'Leave the chocolate milk out of this': School cooks, parents, kids push back on USDA effort to make

[riversedge]

Geez. Biden can't win for losing!! I am just glad he is trying his best to have healthy meals. but seems few others are having it!!
I have no idea what the RW is saying but the opening sentence--The feds are coming for your kids' chocolate milk --is probably what they will be saying from the rooftop!!


‘Leave the chocolate milk out of this’: School cooks, parents, kids push back on USDA effort to make lunches healthier


https://www.statnews.com/2023/03/14/chocolate-milk-school-lunches-healthier/?utm_source=pocket-newtab


By Nicholas Florko March 14, 2023

Photo illustration of an anthropomorphic chocolate milk carton holding on to a lunch tray while being pulled away
The feds are coming for your kids’ chocolate milk. At least, so say the cooks, parents and others complaining about new USDA rules for school lunch.
Alex Hogan/STAT

WASHINGTON — The feds are coming for your kids’ chocolate milk.

At least, so says the stampede of school cooks, administrators, and parents flooding the Department of Agriculture with complaints. They’re “targeting” kids, forcing them to “go thirsty,” and are being “just mean,” they’ve cried.

The anger was prompted by a February proposal from the USDA aimed at making school meals healthier by limiting the amount of added sugar and sodium in breakfasts and lunches. The USDA reimburses schools for a portion of nearly every meal they provide, which gives it some say over what foods schools offer.



No element of the February proposal has generated more vitriol than a suggestion that the agency might stop reimbursing schools for chocolate milk served to children in elementary and middle school.

Most chocolate milks have about 20 grams of sugar per carton — roughly half of which is added sugar. The American Heart Association recommends kids consume just 25 grams of added sugar in a full day. But parents, teachers, and school officials simply aren’t having it. They insist children won’t drink unflavored milk — so the proposal would rob them of necessary calcium — and force them to go thirsty.


“Leave the chocolate milk out of this,” said Michelle Wickstrom, a teacher from Green River, Wyoming......................................................

[James48]

1. Sorry-

But I’m with chocolate milk on this one.


BROWN COWS UNiTE!

[blue neen]

2. I'm with the kids on this one.

Plain milk is just gross. To this day, I can only drink milk if it is chocolate.

[barbaraann]

3. Chocolate milk in childhood probably contributes to hedonic hunger.

...
Eons ago, the first humans quickly learned that naturally sweet foods are never poisonous and therefore safe. Back then, these kinds of energy-dense foods were relatively rare. When early humans found one of these treats, the hedonic reward system encouraged them to keep eating. This kept our ancestors from starving.

But our hedonic appetites have turned on us. Hedonic eating is now being studied as one of the biggest drivers of obesity. That’s because modern society has become awash in easy-to-grab, highly processed foods that our pleasure-seeking brains compel us to eat.
...
https://www.webmd.com/diet/story/hedonic-hunger-and-why-we-cant-stop-eating

[Celerity]

26. belladonna instantly proves this wrong:

the first humans quickly learned that naturally sweet foods are never poisonous and therefore safe

Cheers

Cel

[Dorian Gray]

4. Milk has protein and fats in it

both of which will keep kids fuller longer and learning better.

Honestly, I'm with the kids, the parents on this one. When I was a kid, I left my daily milk undrunk. I hated it. If the chocolate milk helps kids get more nutrient dense calories (with a little sugar) then it will make learning better for everybody.

[Hope22]

5. Lol!

White milk always smells sour when drinking from a carton.

[badhair77]

6. If they can offer a lower sugar chocolate milk then ok.

Tues and Thurs used to be chocolate milk day at my school and I could tell. My 11th grade afternoon boys would go crazy. They probably had 2 or 3 containers. As someone on the other side it was a nightmare for me. They eventually made every day chocolate milk day. Learning be damned. Just something to consider.

[Hortensis]

7. :) Yet another battle in a never-ended dispute. On one side,

those who feel it's better to compromise on nutrition in order to get kids who insist on it to drink milk.

On the other, those who won't compromise on nutrition, even if it means much more milk will be thrown away instead of drunk.

Yet banning chocolate milk also backfires nutritionally -- children stop buying milk, up to a third of milk is thrown away, and some kids stop eating lunch altogether.

I'm for ending this. When is science going to develop a healthy, nutritious fake?

[keep_left]

9. They might substitute something like Splenda in place of all the sugar. The UK has a "sugar tax"...

...high enough that most of their sodas and other sugary drinks have been reformulated. Apparently you can't even get a lot of the sugar sodas we have here in the UK anymore.

[yorkster]

14. They could cut the amount of sugar

and avoid artificial sugars.

20 grams is an astounding amount.

