I've been watching Jamie Oliver's TV series filmed in the USA, Jamie's Food Revolution with a degree of interest. I call shows like this (and its UK-based predecessors, Jamie's School Dinners and Jamie's Ministry of Food) car-crash television: some of the scenes are so horrific, you can't help but watch them.
Jamie's message on the Food Revolution website says:
This food revolution is about saving America's health by changing the way you eat. It's not just a TV show, it's a movement for you, your family and your community. If you care about your kids and their future take this revolution and make it your own. Educate yourself about food and cooking. Find out what your child is eating at school. Make only a few small changes and magical things will happen. Switching from processed to fresh food will not only make you feel better but it will add years to your life.In this series Jamie heads to Huntington, West Virginia - which has been called the unhealthiest city in America - to start his new cooking initiative. He aims to combat obesity, heart disease and diabetes by challenging the way the people are eating and he hopes to use Huntington as the spark to initiate positive change across the United States.
I've only watched two episodes so far, but I was especially shocked by the meals that were being served up to young children in the school cafeteria in the first school he visited in Huntington, and I remember being similarly shocked when I watched the UK version, Jamie's School Dinners.
While the meals may technically tick all the boxes with regards to Government nutrition guidelines, I would hate to think my children were being dished up processed, frozen and reheated pizza for breakfast, or chicken nuggets for lunch (washed down by flavoured milk).
Have a look at the (top) photo of a school meal that meets that US Federal guidelines here.
Or how about this promo video which shows some of the processed foods Jamie found in the school kitchen freezer?
Whether it was by design or default (I don't know, perhaps someone may be able to enlighten me) I think one of the cleverest choices Australia made before our time, was not to provide Government-subsidised school lunches. I suspect that when a Government delivers food, cost-cutting and efficiencies become paramount. In addition, parents lose some of the accountability of choosing what their children eat.
Australia has a strong culture of 'packed lunches'. Each child brings his or her own lunch to school, or selects and pays for his or her own from a school canteen (which doesn't always offer great food options, but that's another story). This places the total responsibility for that child's nutrition firmly back in the family fold. It doesn't mean parents always make great choices either, but at least we don't have to battle an institution and Government to ensure our children eat what we want them to. (We just have to battle stubborn children!)
On the other hand, the provision of subsidised meals can offer a guarantee that children are getting at least one meal a day which will be filling and will meet some nutrition guidelines, as not all children are fortunate enough to be well-fed at home.
What do you think? I'd be interested to hear the school-lunch experiences of readers in other parts of the world.
12 comments:
School meals were introduced in Scotland after WW2 to try to build up a nation of children who had gone through the food rationing rigours of that war.
We lived a hop, step and jump from our primary school and went home for lunch - but how I envied the chilren who stayed for lunch! I don't know why, because our chickens(chooks) got the leftovers and pink custard mixed with brown stew was not an appetising sight!!
On moving to High school I achieved my dream! The food was very basic -- Shepherd's pies, sausages, stews usually with potato, carrot, swede or cabbage and always Fish and chips on a Friday to comply with Roman Catholic preferences.
Desserts were all the old favourites, rice pudding ,bread pudding, steamed puddings and lots of custards -- including the pink!--with prunes or rhubarb.
By the time I had reached fifth year of High School I was nicking down to the cafe for a fried egg in a roll!!
I rather like the idea of school lunches - if done well. They would certainly have been better than the rancid cheese sandwiches from having sat in my hot schoolbag all morning that I was forced to eat as a kid.
Kate
When I went to Jr. & Sr. high school, we had the choice of packing our own lunches, or we could buy our lunch at school.
The lunch at school cost us 25 cents a day. For 5 cents we could have ice cream for dessert. I got my lunches for free, because I would work in the cafeteria during my study hall washing pots and pans plus the tables each day. The meals were tasty as I remember and healthy. Our drink of choice was white or chocolate milk, no sodas, only milks.
I've been watching Jamie's show ... I was so shocked when, despite finding out the ingredients, the kids still ate the chicken nuggets. HAving experienced what was on offer with school dinners when I taught in the UK ... I was absolutely horrified - I think Jamie Oliver is a legend for tackling such a huge issue. Makes me realise how preogressive our school canteen was in the 1980s ... it had a no junk food policy!
