A bill for $45.23.
Impossible I think.
The boys take from home daily, and we only indulge them with a rare opportunity to "buy" their lunch. I also pack abundant choices - plenty of carbs like bagels, breads, pitas and proteins like chicken, hummus, almond butter, fruit, homemade goodies, multiple organic milks ... they eat plenty and well.
I called the cafeteria lady.
"There must be a mistake," I say.
"Let me check their codes," she says. "Well, Patrick ordered pizza on Friday with a milk. And Aidan ordered pizza, milk, cookies, popcorn and chips."
"What?"
"Yes. That's the only order I have for Patrick. On Thursday, Aidan ordered popcorn, chips and a cookie. On Wednesday, popcorn and a cookie ... "
"Ok, Ok, I get the picture. This is all unbeknownst to me. They're only supposed to 'buy' once a week," I say.
The cafeteria lady who works for corporate food giant Aramark laughs and we say goodbye.
I immediately call Aidan in to the room.
"Hey, Buddy, are you ordering lunch every day?"
"No."
"Really?"
"Not lunch."
"Right, you're ordering lots of chips and popcorn and cookies."
"Yeah."
"Why? Are you hungry?"
"No, the popcorn and cookies are just so delicious I can't resist them."
Now, I realize that this is a wildly kid-like thing to do, but I emphasize to him that this is an expensive way to eat and not a very healthy one. And I ask what about Fresh Mouth?
"Mom, don't worry. It's Smart Food and hot chocolate chip cookies just like homemade. And you just have to enter a code. I don't need money," he says.
You just have to enter a code.
The cafeteria never turns a child away. They can always eat even if there's no credit on their balance sheet. So, weeks pass and parents can pay a hefty price. It's an American credit fairy tale in the making. I explain to Aidan that the food has a price. He listens. And I tell him that Smart Food is nutritionally vacant and that hot microwaved cookies aren't like homemade just because they're warm. We agree that once a week is the rule, and that we'll pack our own delicious popcorn - one that's healthy and inexpensive. I give him a pinch and kiss and send him on his way.
Teaching kids moderation and health in the modern food system is a daily battle.
So, I baked some homemade oatmeal cookies with dried cranberries for the upcoming lunches and made two pizzas for dinner - one straight up plain and the other pesto and spinach. I enhanced "Dolbeare Dough" with flax seed meal which made the crust spectacular.
Dolbeare Dough
1 tablespoon yeast
2 1/2 cups flour (50% whole wheat, 50% white)(I add about 1/2 cup of flax, and when I do, I reduce the flour amount by a corresponding 1/2 cup. Play with your dough ... you may need to add more if it's too wet.)
1 cup warm water
1 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon honey
1. Add yeast to a large bowl. Pour warm water over yeast and stir with a fork until yeast is completely dissolved. Add olive oil and honey. Stir.
2. Add flours and mix.
3. Knead dough until it becomes a shiny ball.
4. Let rise for about two hours. Form into desired shape - pizza crust, baguette, rolls ... bake at 400 degrees until golden brown.
I defrosted leftovers from our pesto festo several weeks ago. I added cooked frozen spinach, mozzarella and parmesan and cooked the pizza at 400 degrees for about 15 minutes.
Nugget o' the Moment: "Dear Mr. President-Elect, It may surprise you to learn that among the issues that will occupy much of your time in the coming years is one you barely mentioned during the campaign: food." More.. Michael Pollan who wrote an open letter called "Farmer in Chief" to the next president of the United States published in the NYTimes on October 9, 2008.
10 comments:
Wow, I understand never turning a kid away if they're looking for milk or a sandwich, but never turning kids away when they want cookies or popcorn? That seems like a pretty silly policy to me! You're lucky Aidan is such a good kid, because I can see a lot of kids continuing to buy junk regardless of what their parents say.
And they do, Laura. I went in initially to see the "new and approved" cafeteria plan. I was really shocked by the lunch chioces. The worst lunch I saw was french fries, chips and a cookie. Yikes. It's a costly food system on all counts - especially on our health.
Liz from Meal Makeover Moms here. It doesn't surprise me that kids are allowed to buy the "a la carte" without their parent's knowledge though it saddens me. It seems to me the school is more interested in making $ vs. the health of the kids. I recently read "Chew on This" to my boys, ages 10 and 13. The book is a real eye opener and gets kids to think twice before they grab for the junk!
Liz- thanks for the recommendation! I am going to check it out the book. I definitely sense the school pressure to
"support" the food services arm. We're staying clear of "buying."
Funny post! When I was a kid I got $.35 in my lunchbox each week to buy an ice cream sandwich if I wanted!
Perhaps your school will spend nearly $10 million, like the LA-USD which allows parents real-time online tracking of what their kids are eating. (Note, they didn't spend $10 million on improving school food...)
http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-fi-schools5-2008sep05,0,2592718.story
oops. meant to include the link to that story.
Kitchen Kid - Thanks for the article! It's so amazing how we circumvent the problem of kids and eating well - spending $10 million as you say to track, but not change choices. Is it really so hard to offer kids a healthy lunch? The quote in the piece - "Transparency creates pressure" - is a bothersome notion, isn't it? Eating well and eating in general shouldn't be a pressure-laden experience for kids! This was a really interesting piece!
It's hard with kids, isn't it? My 5 yr old son gets why we've given up certain foods (we've banned HFCS from the house), and he really seems to WANT to eat healthy food - but the junk is so tempting and so ubiquitous. And schools seem to be the worst - especially since kids assume that the junk served in school must be good for them.
That kind of food has now been banned from UK school canteens - including all the vending machines - even the lunchboxes the kids bring in are meant to be inspected for healthiness by the teachers....
It is amazing that a young child is allowed to chose to buy these foods without you specifically consenting in advance.
Charlotte- we need some kind of food checks and balances in place in our schools. Some progress has been made, but not enough. I used to live on Kensington High St. right across from Holland Park ... the sculpture garden was a morning run!
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