School Food on the Frontlines: It’s been a COVID year for Dawndrea and her one woman show!

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Posted on March 30, 2021 by schoolmealsthatrock

Dawndrea Daly, has been the Foodservice Coordinator in Platte County #2 School District (Wyoming) for 6 years. The district is located in the very rural town of Guernsey, about two hours north of Cheyenne. It serves 244 students, with a pre-pandemic free/reduced rate of 44 percent. Before school closed in March, the school was providing 160 to 180 lunches (depending on the menu) and 80 breakfasts. Currently, with all students back in school, Daly reports that they are serving 160 breakfasts and 160 to 180 lunches (again depending on the menu).

What was the biggest challenge that you had to overcome in the past year?

When COVID-19 closed all schools in Wyoming in March 2020, Dawndrea Daly became at “one-woman show” at Guernsey High School. While other foodservice employees were reassigned by the superintendent, she kept the kitchen lights on – and she kept on serving breakfast and lunches to any student who came to pick them up. Daly admits that the “first week was insane” but she knew that it had to be done, so she did it. From March through August 2020, she offered curbside pickup by car, bicycle and wagon – and she served a grand total of 16,210 meals. She ordered the food (which became a major challenge during supply chain shortages), prepared the meals and packaged the meals by herself. She had help with curbside pickup from administration – but all the rest was up to her.

**Ready to distribute meals to hungry students in Guernsey, Wyoming**

What achievement are you the proudest of in the past year?

Dawndrea Daly is not one to brag about her achievements. She says that she was just doing her job and making sure that kids were fed – and fed well. She did want the community to know that school meals are important to children and families. The gratitude and appreciation that she has received from making over 16,000 meals is beyond anything she ever expected. In fact, she received statewide recognition as a Wyoming hero when she was invited by Governor Gordon and his wife Jennie to attend and lead the Pledge of Allegiance for the Governor’s virtual Prayer Breakfast in March 2021. Dawndrea was proud to represent all school foodservice professionals at the breakfast and honored to meet state leaders. Once the weather is better, she hopes to ride her Harley back to Cheyenne and to visit with the Wyoming’s First Lady again.

What innovation have you made that you will continue using in the future?

For the past several years. Daly has gone above and beyond in her role as Foodservice Coordinator, applying for many successful grants. She received a Salad Bars for Schools grant from the Chef Ann Foundation, a USDA Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Grant and a Geodome for students to grow fresh vegetables (which will be back up and running as soon as COVID precautions allow).

Right now, she might be running the only salad bar in Wyoming – with a plexiglass front and a dedicated staff member who builds a salad from items chosen by each student. It’s not at all surprising that someone who made thousands of meals by herself would find a way to safely continue using a salad bar to benefit her student customers. Hey COVID, I think you met your match in Guernsey, Wyoming!

#SchoolLunch is GREAT in GREELEY

Posted on May 4, 2017 by schoolmealsthatrock

First grader Shayla chooses flavorings for her egg pop.

There are three great reasons to share my recent visit to Greeley-Evans School District 6 in Colorado. First, there has been lots of recent attention to school lunch acceptability and food waste related USDA school meals nutritional standards. Secondly, it is School Nutrition Employee Wellness Week culminating on May 5, with School Lunch Hero Day. And, finally, farm to school remains one of the hottest trends in school meals.

Greeley Central High School salad bar is well-loved.

Greeley-Evans School District 6 Nutrition Services is dedicated to getting delicious school food into hungry kids. In a district with 22,000 students (67 percent eligible for free or reduced meals) located in a population-boom town (4^th fastest growth in the US), everything starts in a 12,000 square foot central production facility where nearly 100 percent of the district’s meals are prepared from scratch and sent out in bulk to schools. On my tour with district Chef Matthew Poling, I saw pallets of local Colorado red-skinned potatoes, boxes of frozen local, grass-fed beef, and 50-gallons drums of canned tomatoes direct from a California farm – as well as a commercial-sized chili roaster and a walk-in cooler of fresh produce. Why then do I have a photo of a messy salad bar with half empty containers? Because the high school students took – and ate – the produce. When I arrived at Greeley Central High School, it was standing room only on the Tierra Del Sol line. They actually they ran out of the burrito that I wanted for lunch (I did not go hungry; I enjoyed a Fuego Cheese Steak from the famous El Fuego Food Truck).

