School lunchs in other countries.

[elfs]

One of the things that I've found recently, in my job search, and for no reason I can fathom, is School Lunch Talk, a website about, well, school lunches. One of the things they've been discussing recently is school lunch programs in other countries. Here's Japan:

Japanese schoolchildren eat lunch in the classroom, and students take turns serving the meal and cleaning up afterward. Their teacher eats the same food with them - typically rice, soup, fish and milk - and pays close attention to manners. Virtually all students eat the school lunch, as they're usually not allowed to bring their own food.

Lunch in Japanese schools is part of the curriculum just like math or science.

And here's France:

Basque chicken thigh with herbs, red and green bell peppers and olive oil; couscous; organic yogurt and an apple. For snack, they had organic bread, butter, hot chocolate and fruit.

The French take school lunch seriously. The mid-day meal is supposed to teach students good manners, good taste and the elements of good nutrition. Recommendations from the French government assert that eating habits are shaped from a young age and that schools should ensure children make good food choices despite media influence and personal tendencies.

And Italy:

On a recent Friday, students in the northern city of Piacenza ate zucchini risotto and mozzarella, tomato and basil salad. Tomorrow they're getting pesto lasagna, a selection of cheeses and a platter of garden vegetables. Meat only shows up on menus only once or twice a week, and it's usually not the main course.

Italy views lunch as an integral part of a student's education. School meals are supposed to teach children about local traditions and instill a taste for the regional food. To that end, Italian law allows schools to consider more than just price when making contracts with meal providers. Schools can take into account location, culture and how foods fit into the curriculum.

That's a pretty impressive set of distinctions between school lunch in other countries and the school lunch that Omaha and I had the other day: USDA Cutter quality burgers, iceberg lettuce and "creamy vinagrette" dressing, unripened watermelon, guar gum-laden cookies, and a half pint of milk.

In the US, the tendency has been to view the cafeteria as a necessity: we have to feed the kids to keep them from collapsing somewhere in the afternoon, and we have to provide a cafeteria (and government money) to feed the children from poor families. There are abstract nutritional posters and the classrooms handle "nutrition" seperately from the actual act of feeding the kids. Reading through these examples from other countries, though, I know how poorly we're failing our kids now.

Comments

[shockwave77598.livejournal.com]

Yes, but these countries you cite also have higher taxes to pay for it. They also don't have conservatives crying about feeding the children of unwed crack mothers, either.

There were times growing up, when the school lunch was the only meal I got in the day.

[gromm.livejournal.com]

"They also don't have conservatives crying about feeding the children of unwed crack mothers, either."

Are you sure? France has flip-flopped between religious conservative and socialist several times this past century, just as the US has. I know for certain that prostitution for example, has been outlawed and decriminalized at least twice. Even the Netherlands has a right wing population you know. And the French and Italians are famous for being Catholic countries.

However, France and Italy have an ingrained cultural belief that food - especially good food - is Very Important. It doesn't surprise me in the least that lunch is more a subject in school than it is a break from school. Italy is also very gung-ho about its traditional dishes. Jamie Oliver says deviating from traditional recipes is just not something you do in many towns if you want to have friends.

[halloranelder.livejournal.com]

Have you seen the "School Dinners" special by Jamie Oliver (British celebrity cook)? I think that's what it was called.

From what I saw of it, UK School dinners were much, much worse than the US ones, and it was only as a result of the special (and his attempts to cook nutritious, healthy, tasty food that the kids would want) that the UK government changed it's way of thinking about the whole thing.

[bldrnrpdx.livejournal.com]

The Head Start I serve has 'family style' meals. The food is somewhere between bland and abysmal, but mealtime is part of the curriculum. Kids take turns setting the table, everyone sits together regardless of whether they eat (most of the classes are half-day, so some kids eat breakfast/lunch at home), the teachers eat with the kids, and manners (of a sort) are part of the program. I can't say as nutrition as a teaching point really enters into it, but as bad as the food sometimes is, there is always a vegetable (cucumber slices, salad, overcooked broccoli) and a fruit at the main meal (breakfast or lunch), and there is almost always a fruit of some sort (whole, canned, or processed like applesauce) at snack time. The vast majority of kids in Head Start also come from families who qualify for reduced-price or free school meals, so we know it's an important part of the kids' day just from a "will they get to eat more than one meal today?" standpoint.

[urox.livejournal.com]

I'll take overcooked broccoli over the al dente rice from my *work* cafeteria.

Rice

[(Anonymous)]

Most likely "Uncle Bens Perverted rice", why Uncle Bens exists I don't know how hard is it to cook rice? Especially with a rice cooker.

[zonereyrie.livejournal.com]

Damn, those lunches make me hungry.

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

Cripes, that's better than most Americans eat when they're adults!

[gromm.livejournal.com]

The French and Italians take eating and cooking very, very seriously, you know. It's not at all surprising.

Why...

[ideaphile.livejournal.com]

Why do you assume that website is giving you useful information? It looks like propaganda to me. For all you know, they've described the three most generous and most expensive school-lunch programs in the whole world.

Congratulations, you're being manipulated again.

Just because someone is pushing an agenda you agree with doesn't mean they're honest.

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