Maybe kids aren't so dumb. Maybe they wonder why their meals are getting more attention than their grades? Maybe they're stressed anyway and can't take food stress. Maybe like adults they can't do everything well at once despite the best intentions.

Latest flash from the generational debate re food....

The BBC television programme Jamie's (Jamie Oliver) School Dinners triggered a national debate about the quality of school food in 2005, made Turkey Twizzlers instant shorthand for all that is dreadful about processed food, and prompted ministers to instigate a new standard for all schools - The Guardian, today.

After a year, the report on the schools is depressing. Across the country pupils have been taught the healthy options, why they should choose them and how they will benefit from a better diet. the inspectors find.Pupils fully understand why they should eat salads, fruit and healthy carbs, but they just want to eat chips with their friends.

In 19 of the 27 schools visited the number of pupils opting for school lunches had dropped significantly since the healthy menus were planned. Local reductions ranged from 9% to a 25% drop in the number of pupils eating school meals.

The Findings:

Three of the primary schools visited reported that younger pupils could not manage a knife and fork

· Some schools misunderstood the "five-a-day" fruit and veg recommendations and included potatoes

· One teenager told inspectors that he had become far fitter as a result of regular walks to a nearby chip shop

· Pupils snacked on fizzy drinks and sweets on the way to schools

· At one secondary school counsellors were brought in to help a group of high-performing year 10 girls who smoked and were involved in substance abuse, and were skipping meals in an attempt to lose weight

· Pupils frequently said that the portions were small and left them still feeling hungry

New spin on the organic vs. conventional food debate. In today’s NYT, science writer Harold McGee quotes a study that shows rats prefer the taste of organic wheat to conventional wheat while humans can’t tell the difference!

Let me parse that carefully. I study the rat’s palate. The rat is an uberominivore, but it is also a neophobe. It is acutely aware of the dangers of unknown food. Instead it eats anything that smells of another rat, and it strongly prefers those foods that rats have previously eaten. Among other rats’ leftovers, the hungry rat likes to graze on such treats as grain, livestock feed, and meat, soap, leather, furs, candy, milk, meat, vegetables, poultry, eggs, grain, seeds, fruit, nuts, snails and other rodents and of course it yearns for a juicy human steak, if only humans stayed still long enough, even babies move too much.

A rat is also a coprophiliac. Nothing so delicious and nutritional as a dish of fresh or vintage feces, preferably their own. Rats eliminate an average of between 20-50 droppings per day, along with an ounce of urine, onto whatever’s available – usually the food er call it wheat they’re feeding on. One study claims that 70% of a tonne of wheat had been spoiled by 10-26 rats over the course of 28 weeks. Worldwide, half our food is ruined by rat contamination.

So before I buy into the rats’ preference for organic I need to know how the wheat samples were composed. Maybe the organic wheat sample had a whiff of rat in it…..