Greeley-Evans School District 6 celebrates all their school lunch heroes.

Before I ever entered a school, Director Danielle Bock gave me my very own School Lunch Hero Day button (distributed to every team member this week). During our tour, Danielle and I started with egg pop tasting in Chappelow K-8 Magnet School’s cafeteria at 7:30 AM and ended at a student-run coffee kiosk in Greeley West High School at 2:30 PM. During the intervening hours, I met dozens of school nutrition heroes – serving pancakes with mixed berry compote, explaining their Dance Party kits from the award-winning Student Wellness Program, scrubbing potatoes in the central kitchen, customizing sub sandwiches for teens, working the El Fuego Food Truck (and preparing my lunch), and sampling coffee with teen entrepreneurs at their student-run business.

Director Danielle Bock helps Chappelow students choose flavorings for their egg pops.

Greeley-Evans School District 6 is also a National Farm to School Network super-star – nearly 25 percent of their food purchases are local, with the rate increasing each year. The Greeley-Evans School District 6 Farm to School goals are ambitious and obviously achievable!

Continuously expanding local produce offerings during breakfast, lunch and in Fresh Fruit & Vegetable Program sites
Sourcing milk from local dairies
Integrating locally-raised beef and chicken into meals
Expanding and improving school garden programs
Increasing Farmer in the Classroom and Chef in the Classroom programming
Partnering with other Northern Colorado school districts to develop efficient and effective systems, like the USDA-funded District 6 Food Hub, to work with local producers

My day at Greeley-Evans School District 6 Nutrition Services was filled with enthusiastic school nutrition heroes, satisfied student customers, fresh food served with a smile, and support for the new frontiers of school food: think egg pops, food trucks, house-made hot sauce and coffee kiosks for teen entrepreneurs. I salute every staff member – and hope I can go back for lunch soon!

For details about these farms and links to their social media, go to goo.gl/ZUrbNR

10 Reasons to Ignore School Lunch Haters and Support #RealSchoolFood

Posted on August 20, 2015 by schoolmealsthatrock

By Dayle Hayes, MS, RD

NOTE: This blog was originally posted in April 2015. Sadly, more than two years later, some of the same lunch haters are still sharing the same out-of-date photos and information. Seriously, it is 2017 and #RealSchoolFood has evolved across the USA. Read my 10 reasons below, then go help serve #SummersMeals to hungry kids in your community. THAT is where the child really meets the tray!

To all the mommy bloggers, food celebrities, academic researchers, restaurant chains and media channels who want to blame School Lunch for the ills of the US food system (while promoting their own products, endorsements and programs), it’s time to STOP. Trying to refute your inaccurate claims, staged photos, out-date sound bites and negative descriptions is a waste of precious time we could be working together to support #RealSchoolFood for real hungry kids all across America. If you really want to improve school meals, here are 10 effective ways to support the hard-working school nutrition HEROES who are reshaping local and national food systems, teaching kids about where food comes from, and feeding millions of children their best meals of the day – every day – in thousands of schools across our country.

#1: Please get some real photos of #RealSchoolFood. Your staged, stock and decades-old examples do a terrible disservice to the dedicated chefs and cooks who offer gorgeous cafeteria lines, produce bars and grab-n-go options to students every day. Need help finding photos? We’ve got your back with thousands of photos on Facebook and Pinterest. Tray Talk also features #RealSchoolFood from hundreds of districts. These gorgeous salads are from Polk County Schools in Florida.

New Chopped Salads on the menu this Fall! Asian Chicken and Buffalo Chicken. Polk School Nutrition, Polk County, Florida

#2: Please move on from ‘ketchup is a vegetable.’ Seriously people, check your facts. This was a stupid proposal in 1981 which never made it into a regulation. Before you complain, learn the details of the Healthy, Hungry-Free Kids Act of 2010. There are specific requirements for five different vegetable sub-groups, including Red-Orange. This is how schools are promoting colorful produce and #RealSchoolFood to students all across Tennessee this fall.

These gorgeous banners, shown here by Chelsea Cordes, RDN, in Shelby County Schools, are a healthy collaboration between the Department of Education and the Governor’s Foundation for a Healthy Tennessee.

