Food Branding Hits at a Young Age

For the past few years I've been pretty disgusted during some of my trips to the grocery store.  It's not the particular store or the food selection, it's the fact that starting around age 6, my first born started asking for brand name food items.  I don't mean he wanted the Cheerios instead of the Tastee-o's (or however your spell that generic knock-off) - he was asking for crap food items by brand name.

"Mom I want Pepsi."
"Mom I want Dr. Pepper."
"Mom I want Mt. Dew."  -  AHHHHH

If I routinely allowed any of those, then it would have been understandable, but I don't!  In fact, at this point my husband and I don't really drink soda, and haven't for a few years aside from an occasional diet Dr Pepper.  Where was this coming from?  Pepsi?  Had he had this at a birthday party somewhere?  No, all the birthday parties he attended seemed to have soda in pitchers.  Mt. Dew??  Seriously!  Why does it seem that my now 8 year old is hard-wired to ask for a soda he's never even tried, which has got to be the worst of the worst for him?

Is this a test?  Is someone from the Commission on Dietetic Registration sending him scripts to read at the grocery store in hopes of catching me?  Are there hidden cameras at the store hoping to catch me at a weak moment?  Well, if so they can go watch someone else because I've perfected my eye-rolling and my firm "not in this lifetime" responses.

So I thought this would continue on, with every horrible-for-you food that was offered at the store.  Yesterday I got a pleasant surprise that really warmed my heart.  I had loaded up the boys and their bikes to go help a friend finish sanding her from porch railings and paint them so her significant other would have to eat his words ["she's never going to finish this"] when he returned home from a trip.  :)

We worked for a while and the boys got hungry.  She eats super healthy too... actually I think she has me beat by a mile in that regard.  So she made this most delicious chicken salad for us, and a sandwich for the boys using up some of the white bread that had only been purchased for recent house guest.  My 8 year old thought this was great since they have to suffer through 100% whole wheat bread consistently at our house.  I grumbled a bit and commented that, "...I like your healthy bod and I want to keep it that way.  If I didn't love you so much I would shove Spaghetti-O's in your face and not care."    ...wait for it... here's when my most fabulous moment arrived....

"What are Spaghetti-O's?"  AHHHHHH!!!  Success!  He really has no idea!  I was so giddy.  While I totally get that some parts of the country start their babies on this staple before they even introduce mashed up bananas, it's got to be one of the worst things to feed your child.  And acting as though it's nutritious in any way is just ridiculous.  Hold up!  Oh, wow they must be nutritious (insert: eyes rolling and most sarcastic voice you can imagine) they have added Calcium.  Ugh.  Here was my 8 year old brand whore with no clue what it even was!  Happy mommy/Dietitian moment.

I did go on to tell him that crap like that wasn't even fit for animals, as evidenced by the Beefaroni incident on Seinfeld.  Ah, I don't think Seinfeld references will ever get old for me.

The first part is just the feeding of the Beefarino, but the second video is the effects.  Horrible video quality, but seriously couldn't find another clip of it.  :(