The Disgusting Nature of the School Cafeteria- Part 1

Though I have been talking about the vile nature of my middle school cafeteria food selections for many years. I have a new sense of urgency about speaking out about it. It started with watching Jamie Oliver's TED talk, and it has continued with the Food Revolution show by the same Jamie Oliver. Over the next few weeks, I will be taking some pictures of items in our cafeteria as examples of the problem, and explaining my hope for the future of school cafeterias. I know that I am headed to a district in the fall that has stated that they are focused on big shifts in what is served to our kids for breakfast and lunch, so I hope to see how it should be done in the future.

In an effort of full disclosure, I do eat 90% of my lunches in our cafeteria because I do believe that there are ways to cobble together a decent lunch each day, but this is certainly not the path of 80% or more of our students.

Part 1- Rockin Blue Raspberry Applesauce

I don't mean to be picking on blue raspberry (is there actually such a thing?) because we have had GRAPLESAUCE (grape+applesauce) also. The bottom line is that we don't need to add color or sugar to regular applesauce. We need to continue to offer a variety of fruit choices. There are some days when we do this, and there are others that we resort to this food-like stuff. It seems like removing this item would be an easy start to changing our cafeteria. I can't imagine that having it is a huge cost benefit or that it encourages more fruit consumption.

I'm starting easy. The tough stuff will come in future days. Any thoughts on school lunches. What should it look like? Anyone interested in changing the farm bill or contacting the USDA?