#3: Please read the research comparing school lunch to lunches brought from home. Studies from Baylor (TX), Tufts (MA) and Virginia Tech (VA) confirm that lunches brought from home rarely meet the tough nutrition standards now required in all USDA school meals programs. Many contained sugary drinks and snack foods that cannot be sold as #RealSchoolFood.

A Tufts study published Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics showed lunches brought from home had lots of packaged food and sugary drinks

#4: Please dig deeper into the causes of food waste in schools. Kids throw away perfectly picked organic oranges and bento box baby bananas with cute notes written on them – just like they throw away school lunch items. Two of the best solutions to reducing food waste in cafeterias work for #RealSchoolFood and lunches brought from home: Recess Before Lunch and Longer Lunch Periods

USDA Analysis of Food Waste Solutions in School

#5: Please recognize that school nutrition professionals frequently do not have needed administrative support. School nutrition heroes have a tough balancing act with complex government regulations, limited budgets and limited input into school schedules that affect recess options and the length of lunch periods. Like you, they care deeply about feeding children well – and are trying to do the best they can with what they have. Maybe you can work together on a grant for a salad bar or school garden? Many of the #RealSchoolFood veggies served in Kalispell, Montana, schools come directly from the school garden.

Kalispell, Montana, Schools feature greens grown at school. A fabulous director and FoodCorps Montana work together to grow ‪#‎SchoolGardens‬, serve ‪#‎RealSchoolFood‬ and nourish healthy eating habits.

#6: Please talk WITH rather than AT school nutrition directors. Arrange a friendly meeting with your local nutrition director. Find out about their everyday challenges and what changes they would make if they could – maybe new equipment or more local foods. Find out how you can work together to do what’s best for kids. If you look for common ground, you are likely to find it. Believe every school should have a school garden? Get out there and help a school grow one for #RealSchoolFood to be served in your district. The amazing Waterford Edible Schoolyard has dozens of amazing volunteers, especially during the busy summer months.

THANKS to the Waterford Edible Schoolyard: “72 pounds delivered to the kitchen today – bringing our total to 175+ lbs since June! The peas are in with a vengeance, tomatoes are starting to ripen, and we can’t seem to pick the cucumber and zucchini fast enough smile emoticon.”

#7: Please be realistic because nutrition perfection is just not possible on $1.50-1.75 per meal. That’s how much the average school district has to spend directly on food. While meal prices and USDA reimbursement rates provide more money, that also goes to pay for labor, equipment and overhead costs. If you want all organic, GMO-free, clean-label, local, scratch-cooked meals, you are going to have to help schools lobby local, state and federal decisions makers to provide more money for school meals. 2015 is a critical year for child nutrition and childhood food insecurity. This fall Congress will reauthorize funding for the critical local programs that support healthy children, schools and communities, including School Breakfast Programs, National School Lunch Programs, WIC Programs and Farm to School Programs. 2015 is a time to advocate for fresh, local, delicious #RealSchoolFood rather than pointing fingers and telling families “avoid school lunch like the plague.” THIS is #RealSchoolFood lunch in Greenville, South Carolina.

On August 20, 2015, Greenville County Schools students will have the option to choose from Turkey Pot Roast with a fresh baked roll, Scratch-made Mac-N-Cheese, a Fresh Fruit and Veggie Bar with four options of fresh fruit and four options of steamed vegetables, and ice cold milk!

#8: Please eat a #RealSchoolFood lunch. Send a message with your location to SchoolMealsThatRock@gmail.com and I’ll recommend a #RealSchoolFood cafeteria nearby you can enjoy hot lunch or a grab-and-go salad like these from Provo School District, Provo, Utah.

Grab n Go Salads at the secondary level and Chef Salads at the elementary level. First day choices first day delicious!

#9: Please consider the consequences of your criticisms. Be respectful and ditch blanket descriptions of school food like “hideous piles of indistinguishable vegetables” and “avoid like the plague.” When you use negative and judgmental language, it makes parents feel badly about letting their children eat at school, even if they can’t afford to pack a meal from home. Dedicated school nutrition heroes deserve your respect and thanks for all their training and hard work to feed kids #RealSchoolFood every day. This is why they do it – smiling face of hungry students, like this girl in Bradley County Schools, Cleveland, Tennessee.

