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L.A. schools' healthful lunch menu panned by students

jamesrage

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I do believe that one of the easiest ways to get kids to eat healthier is to start at the schools since 5 days a week they are eating breakfast and lunch there.But it looks like they are adding crap that normal people wouldn't eat and ****ing up the dishes that students liked at the taste tests.


L.A. schools' healthful school lunches panned by LAUSD students - latimes.com
It's lunchtime at Van Nuys High School and students stream into the cafeteria to check out the day's fare: black bean burgers, tostada salad, fresh pears and other items on a new healthful menu introduced this year by the Los Angeles Unified School District.

But Iraides Renteria and Mayra Gutierrez don't even bother to line up. Iraides said the school food previously made her throw up, and Mayra calls it "nasty, rotty stuff." So what do they eat? The juniors pull three bags of Flamin' Hot Cheetos and soda from their backpacks.

snip...

Students have embraced about half of the new fare, according to Binkle; the salads and vegetarian tamales in particular have been popular.

But some students said they still are not eating — including those who liked the food at the taste tests.

Andre Jahchan, a 16-year-old sophomore at Esteban Torres High School, said the food was "super good" at the summer tasting at L.A. Unified's central kitchen. But on campus, he said, the chicken pozole was watery, the vegetable tamale was burned and hard, and noodles were soggy.
 
I always bagged my lunch. I mean, for one thing, the portions my school gave out were crap. I had soccer practice right after school, till 6pm. HAD to eat a big lunch....or DIE out there, lol. Taste was not even an issue. I was always more concerned with quantity. The problem with school lunch is, everyone is different. You're simply not going to be able to meet all those different needs. You just gotta find a "good enough", and then tell folks that don't like it to find their own food.
 
What in the world is "chicken pozole"? The name alone sounds nasty.
 
They should be supplying healthful tasty food. What they shouldn't be doing is offering crap because that's what the students want. That includes Cheetos and soda.
 
They should be supplying healthful tasty food. What they shouldn't be doing is offering crap because that's what the students want. That includes Cheetos and soda.
that is the trick
one must often choose one or the other; seldom do both appear as the same menu item
 
we had some ok school lunches when i was a kid, but there are a few reasons why the food is never going to be popular no matter what it is.

first, the food is bought and prepared in bulk. and the ingredients are often the cheapest available. we had this flat square pizza stuff that resembled orange tempera painted on grease soaked cardboard.

second, the requirements necessitate odd food pairings, such as square tempera cardboard grease pizza with a side of carrots and canned peaches. to drink : boxed milk.
 
My 12 year old gets up, makes breakfast. Be that oatmeal (the boil the pot of milk or water and cook it kind, not instant), eggs and toast, cereal... packs his lunch which includes a sammich, chips, a fruit, Capri Sun to drink. I SOMETIMES give him $$ for school lunch.


When you rely on the schools to feed your kids, what are you teaching them?
 
Wow, schoolkids complain about school lunches! That is so unusual...
 
What in the world is "chicken pozole"? The name alone sounds nasty.

Black bean Burgers and vegetarian tamales sounds nasty as well.Taking food they usually eat and replacing it with vegan ***** **** is the wrong way to get someone to eat something healthy.Plus it doesn't help that the schools usually take any kind of food and make it worse.Its almost like reverse beer goggles.


Chicken pozole is a stew with some kind of corn in it.
 
I looked it up, it's Mexican, with Hominy in it, whatever hominy is.
 
We should provide fresh fruits and veggies with lean fresh meats, but that would cost money, and with people not wanting to even properly fund the education, that's not likely to happen.
 
We should provide fresh fruits and veggies with lean fresh meats, but that would cost money, and with people not wanting to even properly fund the education, that's not likely to happen.

After seeing the eating habits of kids at school - I don't see why they bother giving the food at all if the child doesn't want it outright.

When I was a child we were offered all of our items and only charged for what we took.
We could not, however, get a dessert immediately until after we had shown that we ate (or cleverly gotten rid of) some of our healthy options from the plate.

This immediately addresses two wasteful issues: kids are just given food they have no intention of eating at all - but yet we pay for out of pocket anyway. And that dessert will almost always be eaten first if it's put onto the same plate at the same time.

What's the point of food-choices and healthy this/that if no one's around to MAKE the kids eat it?

But when it comes to the choices my children DO have RE food: the salad cart - they don't have to get these items and when they do it's because they *like* to eat those items: My older sons likes certain fruits. Our daughter likes slices of cucumber.

So there are two clashing issues: 1) providing healthy foods - and making them eat it if they don't like it 2) offering foods they do like so they will eat it.

I think it's smart to give the sutends themselves a choice as far as dishes go - that meet certain healthy standards - and going from there.
 
It really shouldn't matter much what they eat. If they didn't go home and watch TV and play videogames every minute of every day in their spare time, their natural metabolism would burn it off anyway.

Kids are so incredibly fat, rude, and socially inept these days. It's pathetic.
 
