blenderx in booju_mooju

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Mar 24, 2010 17:56

How do you all feel about babies (under 1 or 2) getting junk food? (juice boxes, french fries, iced cream, mac n cheese, etc.) Do you allow it? If so, how often? Would you be okay with this once a week?

edit: I am referring to the prepackaged, processed versions, NOT homemade.

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alacrity_danger

It really grosses me out when I see babies eating junk food. We avoid anything with high fructose corn syrup, preservatives, and weird chemicals. Most juices boxes are not actually juice so I would not let my daughter have them. She has baked fries sometimes with meals. I don't necessarily think a baked potato fry is junk if it is an actual potato and not the nasty processed fries.

As for ice cream I eat mostly coconut milk ice cream so if I have some she is welcome to some. That happens once every few months.

we're vegan so no mac n cheese here.

Junk food for us would be Boca veggie chicken nuggets. I give them to the kids a couple times a month.

alacrity_danger

Other junk: If I bake cookies or cupcakes from scratch she gets one and I have always allowed that. I think it is good to teach kids moderation and that making things at home is much healthier than eating store bought junk food.

cubes

Weird chemicals like... ZEATIN?? (and other cytokinins found in, yep, coconut milk)? they use that stuff in fertilizer, you know.

Seriously, I don't get the whole "OMG CHEMICALS!1!!!11" reaction. Chemicals are everywhere, in plants, in people, and in laboratory beakers. Some chemicals found in nature are deadly. Some synthetic chemicals are lifesavers. "Weird chemicals"? How do you define what's weird and what's not? If you go by function, many natural substances (some that we don't even fully understand) have man-made stuff beat hands-down for weirdness.

alacrity_danger

Listen, I'd rather feed my kid something with ingredients that are understandably food. How do you have a problem with that? I am a lot more comfortable feeding my kid something that has a couple ingredients say potatoes and olive oil rather than "Potatoes, vegetable oil (partially hydrogenated soybean oil, natural beef flavor (wheat and milk derivatives)**, citric acid (preservative), dextrose, sodium acid pyrophosphate (maintain color), dimethylpolysiloxane (antifoaming agent)), salt. Prepared in vegetable oil ((may contain one of the following: Canola oil, corn oil, soybean oil, hydrogenated soybean oil, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, partially hydrogenated corn oil with TBHQ and citric acid added to preserve freshness), dimethylpolysiloxane added as an antifoaming agent). **CONTAINS: WHEAT AND MILK (Natural beef flavor contains hydrolyzed wheat and hydrolyzed milk as starting ingredients.)"I think it is a bit odd that foods that should have one or just a few ingredients are packed with non food chemicals so I will not support ( ... )

cubes

Feed your kid whatever you want.

But the "weird chemicals" thing you're trying to avoid is just silly, when the plants you eat have chemicals in them that are every bit as "weird" as anything man-made.

The whole "natural good, man-made bad" is over-simplistic and does a disservice to people who can actually benefit from many of those "additives" (vitamins, for example).

alacrity_danger

There is a difference between consuming chemicals as they occur naturally in foods and extracting them and using them as fillers, preservatives, dye, anti-foaming agents, etc. I think it's a pretty good rule to avoid companies that do this because overall the foods do tend to be healthier without all the additives. Much of the time they are just added to extend shelf life.

It's not silly to me. Eating whole foods is important to me.

thismakebelieve

I agree with this whole-heartedly. Eating whole foods is very important to my partner and I as well. Growing up my parents grew and made ALL the food we ate, and I'm doing just fine today without ever having consumed processed food more than a handful of times until I was in my 20s. It's not so much that I think the chemicals are poisonous or evil or anything, just that they don't need to be there to make food taste good or be healthy, so why would I feel the need to eat them?

therachel

It's definitely not silly.
Feeding your kids anti-foaming agents???? Really???

Just because post-industrial revolution starry eyed people with dollar signs in their souls decided they could make something tasty out of GARBAGE and MARKET that garbage and GET RICH off of the sale of that garbage and CON the FDA into thinking that it's PERFECTLY safe doesn't mean that it's food, OR good for your children.

wholeytoast

I agree with you!

Additives aren't all evil...such as the above mentioned citric acid, which is actually a natural preservative.

And just because they are listed by their chemical name doesn't mean they're created in some mad scientist lab either, it just means nobody has bothered to come up with a nickname yet.

alacrity_danger

The whole point is that they are not necessary. Why should apply sauce be more than apples? Why should peanut butter have tons of oils, corn syrup, and preservatives when all that is needed is peanut butter? It makes no sense.

wholeytoast

A lot of additives are preservatives, so if you want food that has a longer shelf life than say...a couple days, your food won't be contaminated with microbial growth. Groceries are expensive, I like mine to stay as fresh as possible for as long as possible.

Other additives are added because of consumer tastes; most people I know pick out a chip that looks too brownish and throw it away. Keeping color and texture consistent are just more attractive and the additives are deemed generally safe by the FDA which, to me, means they are nontoxic. Again, I prefer crisp things to remain crisp and to be able to have a general idea of what my food will look like when I open it up.

There's also no reason whole foods and prepared foods can't exist together in a healthy diet. When I want a whole apple I eat a whole apple, when I want an apple chip I eat an apple chip.

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therachel

Mmmm.

lunasol

But why would anyone want to?

alacrity_danger

The EU seems to disagree about the safety. We used to think lead paint was safe, too.

thismakebelieve

There's a list in the book Skinny Bitch, which is sort of like, a vegan healthy eating book from what I understand (I have only skimmed it and used some parts of it) and the list contains some scary sounding additives that are in food but lets you know what they really are, in one case it's just lemon juice for example. I'm not sure why they even bother putting the scientific name when the layman's terms sound far more benevolent, but heh. Now I wish I could find the list online but my Google Skillz are lacking.

Here's the book:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinny_Bitch

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