North Lee Elementary Pre-K. Beautiful, healthy tray for smiling faces.

#10: Please be transparent about the companies who sponsor your post or blog or program. If your blog ends with photos of branded food products and lunch boxes, please indicate if they are sponsors or advertisers. I do consulting work for a variety of agricultural groups and a few companies, which are all disclosed below. Not a single one of them supported this post or provided input in any way.

Board Member/Advisory Panel
- American Association of School Administrators (AASA) Breakfast Council
- Kellogg’s Breakfast Council
Consultant
- US Department of Agriculture and Team Nutrition Program
- Multiple state departments of education and agriculture
- California Walnut Commission
- The Mushroom Council
- Cherry Marketing Institute
- American Egg Board
- CLIF bar
- Chobani Yogurt
- Bush Beans
Speaker’s Bureau
- National Dairy Council and state/regional dairy councils
- National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and state beef councils

10 Ways School Lunch Haters Can Get Off Their Soapboxes and Support #RealSchoolFood

Posted on April 1, 2015 by schoolmealsthatrock

By Dayle Hayes, MS, RD

To all the mommy bloggers, food celebrities, academic researchers, restaurant chains and media channels who want to blame School Lunch for the ills of the US food system (while promoting their own products, endorsements and programs), I’ve had it. Trying to refute your inaccurate claims, staged photos, out-date sound bites and negative descriptions is a waste of precious time we could be working together to support #RealSchoolFood for real hungry kids all across America. Really want to improve school meals? Here are 10 effective ways to support the hard-working people who are reshaping local and national food systems, teaching kids about where food comes from, and feeding millions of children their best meals of the day – every day in thousands of schools across our country.

#1: Please get some real photos of #RealSchoolFood. Your staged, stock and decades-old examples do a terrible disservice to the dedicated chefs and cooks who offer gorgeous cafeteria lines, produce bars and grab-n-go options to students every day. Need help finding photos? We’ve got your back with thousands of photos on Facebook and Pinterest (some with recipes like this Roasted Edamame Salad. Tray Talk also features #RealSchoolFood from hundreds of districts.

Eating their way through the alphabet for National Nutrition Month, Windham Raymond School District (RSU#14) in Maine, served Roasted Edamame Salad (adapted from an Alton Brown Recipe).

Eating through the alphabet for National Nutrition Month, Windham Raymond School District (RSU#14) in Maine, served Roasted Edamame Salad (adapted from an Alton Brown Recipe).

Sautéed and Steamed Georgia-Grown Green Beans and Tomatoes, Eat Healthy Eat Local Eat at Carrollton City Schools, Carrollton, Georgia·

#3: Please read the research comparing school lunch to lunches brought from home. Studies from Baylor (TX), Tufts (MA) and Virginia Tech (VA) confirm that lunches brought from home rarely meet the tough nutrition standards now now required in all USDA school meals programs. Many contained sugary drinks that cannot be sold in schools.

A Tufts study published Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics showed lunches brought from home had lots of packaged food and sugary drinks

#4: Please dig deeper into food waste in schools. Kids throw away perfectly picked organic oranges and bento box baby bananas with cute notes written on them – just like they throw away school lunch items. Two of the biggest solutions to food waste in cafeterias work for school lunches and lunches brought from home: Recess Before Lunch and Longer Lunch Periods

USDA Analysis of Food Waste Solutions in School

Poudre School District, Fort Collins. Colorado, offers daily produce bars with extensive choices.

Colonial School District, New Castle, Delaware, gets middle students excited about planting and growing vegetables.

#7: Please be realistic because nutrition perfection is just not possible on $1.50-1.75 per meal. That’s how much the average school district has to spend directly on food. While meal prices and USDA reimbursement rates provide more money, that also goes to pay for labor, equipment and overhead costs. If you want all organic, GMO-free, clean-label, local, scratch-cooked meals, you are going to have to help schools lobby local, state and federal decisions makers to provide more money for school meals. 2015 is a critical year for child nutrition and childhood food insecurity. This year Congress will reauthorize funding for the critical local programs that support healthy children, schools and communities, including School Breakfast Programs, National School Lunch Programs, WIC Programs and Farm to School Programs. 2015 is a time to advocate for fresh, local, delicious #RealSchoolFood rather than pointing fingers and telling families “avoid school lunch like the plague.”