I don't knowl, what is wrong with a roll, some chicken and green beans? How about a hamburger steak, roasted potatoes and a salad? How about a fruit tray? Let's not get too complicated here. There is nothing wrong with an occasional hamburger or even pizza. Keep the portions reasonable and nobody is going to get fat off it. We need to offer things that can be prepared in large quantities and efficiently. Just cut out the vending machines and daily offerings of fries, pizza and hamburger and things will be fine. If kids don't want to eat what's offered let them bring their lunch. We can't micromanage this and we can't afford a wide menu variety.
 
It really shouldn't matter much what they eat. If they didn't go home and watch TV and play videogames every minute of every day in their spare time, their natural metabolism would burn it off anyway.

Kids are so incredibly fat, rude, and socially inept these days. It's pathetic.

LOL - it doesn't matter what they eat? :rofl: Oh **** I can't stop laughing.

"Here children: chips and dip all day - wash it down with a gallon of soda! Just make sure you dont' get too lazy!"

We're not just talking about the potential to become OBESE here - we're talking about overall health which is VERY CLOSELY tied to what you eat.
 
After seeing the eating habits of kids at school - I don't see why they bother giving the food at all if the child doesn't want it outright.

When I was a child we were offered all of our items and only charged for what we took.
We could not, however, get a dessert immediately until after we had shown that we ate (or cleverly gotten rid of) some of our healthy options from the plate.

This immediately addresses two wasteful issues: kids are just given food they have no intention of eating at all - but yet we pay for out of pocket anyway. And that dessert will almost always be eaten first if it's put onto the same plate at the same time.

What's the point of food-choices and healthy this/that if no one's around to MAKE the kids eat it?

But when it comes to the choices my children DO have RE food: the salad cart - they don't have to get these items and when they do it's because they *like* to eat those items: My older sons likes certain fruits. Our daughter likes slices of cucumber.

So there are two clashing issues: 1) providing healthy foods - and making them eat it if they don't like it 2) offering foods they do like so they will eat it.

I think it's smart to give the sutends themselves a choice as far as dishes go - that meet certain healthy standards - and going from there.

The problem with your first scenario is there just isn't enough time to do that. To go in line, get your food, eat it, and then go back in line for dessert just won't work, we had 35 minutes to eat at my school, and I graduated in 09, so I'm sure it's like that in a lot of schools right now. In my school we had 5 lines, all offering different stuff, and you get could a salad if you want. Most of the stuff was pretty unhealthy, it was actually pretty good, but it was the best for you, and we had pizza everyday. If you only offer healthy stuff, some kids wont eat it, but eventually it will get eaten, if you offer it to them it will get eaten. (Gosh that sounds like the Cafeteria of dreams there lol) A big problem is the ingredients, my moms a lunch lady, and most of the stuff comes pre-packaged and frozen. Healthy meals are good if the stuff is fresh, and the ingredients are good, that is the key IMO.
 
LOL - it doesn't matter what they eat? :rofl: Oh **** I can't stop laughing.

"Here children: chips and dip all day - wash it down with a gallon of soda! Just make sure you dont' get too lazy!"

We're not just talking about the potential to become OBESE here - we're talking about overall health which is VERY CLOSELY tied to what you eat.

Just because your skinny doesn't mean your healthy.
 
Lots of schools in our area contract out the lunches and what's brought in and heated up can certainly be cardboard. Most "healthy" foods cooked in school cafeterias can be real nasty. Tacos were pretty popular in our day. It's difficult to mess up lettuce and cheese too much. They do the best they can with the funding they have.
 
Hominy is a bland large kernal corn that's used to make grits - it's fab in stew! An acquired taste.

Actually that is not all the way correct.What makes corn a hominy is the fact it has been treated with Alkali. I like it.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominy
 
Actually that is not all the way correct.What makes corn a hominy is the fact it has been treated with Alkali. I like it.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominy

i love cheesy grits, but not hominy grits.
 
My son never ate school crap growing up. It's called making food for your children and packing a lunch, not a difficult concept. Stop depending on government to feed your children for you and maybe the obesity rate will decline. (Unless you are poor, of course.)
 
My son never ate school crap growing up. It's called making food for your children and packing a lunch, not a difficult concept. Stop depending on government to feed your children for you and maybe the obesity rate will decline. (Unless you are poor, of course.)

I think people are forgetting that you pay for a school lunch, and breakfast, unless you qualify for free lunch. Lunch at my mom's school costs over 2 dollars.
 
My son never ate school crap growing up. It's called making food for your children and packing a lunch, not a difficult concept. Stop depending on government to feed your children for you and maybe the obesity rate will decline. (Unless you are poor, of course.)

I don't rely on the government - I pay for our school lunches and becaues i pay a lot every year my opinion is valued. . . I've pushed change that happened - seems I need to push some more.

What I'll push for now is removing desserts from the tray at the beginning of lunch - and push for having monitors that encourage consumption of healthy foods since we shell out millions in tax dollars each year towards it.
 
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