meat and fish dishes, so probably consumed more onions and tomatoes than she appreciated (she didn't cook, she was too stupid to do anything useful) and I don't think she removed the salad layer from her burger. or eschewed desserts containing fruit so her diet was probably still much healthier than the author's

[Joanbunting Profile]

There was a young woman who came with us on a school trip having announced she was a vegetarian. We made huge efforts to see that she was properly , On the second day of apparently hardly eating anything she announced she hated vegetables. Then the girl who was sharing a room with her came privately to us to say she had a suitcase packed with chocolate and crisps - by her mother - so she didn't have to eat that horrible foreign muck

Over the week we managed to get her to eat quite a few salads, fruits and vegetables and I even showed her how ti make a couple of simple things. It seemed that the household diet was , shall we say, restricted? No -one was interested in cooking,

This came back to mind with that horrific story of the las in Bristol who has gone blind because of his diet.

[jeral Profile]

The government has spent many millions here on 5-a-day and Eatwell plates etc and has had very little effect on the slow descent into an almost universal diet with little nutritional content.

Processed foods where more profit can be made by fillers than the good stuff implies that manufacturers will be slow to mend their ways. Supermarkets are part of that problem - you only need to look at the number of aisles devoted to sugary cereals, biscuits and confectionery, crisps and cakes to see where the highest markups are.

The worst of it is that it's likely to be too late to undo harm done once it takes its toll in later life. Invincibility-thinking when younger is hard to counter.

[dennispc Profile]

A few years ago now, forty?, one of our daughters had a primary school friend for tea who'd never had a salad nor green veg. Nothing new, eh?

And then there's this

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... -of-stroke

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-49579820

[Pommes Profile]

Growing up in the 50's & early 60's our Mum cooked a meal every evening, consisting of meat, potatoes & vegetable, followed by pudding, which we ate sitting at the table. Sunday it was always a roast dinner at 1pm. My sister & I ate what we were given. I consider myself very fortunate & thus enjoyed learning to cook. However, many, many children were far less fortunate, in many, many ways, particularly in that Mum could not, would not cook, & with the advent of ready meals, meant that children no longer learnt to cater for themselves & their subsequent families. Thus, we are now into 3rd & maybe 4th, generation of "can't cook, won't cook", which indeed is very, very sad.

[WWordsworth Profile]

I just don't get the not eating vegetables thing.

I have been friends with one person for close on 30 years, and this year I discovered the only root vegetable she eats is potato. I had made a lasagne and it contained small carrot dices. She picked them out.

Another friend eats nothing "round and green." She defines that as peas, sprouts, green peppers and broccoli.

Yet another friend will eat only the onion in a salad, no green veg at all and appears to live on meat, potatoes and bread.

[dennispc Profile]

To be fair, one of our grandsons growing up in a fresh cooking household, wouldn't eat anything green. Even now, living with his girlfriend, not much green appears on his plate.

Following on from Pommes post, one of our local delis converted part of the shop into a coffee bar, doing light meals for breakfast and lunch. Also, make their own quiches, cakes and so on. Nothing fancy but the quality of food is high. The husband was an executive chef in Hong Kong at one time - he knows his stuff.

The prep area is behind the till and coffee machine, thus not in the cooking area at all. They are finding it impossible to get anyone to help with prepping. It’s a 10 to five job, five days a week. Chatting with him, I ventured the thought that some children growing up won’t see anyone preparing food, apart from taking meals out of a box. Being asked to, say, cut fresh herbs is beyond their experience.

[Joanbunting Profile]

It would appear that some people on the autistic spectrum, as well as other disorders, can only deal with certain colours and textures a change in the packaging can throw then into a panic.

Of course this does apply to all fussy eaters but the shocking thing is that these people are not identified and helped. It's not always the fault of the family, especially the mother who is usually the one to be blamed.

[karadekoolaid Profile]

That is a very interesting article, PP. I can relate to that.
Neither I nor my sister ate meat in School Dinners during the late 50s-early 60s. The teaching staff ( aka Enforcers) made us sit at the table until everything was finished. I once sat at the table until 4pm, because I refused to eat the gristly, grungy, revolting,overcooked meat. My sis was more intelligent; she dumped all the meat in her school purse.
I never ate fish (we didn´t have it at home unless it was Bird´s Eye) until I was 30. I could eat it breakfast, lunch and dinner right now.
My first attempt at blue cheese was at university - 1970 - a whole Stilton . I wolfed it down.
My first oysters were on a beach in Venezuela in 1983. Out of a bucket. Love ´em!
HOWEVER... we ate all the vegetables under the sun in my house. My dad grew all sorts of veg in the garden. There is no single vegetable that I won´t eat. Not even one.
Then I played cricket at Blackheath. My fellow opening bowler was nicknamed "Dobbin". His meals involved meat/chicken with chips. Chips were the only vegetable he´d eat.
My kids got brung up on a veggie diet (from my side) and a meat diet ( mother´s side). The eldest won´t eat anything green, but eats veg. Accompanied by huge slabs of dead animal. The youngest eats meat, meat, meat, chicken, meat and chips.