Oakland Unified School District, Nutrition Services participates in CALIFORNIA THURSDAYS™ Day, along with many of the state's largest districts. So many delicious reasons to SMILE about ‪#‎SchoolMeals‬ in OUSD!

Oakland Unified School District, Nutrition Services participates in CALIFORNIA THURSDAYS™ along with many of the state’s largest districts.

#8: Please eat a #RealSchoolFood lunch. If you need a recommendation for a school cafeteria near you, send me an email at SchoolMealsThatRock@gmail.com.

Trish McDonald from Sky Oaks Elementary School (Minnesota District 191) sent this, saying that their kitchen "makes the BEST Vegetarian salads!"

Trish McDonald, Sky Oaks Elementary School (Minnesota District 191) says they “makes the BEST Vegetarian salads!”

The are no hideous piles of veggie in Reynolds School District, Portland, Oregon. There are beautiful cups of eye-appealing produce for students to grab.

There are no ‘hideous piles’ of veggies in Reynolds School District, Portland, Oregon. There are beautiful cups of eye-appealing produce for students to grab.

Board Member/Advisory Panel
- American Association of School Administrators (AASA) Breakfast Council
- Kellogg’s Breakfast Council
Consultant
- US Department of Agriculture and Team Nutrition Program
- Multiple state departments of education and agriculture
- Idaho Barley Commission
- Mushroom Council
- American Egg Board
- CLIF bar
- Chobani Yogurt
- Bush Beans
Speaker’s Bureau
- National Dairy Council and state/regional dairy councils
- National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and state beef councils

31 Days of #RealSchoolFood: MMMMM-Mushrooms in Schools

Posted on December 15, 2014 by schoolmealsthatrock

If you looked carefully at two of the salad bars in yesterday’s #RealSchoolFood post on Salad Bars Bring on the Produce, you may have noticed that they included fresh mushrooms. In the interest of full disclosure, I am proud to work as a nutrition consultant to the Mushroom Council on school-related issues – and I love to eat mushrooms of all types, raw, cooked and dried.

Although it might not seem immediately obvious, mushroom have a lot to offer to school meals. And, the Mushroom Council has made a real commitment to helping school nutrition programs maximize their use of mushrooms in fun and delicious ways with recipes and success stories on the Mushrooms in Schools website. My favorite photo is these fabulous ‘lunch ladies,’ part of ‘Mushroom Week’ in a New Orleans public school where students got learn about mushrooms in the classroom and eat them in the cafeteria. The student-made aprons are marvelously mushroom-y!

Lusher Elementary Lunch Ladies – ready for ‘Mushroom Week’ in New Orleans

Chef Robert Rusan, winner of a 2015 School Nutrition Foundation HERO Award may not wear a mushroom covered apron but he certainly knows how to maximize the unique umami potential of mushrooms. Known as the fifth taste, umami – the savory flavor of mushrooms – helps Rusan reduce the sodium in the Maplewood-Richmond Heights meals. Salads, stir-fries, pizza, meatballs and pasta dishes – mushrooms can be added effectively to many of students favorite meals and Rusan’s farm to school delights! Read about Chef Rusan’s Mushroom Success, as well as others, online.

Mushroom Creations from Chef Robert Rusan, Maplewood-Richmond Heights School District, Missouri

For school nutrition directors, as well as home cooks, blendability is one of the most exciting features of mushrooms. Finely diced or chopped mushrooms taste, look, act and perform like ground meat. When mixed with ground beef and other meats, the nutritional profile of finely diced mushrooms allows schools to serve students some of the favorite foods, while meeting the new Meal Patterns. In Cincinnati Public Schools, Director Jessica Shelley diverted USDA beef for further processing with USDA Foods IQF Mushrooms to make a burger patty with beef and mushrooms. Lower calories, fat, and sodium allowed for additional menu choices, including a Turkey Bacon Cheeseburger which fits guidelines – and lower costs as well. Read more about this blendability success story online or below.