[keep_left]

16. Maybe, if it's whole milk. Take a look at ice cream as one example. The expensive stuff...

...like Ben & Jerry's has much less sugar than you would expect. That's because of all the butterfat from the heavy cream, not to mention the eggs, which most ice cream doesn't even have. Generally, as fats are removed from food products, the manufacturers crank up the sugars to keep it from tasting like cardboard. That's how we got those sugar-bomb cookies years ago like "Snackwells" that had some of the highest sugars of any baked goods--and that's really saying something.

[yorkster]

22. I found Edy's 1/2 the fat vanilla bean ice cream.

Really good. I had heard about increased sugar amounts as fats were being decreased. I'm not even going to look at the sugar amount in Edy's - I try to have it in small amounts....

[keep_left]

23. Well, it's probably no big deal if you don't have a metabolic problem...

...e.g. diabetes or pre-diabetes. But you'll generally find it to be the case that as they take out the fats, they jack up the sugars. By the way, I've found that to be the case with things like salad dressings as well. Of course, they are also starting to use the newer artificial sweeteners to replace some of the sugars, which is a welcome change.

So, everything in moderation, except for those of us who aren't disciplined enough for moderation. I just have to stay away from that stuff.

[yorkster]

27. Good points.

[Silent3]

28. Some people react to any artificial sugar substitute as if it's arsenic

For the "only all natural" crowd, you can't convince them that anything that isn't "natural" isn't POISON!!!!

There are, in these people's minds, no small or manageable risks, no reasonable trade-offs.

[keep_left]

31. Well, I guess I can sort of understand it, except that some peoples' bodies react to...

...sugar like it's arsenic! And something like 10% of the US population is diabetic; I can't imagine how many are pre-diabetic. So artificial sweeteners are really a matter of quality of life as far as I'm concerned.

I always do snicker a little at the "all natural' crowd when I explain to them that cyanide and arsenic are also "all natural"! There are a whole lot of foods that have to be processed to make them non-toxic. I'm all for less chemicals in food (for example, I have a vegetable garden), but I can't really find many objections myself to sweeteners like Splenda.

[Takket]

8. send an e-mail to parents telling them the pros and cons and let them choose

it should also point out there are plenty of ways to get calcium other than milk if that is their concern.

[Autumn]

10. Yep. Let the kids have their chocolate milk. This is just dumb. They want to go after something

they can go after HFCS.

[kskiska]

11. In kindergarten in 1949

I refused to drink the white milk in half-pint bottles that were served for recess. I would only drink chocolate milk.

[Ferrets are Cool]

13. "forcing them to "go thirsty,"

Stupid as fuck. The blatant disregard for unhealthy foods are one of America's biggest problems.

[hunter]

15. My wife is Native American lactose intolerant so we always had soy and almond milk in our house.

Our children gradually quit cow milk in grade school. I didn't ask. I was clueless. Our oldest kid in third grade declared the milk in school lunches "gross," chocolate or not.

It took me a little while before I noticed the gallon jugs of milk in our refrigerator were going bad before they were emptied.

I'd been trained since childhood that "Milk does a body good!"

My dad's extended family were largely California Dairy farmers. My mom's family were cattle ranchers.

My dad's mom and her sister hated cows and the stodgy dairy farmers their relatives tried to set the up with so they ran away flapper wild to Hollywood.

I think they were wise.

I don't support the factory farm dairy industry.

My wife and I have lived just over thirty years in a place where roads are named after the cow-loving cousins of my dad's parents and grandparents. My wife's dad's parents were occasionally migrant farm workers here. My wife's dad was born in a tent in a migrant labor camp near a small farm my parents once owned.

My wife and I met teaching science in the city.

Life is strange...

[Igel]

18. Some groups are more commonly lactose intolerant than others.

It's a relatively recent mutation in 3 or 4 different locations in the Old World (where they had cattle and the milk could help reduce death by starvation).

[hunter]

25. Here on planet earth the lactose tolerant adult humans are the weirdos.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactose_intolerance

[IcyPeas]

17. Are the kids allowed to drink soda in school? I would guess chocolate milk is healthier than coke.

[NowsTheTime]

19. Dem's will be blamed of course...expect to hear this for weeks...

[Renew Deal]

20. Let the kids have their chocolate milk.

[Cuthbert Allgood]

21. Chocolate milk has about the perfect macro ratio for exercise recovery.

A lot of college sports teams workout rooms have it available for their athletes.

[In It to Win It]

24. It's 'Freedom Fries' all over again

[Best_man23]

29. I still remember the wrestling matches at the milk cooler in elementary school

We would arm wrestle over the chocolate milk.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

30. I don't care for the

“We pay for it so we have the say in what you buy” aspect of this.

We don’t tell people on SNAP that they can’t buy chocolate milk (nor should we) so why do it with school lunches?

[JCMach1]

32. This is where I tell most kids skip the milk entirely and drink high fructose

Juices.

The sugar level cannot be better in those, frankly. Just a different type.

In most cafeterias those juices count as 'fruit'

So, they get no milk, no real fruit and take just as much sugar, just a different type.