Most of the schools in our district go throught the district for their menus ideas etc but we didn't like what we saw SO we went our own way. Everyday meals are cooked fresh and served to our K-12 students. Okay, every Friday IS pizza but it's homemade and really kinda good! That is really to give the cooks one easy day! Otherwise we offer a salad bar or the main entree, that's it.
It's funny though, the parents that do complain about the food have never actually eaten lunch with their student so often the manager offers them a free lunch and often wins them over!

Now, we have more of a time issue....kids being rushed to eat etc.

I personaly don't like the paper/foam plates the school uses and miss "trays". They were much sturder and did you ever see the dishwasher's skin? Our gal (way back in my hometown) had beautiful skin from the steam from the dishwasher! HA!!
Maybe schools need to go back to the "home cooked" style of meals instead of fast and cheap.

Our school is pretty good with lunch...and it's actually better then what I remember getting at elementary school. The kids have a standard meal and get a choice of 2 sides. If they don't want the standard meal they can get one of those crustables (I think thats what they are called the circle pb and j) with 2 sides. They are only allowed to have 1 snack with their meal and if you don't want your child having a snack every day (twix, fruit roll ups...) then you can put a tag on their lunch which limits them to however many days you can have it. The teachers help in the cafeteria and they pass out the food so the kids aren't all touching everything. We also pay into an acct and the kids have a lunch number instead of carrying around cash. Every Friday is bonus day and they get a special treat. Two times a month is try something new day (whatever it's called) where they try need foods not on the normal menu like sweet potatoe fries, which btw smell great but ain't that great. A few years ago they 'outlawed' pop/snack machines in my city. Kids at all school levels can not use them unless its after school.

I think that for the most part, our cafeteria does a decent job with what they have to work with. The food is cooked fresh each day at a neighboring school and trucked to ours about 1/2 before lunches begin.

For a hot lunch at our school right now, it costs $1.35 per day, $6.75 per week, $13.50 per month. For that price, you get an entree, a fruit, a veggie, some sort of bread, and milk. It is all preplanned, and the only choice anyone really has is to purchase one or bring lunch. Adults can purchase salads by signing up for one each morning. The salads run $2.50 to $4, depending on the size. My son brings his lunch because he doesn't like to wait in the line and be the last out to recess...lol...

Our k-3 school doesn't offer choices. On days when a salad is offered or fresh fruit, the kids help themselves from the salad bar. My issue is that the salad is just iceberg, with no nutritional value at all. I've eaten lunch with my son three times this year and have been absolutely unimpressed with our food. It is brought in through a service and the "cooks" basically only warm it.

At our 4-5 school, a second choice has only recently been added. There are no soda or snack machines at either school, but there is both at the high school, but they have healthy snack and milk machines also.


I would be very opposed to snack or pop machines being brought into the lower grades.

We didn't have a choice until middle school. My children don't have a choice either. There is one snack and two pop machines in our school mailroom but they aren't really accessable to the kids. I had them in high school. We had a pop machine in middle school that was turned on only for sporting events becasue they didn't offer concessions. As for fries, I never had them with lunch until middle school and they did offer them everyday, but we had a salad bar as well and I usually ate that. I think we could also purchase cans of juice and cookies or ice cream with lunch in middle school. As for chips, our district had a contract a few years ago with Frito Lay to offer chips with cetain meals but it wasn't all the time.

I was watching HGTV the other night. They had a show that revealed the history of school lunches. I have been grumbling about french fries for my kids every day and I think our state program could use a few changes. Now I am sure they do.

The t.v. show had a 6 slot divided try and the President of the National School Lunch Program refered to them as a "thing of the past." Also she said "gone are the days where the children are given the suggested food if they wanted it or not." They showed kids with trays picking up their own food. Does your school do this? How sanitary is this practice? I also saw a child with chips. We do not have that at our schools. They are available in the snack machine but our kids are not allowed to use snack machines until an hour after lunch. There was a bill being pushed to remove soda machines and candy bars from elementary schools. I don't know how far that went. We do not have soda machines (thankfully), but the elementary across town does.

It seems like we had more of a selection when we were in school. Maybe we didn't. I was so picky I took my lunch the majority of the time. My favorite lunches were veggie soup (which is hardly ever served anymore) lasagna, sloppy joes, and bbq chicken. Those things are rarely served if at all. The pizza is much better now days. It's a good thing since it is served an average of 4 times per month. My kids are sick of pizza. They want to take their lunches on those days. And we do have good salads, but they are only available to the kids 3 days a week.

Our principal really wanted to get a milk machine. The high school and middle school have them. Apparently they wouldn't let her. These machines also serve bottled water which I think our kids need more of.