We did because the schools followed the food pyramid. So they pushed foods on us that were low fat and high carb (like the ‘healthy’ chocolate skim milk, and no whole milk). Margarine instead of butter. Government food recommendations are HUGE deal to kids in public schools in the United States.
Margarine and butter both sort under "fat" in old dietary guidelines. The reason schools (or anyone) preferred the former was because of cost.
I bet government food recommendations was just the starting point, and concerns about cost and getting kids to actually eat it would have transformed any plan into something similar. Calories processed into pure forms (sugar and fat) are cheap. Grains are super cheap, which was a big part of why they were the backbone of dietary recommendations for so long - no use instructing people to eat something they can't afford.
I can't imagine eating high carb and margarine is a problem for children. They burn anything they swallow especially if you stick to decent carbs like bread or rice.
It derails where parents serve yoghurt drinks to babies (have seen that) or when they get accustomed to open the fridge for a drink (seen that also).
Ah, that is a good point. I was a poor sack lunch kid so I never considered that aspect.
Have they improved at all? Minnesota passed free school lunch for all, and my daughter will be starting school in a few years. Packing her a healthy lunch literally becomes the more expensive option.
It's so weird to me that free school lunches for children are something that is not 100% immediately obvious and uncontroversial and beyond any discussion.
Even in the UK in the 1980s, at the height of ghoulish neoliberal Thatcherism, there was a major controversy when she tried to stop giving free milk to kids in school (milk-snatcher they called her).
It very much depends on where you live. Many Republicans were livid about Michelle Obama’s healthy school lunch effort and that inspired unnecessary rancor over what shouldn’t be controversial.
The other problem is that if kids aren’t used to eating vegetables at home they might not eat them at school, and the schools don’t want to deal with increased waste / throwing.
