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richk449
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 Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 6:10 pm Post subject: French Kids Don't Snack |
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http://blogs.babble.com/family-kitchen/2012/04/26/french-kids-dont-snack/
| Quote: | French kids don’t snack. Hard to believe, but true. They don’t snack at school, or in their cars, or in their strollers. I never saw a single French child rummaging in cupboards or the fridge. This was as true for the French children living in our little village as it was for the girls’ big-city cousins in Paris and Lyon.
“So when do kids snack?” I eventually asked my mother-in-law.
“They don’t snack, of course,” she replied. Her surprised look was a sign that I’d asked, yet again, one of those dumb foreigner questions. Deflated, I dropped the subject. But I kept thinking about her answer. No snacking? Really? At home in North America, any time spent with kids meant time spent feeding them snacks. I did a little research and found out that Sophie and Claire were typical: North American kids snack, on average, three times per day (in addition to their three meals per day). And I was amazed to learn that one out of every five American kids eats up to six snacks per day.
My mother-in-law was right, though. French kids don’t snack. I knew this from watching the families around us in the village. Their children ate four square meals per day, on a set schedule: breakfast in the morning, lunch at around 12:30, the goûter at around 4:30 p.m., and dinner between 7:00 and 8:00 p.m. That was it. Virginie confirmed my impressions. She even sent me France’s official food guide, which emphatically recommends no snacking. It doesn’t seem as if this advice is really necessary, anyway. For most French parents and children, this eating schedule is an ingrained, unquestioned habit. And it’s not that they are constantly struggling to avoid a secret raid on the pantry. Rather, eating at other times of the day simply would rarely occur to them. Just in case anyone strays, snack food ads on French TV carry a large white banner (like the warnings on cigarette packages) bluntly stating: “For your health, avoid snacking in between meals.”
Why are French kids raised this way? Partly because French kids (like kids anywhere) are adults in training. And French adults, for the most part, don’t snack — at least not in public. They don’t walk down the street munching on muffins or sipping coffee. They don’t keep snack foods in their purses or pockets (or at least they’re not supposed to). When snacks are eaten regularly, and publicly, this is sufficiently out of the ordinary as to merit public comment. |
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pjp
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 6:40 pm Post subject: Re: French Kids Don't Snack |
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Interesting. Maybe this is where Taco Bell got the idea of Fourthmeal?
| Quote: | | Rather, eating at other times of the day simply would rarely occur to them. Just in case anyone strays, snack food ads on French TV carry a large white banner (like the warnings on cigarette packages) bluntly stating: “For your health, avoid snacking in between meals.” |
So, nobody snacks, but there is still enough of a snack industry that they can afford ads, even with 'snack and die' warnings. Seems a bit... less than the whole story.
| Quote: | | Why are French kids raised this way? Partly because French kids (like kids anywhere) are adults in training. And French adults, for the most part, don’t snack — at least not in public. They don’t walk down the street munching on muffins or sipping coffee. They don’t keep snack foods in their purses or pockets (or at least they’re not supposed to). When snacks are eaten regularly, and publicly, this is sufficiently out of the ordinary as to merit public comment. |
Oh, OK. They do snack, just not in public.
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audiodef
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 7:15 pm Post subject: |
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I met an exchange student at university. He was from France, and he once jokingly - not at all in a stuck-up way - told me there are too many fat people here.
Maybe we should change this country's name to the United Snacks of America.
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energyman76b
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 8:41 pm Post subject: |
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must be the reason why the french exchange students at my school who should have been shot after throwing their breakfast on the floor and walls, refusing to eat anything but their joke of bread and being a total pain in the ass, were constantly eating. Or maybe they snacked around because of all the pot they smoked.
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pjp
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:23 pm Post subject: |
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| energyman76b wrote: | | must be the reason why the french exchange students at my school who should have been shot after throwing their breakfast on the floor and walls, refusing to eat anything but their joke of bread and being a total pain in the ass, were constantly eating. Or maybe they snacked around because of all the pot they smoked. |
That's just the French Rumspringa.
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barul
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:26 pm Post subject: |
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Of course we don't snack. Why would we do it?
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aidanjt
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:29 pm Post subject: |
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| barul wrote: | | Of course we don't snack. Why would we do it? |
Sugar rush, having the munchies, etc., take your pick.
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pjp
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:31 pm Post subject: |
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| barul wrote: | | Of course we don't snack. Why would we do it? |
Because you'd like some cheese with that wine?
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barul
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:36 pm Post subject: |
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| aidanjt wrote: | | barul wrote: | | Of course we don't snack. Why would we do it? |
Sugar rush, having the munchies, etc., take your pick. |
Yeah, usually people like to smoke weed on parties, so I think they do it near dinner time, or they smoke all night and eat all night as well, I don't know, I don't smoke (ok, I did once and I puked). By sugar rush, you mean when someone really need some sugar? If so, isn't that a disease?
| pjp wrote: | | Because you'd like some cheese with that wine? |
I'd like some, indeed.
Seriously, French people usually don't snack because we eat enough during "normal" meals to don't need to eat during other moments of the day.
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pjp
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:43 pm Post subject: |
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Sure, and that's great. Snacking isn't inherently bad though. And if anyone would eat wine & cheese, is that not a snack, or is that one of the 4 "square meals"?
Some body builders eat every 2 hours; they're not fat, but they're also not eating whole meals. So gorging on a 2,500 calorie meal followed 3 hrs later by a 1,500 calories snack is obviously not the way to eat.
Trying to manage 4 meals is unfortunately not viable to most of our corporate overlords. I've tried doing mini-meal / snacks and smaller meals, but it is a huge PITA.
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barul
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:54 pm Post subject: |
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Well yes, if someone would like to eat cheese with some wine, that's a snack. I thought you meant at the end of the meal, like a dessert or something like that.
What do you mean by PITA?
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richk449
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 11:09 pm Post subject: |
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| barul wrote: | | Seriously, French people usually don't snack because we eat enough during "normal" meals to don't need to eat during other moments of the day. |
Nobody snacks because they "need" to. They snack because they are conditioned to (the polite version), or don't have the willpower to resist it (the un-polite version). |
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BoneKracker
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| Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 11:16 pm Post subject: |
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Whoever wrote that article is part of the problem. Kids today are spoiled. Get off my lawn.
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audiodef
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audiodef
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pjp
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| Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2012 2:06 am Post subject: |
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| barul wrote: | | What do you mean by PITA? |
Sorry, pain in the ass.
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