Mushroom Blendability Success Story from Cincinnati Public Schools

For more about the availability of mushroom blended products, check with your meat processor. Several companies have multiple products. For more about creating your own blended items, recipes and news, visit Mushrooms in Schools.

31 Days of #RealSchoolFood: Salad Bars Bring on the Produce

Posted on December 14, 2014 by schoolmealsthatrock

“Schools clearly have a role in providing healthy foods to children. Our data suggest that the most vulnerable students are benefitting the most from school food.” A recently published study by Dr. Madeline Dalton, PhD, The Hood Center for Children and Families at Dartmouth College, confirms that school meals are important source of produce for low-income adolescents. According to her co-author Dr. Meghan Longacre, “Innovation in school food offerings for kids has emphasized increased consumption of fruits and vegetables and it’s working for low-income kids, but the evidence shows that a different strategy may be needed to have the same positive effect on high income kids.”

The innovation the authors refer to includes the requirements of the 2010 Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act and changes in Meal Patterns to increase the quantity and variety of produce offerings at school. A quick look at three school salad bars from Southern states – an area not known for its fresh vegetable consumption – confirms that students are enjoying incredible produce options at school.

Lusher High School, New Orleans, Louisiana

This gorgeous salad bar in a New Orleans Charter School includes everything from common celery to more exotic fresh mushrooms. These teens in this school can clearly enjoy a wide variety of flavors, textures and nutrition along with their lunch entrée. In many schools, teens are to take as many fruits and vegetables as they want. Middle School students in Carrollton, Georgia, can enjoy these colorful choices as part of the district’s Eat Healthy Eat Local Eat at Carrollton City Schools initiative.

Carrollton Middle School Salad Bar, Carrollton City Schools, Georgia

Up in Harrisonburg, Virginia, the High School Salad Bar is truly impressive. Like her colleague Dr. Linnette Dodson in the Carrollton, Georgia, Harrisonburg’s School Nutrition Director Andrea Early works hard to source as many local items for the produce bar as possible.

Harrisonburg (VA) High School Salad Bar

Of course, the most important question is: Do teens really dig into these beautiful displays and increase their intake of fruits and vegetables? The answer, according to a January 2014 Evaluation of the Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools Initiative is a resounding success! As reported by the Gretchen Swanson Center for Nutrition (GSCN) the successful outcomes of salad Bar Implementation included:

Increased students’ access to fresh fruits and vegetables
Most schools reported increased student participation in school lunch (57%)
School administrators, teachers, staff, and parents became more supportive of salad bars
A majority of schools reported purchasing more fruits and vegetables (78%)
Schools used fresh, pre-cut fruits and vegetables for salad bars (81%)

Additional results of the evaluation are outlined in this infographic from the report.

Evaluation of the Let’s Move Salad Bars to Schools Initiative

31 days of #RealSchoolFood: Pinterest is THE Place

Posted on December 8, 2014 by schoolmealsthatrock

Every time there’s a wave of ‘bad school lunch’ photos, like #ThanksMichelleObama (which mostly backfired due to a poor choice of hashtags), people look to School Meals That Rock to respond. Now, thanks to our packed Pinterest page, we can! Thanks to lots of photos from across the USA, we now have 86 boards, 2,618 pins and 1,618 followers.

While we are proud of these numbers, we are not just trying to brag. School food Pinterest boards, like ours, can be incredibly useful when promoting #RealSchoolFood. Just today, a client wanted to know what school salad bars look like, so I directed her to our board School SALAD BARS That Rock. There she could see 40 colorful produce bars in schools from Washington state to Florida. (You could use this page to get some inspiration for upping the game on your local salad bar too!)

School Meals That Rock PINTEREST, School SALAD BARS That Rock (12-2014)

Or say someone asked you about the fruit choices available in schools? Our most recent pin is the incredible fruit display you see below from one of our district boards CANYONS SCHOOL DISTRICT, Utah, Rocks. This district, along with 17 others and The John Stalker Institute (Massachusetts) have boards on our page. They can pin photos directly to the board and then share their unique URL, like this one for Gooding Idaho Schools (www.pinterest.com/schoolmealsrock/gooding-idaho-school-meals-that-rock/) with their customers and colleagues.

High School Fruit Prep, Canyons School District, Utah

If you’d like a board on School Meals That Rock Pinterest page, send an email to SchoolMealsThatRock@gmail.com WITH the email address used in your Pinterest account. We’ll get you set up with a board asap and you can pin away.

