Where on EARTH did we get the idea that kids could eat all of the prepackaged junk they want, but that a freaking CUPCAKE consumed once a week is a CATASTROPHE???
1) if grandma cooks like me, Johnny's mom doesn't know there's nuts in something I made('cause I just throw it in until it tastes good) until Johnny goes into anaphylactic shock.
2) I had to eat something at an event the other day that was prepared by someone at home and brought for the event. there was a foreign object in it (hair)--but I didn't notice it until it was on the spoon and on its way to my mouth. I couldn't "ditch" it (it was a contest and I was literally being watched) and so, I smiled, and ate it. Yes, I've gotten hairs at restaurants before, and in prepackaged stuff...but I've never had to eat them so as not to offend someone. ICK.
And if either of those were the rationale that NYC used for this policy, I might be more understanding. But they did it to ensure that everything sold at a bake sale adhered to certain fairly arbitrary nutritional standards, and it's impossible to verify the nutrition info of a homemade baked good. Which is all well and good, except that I personally believe that a homemade item made with real ingredients beats this any day:
Quote:
Whole corn, vegetable oil (contains one or more of the following: corn, sunflower, and/or soybean Oil), salt, sugar, monosodium glutamate, fructose, sodium diacetate, soy sauce solids (soybean, wheat, salt), onion powder, corn maltodextrin, hydrolyzed soy protein, hydrolyzed corn protein, garlic powder, torula yeast, malic acid, extractives of paprika, spices, caramel color, disodium inosinate, disodium guanylate, dextrose, and natural flavor.
(mmmm...disodium inosinate and guanylate, PLUS hydrolyzed proteins and MSG? Delicious!)
Anyone with nut allergies should, IMO, know better than to purchase bake-sale goods, because of potential cross-contamination (which also exists in some factory-made goods).
And anyone worried about a hair/foreign object should avoid bake sales as well, and ALL processed food in addition (honestly, hairs almost never bother me...I've seen enough research on what is allowable in factory goods to not think they're any better...for example, the following contamination level is allowed in a commercial chocolate bar:
Quote:
CHOCOLATE
• Defect: Insect and rodent filth
• Action level: An average of 60 or more insect fragments and one or more rodent hairs per 100 grams
• Example: A typical chocolate bar is about 60 grams, or 2 ounces. It could have as many as 36 insect fragments and about half a rodent hair and still be sold in supermarkets.
Yeah, I always told my DS that there were rat-hairs in her peanut butter! I read something as a child to the effect that 6 rat hairs are considered allowable per jar. YUCK! Still eat it now, though I didn't for years, lol.
I am glad they haven't made rules like that here yet, though they DID take out all of the vending machines from the schools.
My DSS's mom is a fantastic baker. Should be selling this stuff professionally fantastic. Because of the verifiable nutrition requirement she can't take home made cookies, cupcakes, etc to his daycare for events and parties. She could however pick up a box of cupcakes from Publix, take a bag of dorito's or a pack of oreo's. Kind of sad. I remember when my mom used to make cupcakes for my classes - we had a kid who was allergic to nuts so we made sure everything was nut free. Told the parents that and they trusted us to really be nut free.
I know about manufacturer impurities. The gross factor was that I couldn't pick the hair out because the preparer was THERE and people were watching me.
The rationale given in the article is strange...the school districts we have been in are the ones I mentioned (no way to know ingredients, food prep standards of home kitchen), sorry I assumed that was what your link was about. Personally, I don't like junk food in the classroom anyway and I wish they would do away with it altogether.
Especially since I have been dieting, I have tried to uninvite myself from any social obligation which required me to eat someone else's food (home-cooked or factory made)--it is amazing how little thought people put into the food they prepare (but yet how much care they put into it).
Oh that reminds me of an actual summertime ad poptarts did..."place a scoop of ice cream between a strawberry poptart as a good summertime treat" wft?! My mother would have asked me if i lost my mind. why not just put chocolate syrup over a bucket of lard, stick a swirly straw in it, cover it with butter sprinkles and give it to some kid. oh, and don't forget the triple bypass.
Geez Louise, I'm so tired of weird incidents of stupidity by commitee, such as the six year old who was expelled for violating his school's gun ban - bringing (if memory serves correctly, this was a few years ago) a toy gun to school, sounds reasonable til you realize the gun was a brightly colored eraser less than 1 inch long and 1/2 inch wide. Teacher saying "Johnny you can't have this at school, take it home and if you bring it back, I will get thrown away," makes sense - but schoolboard saying "you can't come back to school for the rest of the year, and this will be recorded in your school record as an act of violence" not so much).
The dumbing down of America is truly scary. It makes the (nearly as stupid as the future world it portrays) movie Idiocracy almost seem prophetic
(If you haven't seen the movie, it's worth renting - but NOT buying IMO unless you really like stupid movies)
I lived in new york for 30 years. I am very disapointed with the way our city government has allowed our public amenities to be be gobled up by corporations. First it was large advertising signs in the city parks...just about the only green spaces left....and now some sweetie pie contracts between the board of ed, and junk food vendors...what's next ?
Wow. That is a bunch of BS. I work in public schools (K-5) but while our policy of "no homebaked goods" is the same no one is STUPID enough to think packaged junk with a nutrition label is BETTER for you; it is strictly an allergy issue. Although I noticed one of my "new to me" buildings (I travel between 2-3, unfortunately) does not enforce that rule at all. Staff brought cupcakes for an at lunch bake sale and not a single contribution was store-bought, Mine were smaller (aka a normal serving unlike jumbo cupcakes these days) and with less sugar than you'd get from a packaged cupcake. I was quite pleased to be able to do that. I also made sure there was no way for nuts to touch any of my utensils since I knew I had to be aware of that (not that it was an issue with chocolate/chocolate).
Our schools don't allow homemade goods to be brought in either. I actually support the policy because we live in a large city and there is no way of knowing if the food is safe. If something was to happen with "tainted" foods, it certainly wouldn't be the first time it happened in a school here. So, yes I am okay with the policy.
It looks like the processed foods are pre-selected so I guess that is a good thing--probably still just garbage though. I wish more parents took their children's nutrition seriously. If the food item doesn't support growth, development and learning why would you offer it to a kid--especially during school hours?
(Says the mom whose child sneaked ice cream 31 times this year at school!)
New York schools regulation: Commercial packaged snacks ok, but no bake sale stuff
