The Kitchenette
Guest blogger: Denver area school lunch experience
The Kitchenette
Top picture: my lunch; Bottom picture (clockwise from top): Brianna’s dressing, “Primo Taglio” turkey slices, cheddar cheese, Fage 2% greek yogurt, EarthGrains 100% natural thins, organic baby spinach
The Yoplait I ate last time did have HFCS in it — I shouldn’t have been surprised since I didn’t read the label. I’m done with Yoplait now that I know that. Instead I bought greek yogurt based on your suggestions (even though I have had it before and I’m not a fan). I have to force it down because of the thick, extra clumpy texture. I wanted to drizzle honey on it, but I couldn’t find my honey in the cupboard or in the fridge door! I know I have some…it’s just a matter of finding it. Where do you store your honey?
The salad is in a deep bowl (I’m not sure you can tell from the shot). I sprinkled raspberries (organic) and walnuts on the spinach leaves (like I said before I’m not a fan of plain lettuce). I bought new poppyseed dressing (we have some vinagrettes in the fridge – eh) and it was tasty (I’ve had the Brianna’s brand before – good stuff). I enjoyed every mouthful of today’s salad. And I made the salad again for dinner.
I know this lunch is better than my “tuna melt” meal. Today I felt full until around 4 pm, which is longer than any of the school lunches I ate during the school year. On the other hand, demands at home are less than working at school so it’s possible I didn’t burn as many calories. I welcome your thoughts and feedback on what I ate for lunch!
“Pimp my lunch” is going to be a regular feature this summer. If you would like to participate by posting your lunch and having readers critique your midday meal, fill out the little linky form below. Make sure to post the link to your actual blog post. I’m looking forward to seeing what you are making at home (and giving you feedback if I can think of anything to improve).
Please feel free to contact me if I can assist your efforts in any way. American’s children need all of us working together to insure their healthy future.
Dayle Hayes, MS, RD
2010-2011 Chair, School Nutrition Services DPG
President, Nutrition for the Future
Blogging at Nutrition for the Future
Champion, School Meals That Rock
Author, Treasure Your Families Health: Back to Basics 2010
Columnist, The Billings Gazette
I just opened up the poll for June (running a tad late) so please vote when you the chance. There were only four nominees this time around so it won’t take you long to cast your vote!
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Last month’s winner Lisa Suriano of Veggiecation recorded an acceptance speech on her blog, which you can watch below:
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Fantastic speech! Thanks so much for your hard work and dedication to kids. This blog is dedicated to everyone who works to make kids’ lives healthier at school and at home!
What kids drink at school is just about as important as what they eat.
1) Milk – I don’t drink milk anymore myself. But I support milk for kids when it’s hormone-free (which I don’t think it is in my district). Among the readers there seems to be a bunch of folks who prefer full-fat and those that don’t. Personally I support full fat. The reason is that it appears that eating fat doesn’t make you fat. Additionally, it’s a good source of fat (better than trans fat) and there doesn’t seem to be enough good fat in the school lunches I eat. See my previous post on milk for ingredients.
2) Water – Regular fountain access (water of dubious quality) and bottles sent from home (or bought in high school). I will post about school water next week.
3) Juice – Offered as the “fruit” in many of the lunches I ate. Additionally juice boxes are a popular home lunch box item. I’m planning a post on juice boxes too….
4) Sports drinks – Not available in elementary school, but are prevalent among student-athletes.
5) Soda? (pop?) – Banned in the majority of elementary schools and some high schools. Is it still offered in a lot of high schools?
Am I missing any? Please discuss drinks at school…
Bonus for the adults: I couldn’t get a good picture of the cappucino mix labels, but here’s the ingredient list for the “Red Line French Vanilla Cappucino” (the extra caffeine version):
Many of you have wanted to know what I eat at home for lunch. Well, here’s a home lunch I had this week. I love tuna melts (1/2 can chunk light tuna with real mayo, extra sharp cheddar, thin sandwich bread) and a yogurt, and an apricot. I’m not taking pictures of all of my lunches, but the occasional few… My husband laughed when I took a picture of the hospital breakfast the other morning and said, “Old habits die hard.” Too true.
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Yesterday I participated in an interview with Andy Bellatti. We’ve tweeted a lot (Twitter) and so we finally got a chance to chat. To listen to our discussion, visit his blog.
I wish I could walk by a fruit stand every day. I used to live in a walkable neighborhood, but I don’t anymore. My husband and I walked to a health food store, the regular grocery, or just out to dinner. No car required. I miss it.
My old walkable neighborhood did not have fresh fruit out on the street like this though. It’s so easy to snack healthily when you walk by fruit stands everywhere instead driving through Mc*Donalds’ drive-thrus. What happened to the neighborhood fruit stands? There isn’t money in it I guess.
One commenter recently mentioned “fruit vending machines” and how prevalent there were in the 1970’s. We already have refrigerated vending (soda) — how hard would it be to obtain refrigerated fruit vending machines? It could be the “fruit stand of the future” (but really it has already been done). Like so many things in life, we need to go back in time.