The Kids' Menu

We just returned from a week-long family vacation – my husband, my two-year-old son, and me.  Traveling with a toddler no doubt brings to light many needed lessons regarding the virtues of patience and flexibility.  One thing, however, that became painfully clear to me on our trip is this: Kids’ menus are awful.  Just awful.

After my son turned one, I was able to remain blissfully unaware of the kids’ menu for several more months.  He wasn’t consuming a large quantity of food, and we weren’t doing any lengthy traveling.  I could fairly easily pack his dinner with us if we went out, or at least bring fruits and veggies and feel confident he could scrounge off our plates to round out his meal.  But now he’s almost two and a half, and the child eats.  Add to that the fact that we’ve become more adventurous with him in the last year and taken longer vacations; there’s only so much I can stock in a tiny hotel refrigerator.  So naturally, my eyes are drawn to the kids’ menu, as our options are to buy him a full price entrée that may go untouched, or choose the economical route with a portion sized just for him.

Returning to my initial point: kids’ menus are awful.  Awful food, awful selection, zero health benefits, and most of the time my son won’t even eat it!  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not opposed to an occasional “treat”, and yes, he had his fair share of french fries while we were away.  I can get on board with vacation being partially about indulging – enjoying activities and foods you may not normally partake in at home.  It’s not like I had a salad at every meal.  And I also understand that dining out isn’t meant to be a daily occurrence, so ideally these things are being balanced with normal eating at home.  However, being faced repeatedly this week with an endless parade of processed meats and fried foods as the featured options for a child started to make me think...

Why are these the foods that are generally understood as being especially for our kids?  When we think about typical kid foods, why are the first things that come to mind chicken nuggets and hot dogs?  I refuse to believe children eat these things because they demand them.  Our son didn't know what a french fry was until we introduced it.  These “kid” foods are marketed to them, and we are buying it.  They’re convenience foods – quick, easy, and fun to eat.  When we process chicken (bones included, and bleach it, etc….) we can make it into any shape we want.  What child wouldn’t want their dinner shaped like a dinosaur?  Blech.

About a year ago I read a book called, “Salt, Sugar, Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us.”  Based on detailed research, it describes how the processed food industry has literally calculated how much salt, sugar, and fat they need to pump into their products to make them as addictive as possible.  And much of this effort, sadly, is aimed at children.  Sugary cereals, juice drinks, lunchables…they prey on our natural desire for convenient and portable ways to feed our family.  And the more we keep buying it, the more it supports their bottom line and encourages them to keep doing it. (I'm going to stop myself here and just offer this small aside: I highly recommend this book!)

My point is, our food culture has just gotten to a bad place.  We regularly eat processed foods (and I say we because I’m not innocent, but I’m trying) and rarely read labels.  We believe health claims on the front of boxes.  We purchase kids’ meals at restaurants because we have kids and they need to eat.  And I'm not talking simply about a difference between healthy and unhealthy – this is a difference between real food and imitations.  The good news is we as the consumers hold all the power – we vote with our dollars.  We can choose to buy local produce and fresh foods.  We can limit our consumption of processed foods and demand better options.  I constantly remind myself I can just as easily steam broccoli as I can warm up a hot dog.  And it is just as fast (and SO much better) to grill our own hamburgers at home as it is to rely on that place with the golden arches which shall not be named here.  And more importantly, doing these small things teaches my family about the value of good food.

Likewise, we now plan to more often resist the kids’ menu.  Our most successful dinner outing with our son this week was when we opted to order him the shrimp cocktail appetizer and a side of rice.  Add to that the olives they brought to the table when we arrived and the tomatoes pilfered from our salads, and the child was on cloud nine.  Real food: everyone likes it.  We were so relieved we went back the next night and did the very same thing.  So eventually, perhaps the people selling us this stuff will catch on.  Restaurant owners will realize if they really want to do parents a favor, they can offer child-sized portions of actual entrees.  When planning the menu, maybe the chef won’t give up when they get to the kids’ menu.  After all, kids are real people, too, and in every other regard we give them our very best.  Why stop here?

Don’t misunderstand me – as soap-boxy as this may sound, I by no means pretend to have it all together.  My child doesn’t eat only 100% organic and natural food, and I sometimes rely on convenience.  Yes, I’m sure he will eat from a kids’ menu again at some point, and for goodness’ sake it’s summer so the child can (and does) have ice cream.  I’m just a disgusted consumer trying my best to stick it to the man.  I don’t want my child to grow up not knowing where potatoes come from, or unable to recognize the natural shape of chicken.  I want him to help me select ingredients for our dinner at the farmers’ market and then shuck corn and snap beans together on the deck at home.  I want him to appreciate and enjoy food the way it was meant to be experienced – fruits, vegetables, and treats included.  The kids’ menu is a symptom of a larger problem, but it is in our power to redefine it.