The good news is School Meals That Rocks is not the only Pinterest page in the school food game. Here are three recommendations – if you know of others that we should be following, please let us know.

Tray Talk (School Nutrition Association): www.pinterest.com/traytalk/
FoodCorps (national): www.pinterest.com/foodcorps/ (some state FoodCorps have there own Pinterest boards too)
School Food Rules (CSPI): www.pinterest.com/FoodRevolution/school-foods-rule/

31 Days of #RealSchoolFood: Lunch Is All About Choices

Posted on December 3, 2014 by schoolmealsthatrock

The recent, but short-lived Twitter hashtag #ThanksMichelleObama, consisted of ‘gross’ tray photos posted by teens. It’s critical to remember that a bad school lunch photo can even be taken in an outstanding program. How is that possible you ask? Because of the “Offer versus Serve” rule in school nutrition programs. This means that specific components must be offered to students, but they do not have to take them all. In school lunch for example, a complete reimbursable meal must include five components but students only have to take three. Beautiful, often unlimited, produce bars (like the one pictured below) may also offered, but students can walk right by them if they want.

New Orleans High School Salad Bar, 2014

Since “Offer versus Serve” is required in high schools (optional in K-8), it is possible for a teen’s tray to look pretty skimpy with the bare minimum servings of bread, meat (or alternate) and a ½ cup fruit or veggie (required for any lunch to be reimbursable). Students can also discard some items before taking a photo or even alter the food to make things look ‘grosser’ than they are. Remember these are teens who want to get their photo to go viral. This poster illustrates the requirements and recommendations in all National School Lunch Program sites.

Offer vs. Serve is required in senior high school lunches

Offer versus Serve is required in senior high school lunches

In fact, most school food service programs – elementary through high school – offer multiple lunch entrées as well as different fruit and vegetable side dishes. Students often have a vegetarian choice as well as beef/pork and chicken/turkey – in addition to grad-n-go prepared salads and sandwiches. Savvy school nutrition operators know that their customers, especially teenagers, like choices – and they go to great lengths to provide them. The real trend in high schools is customization – just like teens get to have a quick-serve places like Subway and Pita Pit. Lake Stevens Nutrition Services (WA) is a leader in this style of service, using a wide variety of flavors, ingredients and colors in their ‘Fresh for You’ lines illustrated below. Lucky students who get this every day!! KUDOS to Director Mollie Langum and her staff for offering so many choices!

lake Stevens, Washington, Fresh for You Bars

S.M.I.L.E. for Kids: It’s 31 Days of #RealSchoolFood

Posted on December 1, 2014 by schoolmealsthatrock

The recent, but short-lived Twitter hashtag #ThanksMichelleObama, was one more in a long series of efforts to vilify U.S. school nutrition programs. I’m not exactly sure why school meals continue to be a favorite target, but I do know that it’s now time to recognize the improvements and support the #RealSchoolFood enjoyed in thousands of school cafeterias every day.

The 2010 Healthy, Hungry-Free Kids Act (HHFKA) – with new nutrition standards and revised meal patterns – means that schools are now leading the charge to improve the eating habits of American youth. And, the HHFKA is just one of many ‘ingredients’ making school meals something that lunch ladies and ‘food dudes’ are proud to serve from coast to coast. As Health Assistant Marlene Gleim says about Manager Loli Preciado and staff at Woodard Jr. High (Yuma (AZ) Child Nutrition Department), “These ladies cook as if you were going to eat in their actual home. Food made right from the heart!”

Salad Bar, Woodard Jr. High, Yuma, Arizona

Does every school nutrition program deserve a five-star review? No. Is every school meal perfectly balanced? No. While there is room for improvement in some districts, bashing, blaming and pointing fingers doesn’t help. It merely perpetuates a stereotype that no longer represents the norm in school lunch or any other meal.

For the next 31 days, every day of December, School Meals That Rock will tell the #RealSchoolFood story with photos – from breakfast to supper, soup to nuts, farm to school, seed to salad bar and much more. Have concerns about food in your district? We’ll offer more specific ideas about what you can do to enhance the food served in any cafeteria.