I don't know what the pupils at the high school across the road from my house have for lunch, but I do wonder whether any of them have breakfast at home. Many of them are eating take away food and drinking soft drinks on their way from the bus stop to the school. There is a similar pattern after school finishes. How much is being spent per pupil each day? There seems to be a lot of surplus disposable income.
First, I think you need to change the wallpaper - it's really doing my eyes in.
Boarding school food is probably as close as we get in Aus. I endured years of the same monotonous stodge. I still can't face jelly with fruit in it, served with cheap ice cream.
Keep the government out of it. What starts out idealistically is soon taken over by useless public servants.
We are still struggling with J.T. and his eating. Not helped by the fact that grandma has a hard time saying now and keeps stocks of not so healthy snacks and sodas on hand. We have soda, but lock it away.
I pack his school lunch to avoid the processed, fatty, salty mess that passes for school lunch. You are right... the government signs contracts for the cheapest products, resulting in processed, frozen, probably the flies won't eat it, lunches.
His lunch consists of Reduced fat peanut butter on whole grain crackers (he doesn't do bread), a low-fat yogurt, juice box and fruit, with a gingerbread man or dessert (which he sometimes doesn't eat).
My children go to schools in an affluent area with a high proportion of well-educated parents. Despite this the lunch choices provided by many of the parents is often dismal. Sugary drinks, chips, chocolate bars or anything pre-packaged. A proportion of the children get their breakfast on their way to school from the supermarket and often it's a can of coke.
So, I can see a role for school-provided lunches or a healthy canteen to cater for parents who are unable to pack a fresh lunch each morning. My daughter's school moved to being a healthy canteen two years ago. And by healthy I mean no crap whatsoever and all the food is made on site. they have doubled their profits and specifically intervened with families whose children were at risk of health issues from poor eating choices by encouraging those children at school.
Nanny state? maybe but as a mother whose timetable means that the kids have 2-3 lunch orders a week I am confident that they are getting a great lunch for a fair price.
As Mof says for primary school but we didn't envy the children who stayed for lunch. We felt sorry for them as most of us went home, even our fathers (mothers weren't working), so we reckoned there must be something awfully (is that a word?) wrong with their circumstances. Also as Mof says for High School as it was too far away. The downside was there was plenty so we could eat to burst and we did and then had a full meal at home at night so we all put on too much weight over the years of sitting in school all day and at homework at night. The serving of a lot of food in the fifities was also a reaction the the austerity of the war years.
My children had packed lunches but would have preferred school dinners – much better, all that sweet and stodge! So when SonofNanu went to 6th form college at 16 I decided he was adult enough with so many years of good nutritional training behind him to make good choices from the school canteen and I was, at long last relieved of making packed lunches. It only lasted a few weeks when he asked for them again as it was more a free-for-all than a queue in the canteen and it took too long wasting his lunch break!
P.S.
Referring to WW2 has reminded me of the primary school lunch-time when I got home to find my mother waiting for me with her coat on ready to go out. Word had gone round that the local greengrocer had had it's first delivery of bananas since the war began and ended. This must have been well after 1948 which was when I went to school. I didn't know what a banana was never having seen one – never mind having had one. My mother was going to queue during their lunch-hour (when they were closed) to get some. I had to eat my dinner alone, pull the door behind me and go straight back to school. I wasn't impressed with the banana! That's also reminded me of my first boiled egg as we had had war-time years of only dried egg and being told what a good girl I was for eating it all up. It was obviously a luxury for us city children. I wasn't impressed with it, either! I remember, too, later seeing dried egg in the grocer's and begging my mother to buy it but she wouldn't.
I'm frech and when my son when to school in Texas, I was shocked at what they give them in the school cafetaria: hamburger, burritos, hot dogs and so on ... The food was not good at all, tasted like nothing ... Most of my americans nephews and nieces are overweight or obese ....
In France, french kids have real 3 courses meals in the cafetarias. But french kids are getting fat too so the goverment is taking some actions like offering a fruit at recess to all kids, making sure the cafetaria menu is balanced. Some school also try to offer organic meals.
Post a Comment