[jeral Profile]

When I was veggie (pesce now) I encouraged my young son along the same route when at home (out and about was what was on offer). I couldn't help noticing though that if next doors did a bbq, he'd manage to worm his way to the front of the queue - instinct and to him the inviting smell = no contest. He's been vegan for about four years now.

As a kid, my mum eventually acceded to my wishes to eat my veg raw, which to me avoided the unpleasant cooking smell, sogginess and awful taste. She was quite non-plussed by this but in the days of clean plates it was win-win.

I could encourage giving crudites rather than corn or kettle crisps for dips, but I'm betting the crisps would win.

[Pepper Pig Profile]

I think this is what Joan was referring to.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyl ... r-go-blind

[Gillthepainter Profile Website]

I worked with a computer chap whose expense receipts were only McDonalds.
He ate burgers and chips all the time. The occasional pizza.

He went on business to New York, and had to be flown home ill.

With scurvy!

[Joanbunting Profile]

That's the one PP, thanks. There was also a psychologist and a dietician talking on the World Service and both said they felt that the medical profession has to bear some of the blame for not finding a way round at least some of his difficulties.

I suppose it depends on when ASD chikdren get their diagnosis. It would be much easier if they were quite young because they would be easier to pattern their behavious.

[WWordsworth Profile]

I used to work in a high security special needs place.
One young man moved in; at 18 years old he ate only bananas and fruit yogurt. Lots of both.

Due to the patience and persistence of the staff, within 6 months he would happily eat fish and chips. When he left at 20 he had moved on to roast dinners.

His parents were grateful.

The parents had worked well with him over the years and were very hands-on. It was a residential placement several hours drive from their home but they visited regularly and kept in touch with their son and his carers.

[jeral Profile]

WWordsworth, any idea what techniques they employed to succeed in all the stages it must have taken to reach a roast dinner being eaten willingly?

[Suffs Profile]

When I worked with severely challenging youngsters with autism we worked with a fantastic team of clinical psychologists who devised individual plans for each young person.

It was explained to me that their thinking was that different parts of the young person’s brain had not developed as most brains do ... as infants we all go through a phase when we reject unfamiliar food ... this is a keeping safe ‘instinct’ ... a bit like some animals are naturally frightened of snakes although they’ve never seen one before.

Some young people with autism have an overwhelming fear of some foods ... they cannot explain it and to try to make them eat it is like trying to force someone to knowingly eat a poison.

Other people with autism have heightened sensitivity to various things, sound, colour, texture, motion etc. The folk in this group who have a hypersensitivity to colour/texture/taste etc are a lot easier to help than those in the first group whose aversion to some foods is because their brain is fixed in the phase that fears and rejects unknown foods. It’s a fascinating subject.

[Amyw Profile]

I work in supported living with adults with a wide range of learning disabilities . It’s surprising the amount of them that will eat one thing at a time on their plate , such as veg, then potatoes then meat , never combining the flavours .

I work with an amazing guy with autism , who used to eat all his meals with everything segregated . Beans would have to be in their own ramekin, nothing could be touching etc . Partly because of his trust in us , we’ve worked over the years by removing one barrier at a time . He used to eat very plainly but we’ve widened his repertoire of dishes slowly . He can’t abide sauce with any texture in and can detect the tiniest sliver of onion . However he’ll now eat lasagna because we coon his meat separately in plain passata then layer it up with the pasta etc . He’ll then have raw chopped veggies on the side . It just gives a bit More variety and he’s eating similarly to the others .

As Suffs said a lot of the guys have extreme hypersensitivity to different stimulus . I worked with this guy last night and did sausages and mash . It was one of the only times he’s ever eaten my mash , as he’ll only eat it completely smooth. Normally I struggle to get it up the consistency he likes but triumph yesterday .

I think everyone is on the autistic spectrum to some degree and I think people with extreme food phobias and aversions May have their autistic tendencies expressed in that way

[WWordsworth Profile]

All I can add to these two posts is that my care staff colleagues worked slowly and gently with the young man. They encouraged him to try different tastes and textures, they went at his pace and allowed him to reject items

I wish I could tell you more but I was not hands on with the young people, I had an admin role.

[jeral Profile]

Thanks for replying WWordsworth. It's nevertheless good to know that patience can bring about heartwarming results as others are also noting here.