Why? Because 20 million American children eat a free or reduced price school lunch every day. I believe that they deserve the best nutrition possible to fuel their education and their future.

It’s Only Nutrition When They Eat or Drink It

There’s No Need To Ban Flavored Milk From Schools

Posted on May 17, 2014 by schoolmealsthatrock

As a Registered Dietitian (RD) who has dedicated 30+ years of work and volunteer life to child nutrition, I believe flavored milk has a place in school meals. Disclosure: I am proud to work with the National Dairy Council and regional dairy councils, including Western Dairy Association. However, all the opinions here are my own. This blog was first published as Guest Blog: No Need to Remove Flavored Milk.

First, the facts about today’s flavored milk in schools: This is not the chocolate milk served ten – or even five – years ago. Dairy processors have responded to nutrition concerns and continually renovate their products.

From 2006 to 2014, calories in the flavored milk served at school decreased by nearly 28 percent to 120 calories per 8 ounces. This is only about 35 more calories than fat-free white milk.
The most common fat-free chocolate milk served in US schools has 120 calories, no fat or saturated fat, and only 18 grams total sugar. That’s 12 grams of lactose and just 6 grams – 1½ teaspoons of added sugar – per 8 ounces. It’s important to remember that all milk has 12 grams of natural sugar(lactose) straight from the cow!

Monterrey (CA) Home-style Chile Verde, beans, rice and fresh local tortillas

Secondly. the real nutrition issues: While some US children are getting too many calories for their activity levels, many are under-nourished. The 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans listed four nutrients of concern for both children and adults: calcium, vitamin D, potassium and dietary fiber. Our low consumption of these nutrients can affect our health today and in the future.

Just like white milk, flavored milk provides three of the four nutrients of concern – all of them except dietary fiber. All types of milk are excellent sources of calcium and vitamin D, and good sources of potassium. All are nutrient-rich beverages, packed with many other nutrients kids need for strong bodies – protein and phosphorus, along with vitamins A, B₁₂, riboflavin and niacin.

Banning flavored milk could potentially lead to a small reduction in calories consumed by kids at school. However, it also can have serious unintended consequences as documented in the recent study of 11 Oregon school districts. When flavored milk was removed, total daily milk sales declined by nearly 10 percent. Although white milk sales increased by 161 cartons per day, almost 30 percent was thrown away. Eliminating chocolate milk was also associated with about 7 percent fewer students eating school lunches.

I am not surprised by these results. They confirm previously published studies and the experience in many cafeterias. Flavored milk bans do all the wrong things in child nutrition programs. We need more nutrient-rich food for hungry students, more students who are well-nourished and ready to learn – and fewer expensive-to-replace nutrients dumped into trashcans.

Lake Stevens (WA), Customized ‘Power Bowls’ with fresh, local produce

Finally, working together to improve nutrition in schools: There has been a revolution in school nutrition programs across the USA, but we have still have plenty of work to do, especially in low-income, at-risk communities.

Want kids to consume less sugar at school? Let’s provide nutrition education for families (lots of sugar is brought to cafeterias from home). Let’s implement USDA’s Smart Snacks in School rules and shift the focus toward smarter choices everywhere on school campuses. Flavored milk is not the most significant source of added sugar in children’s beverages by a long shot. Soft drinks, sport drinks and juice drinks have more sugar and fewer nutrients.
Want students to drink more white milk? Forget bans. Let’s institute positive nutrition and culinary education into the curriculum, Let’s use smart marketing techniques to make white milk the more convenient choice at the front of milk coolers. Let’s not put nutrient-rich milk in the garbage and throw important nutrients out with misplaced concerns about small amounts of sugar.
Want healthier kids, schools and communities? Let’s put our passion for child nutrition toward effective partnerships on positive ways to improve access to delicious nutrient-rich at school and at home. Let’s look for ways to get kids active before, during and after school with programs like safe routes to school and active recess. Fuel Up To Play 60 is great way to bring nutrition and physical activity to schools – along with grants to purchase equipment and training to implement sustainable changes.

Let’s stop wasting our time, resources and food on negative nutrition campaigns. Let’s work together to make the learning connection for all children – because we know that healthier students are better students.

School Meals That Rock

Featuring school nutrition programs that serve kids well

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