School Dinners

[katex]

Well, once again in the morning, I am in the unlucky position of having to find another assortment of delicacies for my grandaughter's packed lunch. If it were up to me, she would lump or like school dinners!! Packed lunches has appeared to make her more selective (fussy) announcing last week that she doesn't really like sandwiches. Being a 'won't cook and can't cook' sorta' person I find this a really stressful exercise.
At the school my son attended, it was mandatory to stay for school dinners, no packed lunches, no nipping out to the chippie at lunch; dining with other pupils with a knife and fork and with the benifit of mealtime conversation was a bonus.
The fact that they were allowed no choice, gave the school the income and the fact that they knew how many captive diners they had to feed, afforded them the privilege of a menu to die for, with at least five choices of main course every day, including meat and two veg, vegetarian, foreign foods, sandwiches, fruit, yoghurts, puddings, etc., and never ran out of the favouries. A menu fit for a royal banquet every day.
Why did we get to this state then !! There would be no need for Jamie Oliver trying to bring some sort of suitable diet back into school dinners.

[cashman]

agree entirely with like or lump school dinners katex, the points you raise certainly did us no harm,and i know the younger ones will scoff and say "those were the days" i believe that the fact kids go out eg chippy or butty shop does not help the behaviour of kids today,i know there are decent kids but with the reports of bullying increases on tonights news (gathering outside) is a perfect breeding ground for the louts. at the end of the day its the decent responsible kids who are suffering.

[SPUGGIE J]

Considering what is served at school I cannot blame them looking for something different. A packed lunch is a good idea but as kate says if they are fussy its a nightmare. My daughter wood take cooked chicken thighs every day if she could with a packet of crisps a bannana and yogurts. Yet The high school around here just seems to empty to the shops and chippy at lunch time with the end result the council is there 13:30 on the dot cleaning up the mess as bins are the enemy. Yes there is bullying and to cashy's point it is getting worse and the school dosnt seem to worry. Its time for schools to put their foot down and sort out this mess.

[garinda]

I bet shares in semolina and tapioca plumetted when schools lunches stopped being mandatory.

[cashman]

kids who didn't like school dinners could always take a packed lunch,which is fine,but letting them congregate outside is not the answer.

[Debbie J]

My 7year old is on packed lunches. He doesn't like school dinners. After being away for the weekend & arriving home too late to buy bread e.t.c I pursuaded him to have a 'hated' dinner which I paid £1.60 for. He came home and ate almost everything in the fridge & cupboard, saying he had only eaten a bit of pizza which he didn't like & a banana for dinner. It cost me a fortune to fill him up so any idea I had of him having school dinners during the winter have gone right out the window.
Its back to boiling 2 eggs in a morning buttering crackers and buying yoghurts

[shillelagh]

When I went to school i had school dinners at primary school and hated every single one of them. Went to high school and in the first year i took butties and during winter mum used to make me a flask up with soup in it and my butty box had bread to dip into it and either an orange or satsuma or apple if i didnt fancy it i used to swap it! But when i went to the 2nd year i went out for dinner or stopped in school for dinners because you didnt order your dinner like in the first or primary school you could just go to the canteen and pay for what you had.

Im a volunteer in my old primary school now and school dinners are way better than what we had and there is only 35 pupils having school dinners - the rest are all on sandwiches.

By the way there is over 130 pupils in the school. And i know the school dinners are better because i had them not long ago!

[SPUGGIE J]

Originally Posted by garinda

I bet shares in semolina and tapioca plumetted when schools lunches stopped being mandatory.

Loved the stuff and still by it yummy.

[MUMMIBOO]

my kids take packed lunches! and quite often bring some back with them!! i find packed lunches better at least then i can keep an eye on what they are not eating. The only thing is they either dont have time to eat all the food they are given because the jnrs are going for their dinner and the infants have to go out or some of the other children taunt them about what they are eating my daughter likes raisins and she all of a sudden stopped eating them the other kids were going EEeeww your not gonna eat that are you and so now she wont eat them. But i then got her some raisins in yoghurt and the other kids dont know they are raisins but its not the point why so they make her feel she cant eat it just because they dont like it! To me thats bullying its not been to bad since she went back but it just goes to show what goes on at meal times eh!!

[SPUGGIE J]

Taunted and bullied for what they like eating. If its getting that bad the school should be there to protect them. A child should be able to eat a packed lunch with the same enjoyment as the chip butty brigade.

[noseforastory]

think it's too easy to say your son, daughter doesnt like school dinners these days. most schools now offer varied menu and children perhpas must be told in stark terms if don'ty have mixed diet they will be unhealthy and fat, and pay for it in later life. Parents have to be strong rather than caving in and digging out the oven chips and processed rubbish and sweets just to keep little johnny happy. Schools are doing their best - gone is the stodge so to blame them is too easy and in most cases wrong.

[talentedbutslow]

Originally Posted by SPUGGIE J

Loved the stuff and still by it yummy.

bet you used to put jam in the middle of it .....and stir it around to make it pink....

[SPUGGIE J]

Originally Posted by talentedbutslow

bet you used to put jam in the middle of it .....and stir it around to make it pink....

Blast caught out. Yes I do and I love it and proud of it.

[West Ender]

My granddaughter's school does excellent dinners. They produce a menu every month, to be brought home, and Laura is allowed to choose whether she has packed lunch or school meal. It works out about half and half. When she has packed lunch it is usually a sandwich (tuna or cheese), cucumber wedges or carrot sticks, a yoghurt and a fruit. The school dinners are healthy and there's always a choice of fruit for pudding.

When I was at primary school, St Mary's on Moscow Mill St., the dinners were, on the whole, revolting. They were prepared in the kitchens at Moor End school and delivered, in huge canisters, by van so they were invariably nearly cold before they arrived on the plate. By the age of 8 I'd started to go home for lunch, which meant running hell-for-leather from Moscow Mill St. to Church Commercial to get the Blackburn bus to West End. I must have been quite a runner as I made it home in 20 minutes. Mum always had lunch ready as I walked in, always a cooked lunch, and there was time to eat it and chill out for a short while before getting the Ribble bus back (12 minutes past 1 from Spread Eagle St), off at the Palladium and hell-for-leather again back to school for 1.30.

You could say that it was school dinners, or at least avoiding them, that kept me very slim and very, very fit.

[entwisi]

I used to take packed lunch. My mum used to make us 2 doubles of butties which were always topped with homemade picallilli. I used to sell one double to my mate(caused he loved my mums picallilli) and use the cash to buy chocolate bars