Today’s menu: meatloaf, bread, fruit cup, mystery greens (!), milk
To qualify for the label “meatloaf” I think meat should be baked in a loaf pan and then sliced. So given that definition, it is obvious that what I ate today is not meatloaf, but instead a meat patty.
And I was so thrilled to see what I assumed to be spinach!! I was floored. But then when I took a bite they were so very bitter. After work I chatted with my mom about it and she thinks they are collard greens. Frankly, it looks like spinach. But I’m not sure it was. All I can say is that this was the first time I could not finish my veggies during this experiment. I had three bites of the most bitter greens I have ever tasted. Can someone enlighten me as to what I ate?
So basically I ate the meat and the bread for lunch.
Additionally, yesterday’s “day-glo” cornbread muffin was normal colored in real life. There are flourescent lights in school and I also use a cell phone camera so I guess that made it look funny. The picture didn’t look very distorted to me though.
Are collard greens the same thing than Swiss chard?? 😕
To Sonia… (from jesusismagic)
"Making vegetables flavoursome does not cost the school extra money, using non -reconstituted meat wont mean no books for kids."
Flavor is not the issue. Kids will always dislike nutrient rich greens because of the high chlorophilic flavor. Brining them in pork fat makes them tasty, but, in fact, less healthy. It is just simple fact that fresh ingredients cost more. I'm not sure why people think fresh baked whole wheat dough pizza with mozzarella and fresh marinara prepared by cafe staff (extra labor) would cost the same as the current pizza served. It is a reality that "better" food will cost more. Period.
Your statement: "Being denied a healthy lunch wont make kids think "i'm going to work that bit harder" just because it might have made you think that."
Actually, testing concluded time and time again and most psychologists agree that children who experience mild to moderate tribulation during the formative years become more successful well adjusted adults. Making children believe they are "owed" by society and have a birth right to a better life learn nothing. This is why this generation will be the first to not exceed it's parents generation in wealth. This a bad lesson to teach. Charity is good for the deserving, but anyone who has ever received charity is grateful for what is given. Haitian refugees aren't screaming "this water you sent has toxins! We need filtered water!" It is only us who are so spoiled to look gift horses in mouths and ask the giver for a faster horse.
"It probably means for many that the 1 hot meal they get per day is bereft of any nutritional benefit! Not all families care about feeding their kids and if we can turn to schools to care, at no cost, then where is the harm?!"
All of the meals featured so far have included healthy, hearty nutritional benefit. Although most adults are biased against carbs (see fads Atkins, Paleo, etc.) carbs are essential to growth, energy and development. All meals contain a protien, a fruit and/or vegetable with a healthy drink option. This is probably more nutritious than what most children eat for lunch who buy it at the schools because they just end up with chips, soda and a candy bar.
Also, children on free/reduced lunch get 2 meals per day ar school. Breakfast & lunch.
I must say that this sentence blows me away:
"and if we can turn to schools to care, at no cost, then where is the harm?!"
We do to turn schools to care. For EVERYTHING.
At no cost?? Wha? Huh?
The harm is funds needed in other areas being syphened off to food or more taxpayer dollars.
I applaud the author of this blog for advocating more PE time and if there is more money to spend, that's exactly where it should go. The get thin quick answer to health is to tweek your diet, but the lasting solution for your overall physical and mental health and endurance is physical activity and fresh clean air. All of which are free.
Anita, I'm not sure we are talking about the same thing.
You have to make less than a certain amount of household income to qualify for free lunch. The school requires you prove your income. This is the same threshold for public assistance. They are one in the same so the middle class does not have a dog in this fight. Kind of…
Some citizens on the lower end of middle class get reduced lunch. That means they chip in a dollar or so for schools lunch. Most of those kids end up buying the junk food instead, just like the rest of the middle/upper class unless their parents take the time to pack thier lunch. Which is all the more reason to not increase funding for free lunch because guess who shoulders that cost? That's right, The Middle class. If we get to the point in the society where the Middle class begins to demand all the same charitable benifits given to the truly poor, than we are literally headed towards socialism. By literal, I mean textbook definition. Middle class demanding free lunch, and therefor higher taxes to pay for fancier school lunches (the kind of food equivalent to thier lifestyle and social status)is no less expensive than packing a lunch to begin with. You are robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Your increasing the panache of lunch for everyone but only 10% or so of the recipients of the benefit will shoulder the cost. You are nipping money from some, those you deem more capable (middle class) and redistributing it evenly across the table. The lunch table in this case. Like I said in my first post, I was poor. I knew I was poor. Being poor sucked. My free lunch and ugly clothes reminded me every day that there was only one way to do better and only one person who could make it better for me, and that was me. If I had gourmet organic chicken for lunch every day and fresh sneakers, it would have never occurred to me that I have to WORK for what I received. But my teachers taught me that I had an option and showed me a way to get there. THAT is where our money and focus needs to be. I can't expect people who've never been poor (not broke- poor) to understand this point of view, but I this is truth; this is fact.
~jesusismagic
PS. If you have ever fed your children fast food for lunch, you have fed them food much, much worse than this. Let's not be too self-righteous, and let's be thankful for the great country we have and the opportunities it offers to everyone of every station, status and class level.
I vote collard greens.
@jesusismagic
I can appreciate your perspective that the kids should be thankful for what they're getting. I agree. Also, I agree that there's too much of a focus on schools raising kids rather than parents.
However, you seem to not comprehend the underlying problem with these pre-packaged lunches. In one of Mrs. Q's earlier posts she mentions that the company that makes these lunches is part of the same corporation as fast-food retailers like Wendy's.
So the real issue is that the parents are being deceived into thinking that their kids are receiving proper school lunch when really the lunch manufacturer is giving the kids food that will get them into the pattern of eating unhealthy, fast-food. They're being given foods high in salt, fat, etc because it's in the corporation's best interest to create customers for life.
In other words, the lunches that these kids are being given are part of a corporate system that is geared toward making money and not towards providing healthy foods. They're in it for the money. Period.
And the big part of the issue is that even if these kids one day have a choice in what they can eat, habits are really hard to change. So they're most likely going to choose the unhealthy foods in the future too. That's part of the reason why overweight people have such a hard time keeping weight off because they just go back to old habits before they lost weight.