No, the tray of food is a tray of food... education (or lack of) is what is contributing to obesity.
Children in schools are taught more about how to bake biscuits, cakes and how to make food packaging than they are taught about how to make nutritionally balanced meals.
Why don't we take the time to teach children things like how to batch cook healthy meals or preserve fruit and vegetables for later use in future meals??? Taking the time to foster enjoyment of cooking from teenage years will reduce the overall consumption of takeaway meals and other unhealthy alternatives.
Oddly enough, I am still awaiting the opportunity to be summoned by a company to design their pizza box for them (a module I needed to pass to graduate high school).
@HootyTheNightOwl Home economics hasn't been taught in numerous schools for at least 20 years, so they're no longer being taught at many schools anymore. When McDonald's still had their value dollar menu it was far cheaper for a single mother, or father, to feed their children that way, when just a single pound of salmon at the meat market costs $20+ per pound. The OP is speaking economically.
@NativePortlander1970 The thing is that we are not living in 2004 anymore - the messages have changed since then.
Now, we want parents and children to eat smaller portion sizes and a more balanced diet... neither of which are being taught in schools - either back then or now.
So, how do people learn what a "balanced diet" even is??? It's certainly not by baking cakes and cookies...
@HootyTheNightOwl I just saw that You live in England, what happened to Jamie Oliver's organization for healthier school lunches and nutrition education? I thought that was big over there. Here in the United States it was a serious mandatory class for jr high and high school students until about 20 years or so ago when Prez Bush 43 pushed no child left behind, which focused on testing for tax dollars, and many school programs were dropped as a result.
@NativePortlander1970 That was after my time. I was married to soon to be ex by then.
Even with that, though, it still backs up what I claim in that it's only mandatory for two academic years.
Considering that we don't really start to study food until the age of eleven - how are children going to learn all they need to know for the rest of their lives between the ages of eleven and fourteen???
Primary schools don't even have a cooker that is accessible to children - so they're certainly not teaching them how to cook by example... just some teacher droning on in front of a board somewhere.
I have an eating disorder now - and, even though I know that a balanced diet will help me quite a bit, I could still use some help with portion sizes as I break away from the traditional three meals a day and try for six small meals a day. I can't get help with that because I "don't look like" I have an eating disorder.
I eat twice a day now - and I still struggle with feeling like I am constantly eating and overfull... even though my portion sizes aren't all that big.
@Ferric67 You might feel differently if I told you that the last time I ate a vegetable was Christmas... that's how tightly soon to be ex has restricted my diet.
The whole laugh of it is that it's not because there are no vegetables to eat... I blanched and froze loads of vegetables in the days before Christmas - and Christmas Dinner remains the only meal that they were eaten.
I crave to eat vegetables in the same way most people crave a chocolate treat.
