Former WaPo Reporter Looks at D.C. Public Schools’ New “Fresh Cooked” Lunch Program
Y&H isn't sure how he missed this, but former Washington Post reporter Ed Bruske recently spent a week in the kitchen at H.D. Cooke Elementary School in Adams Morgan, where his daughter attends classes. He wanted to witness first hand this new era of the school lunch program, in which D.C. Public Schools food-service provider, Chartwell-Thompson, has replaced "pre-packaged meals from a food factory" with "something they called 'fresh cooked'.”
Cooke administrators were generous in granting Bruske access to their kitchens; someone over there should have suspected the reporter wouldn't like what he found. I mean, just look at how Bruske describes himself on his blog: "Ed Bruske now tends his 'urban farm' about a mile from the White House in the District of Columbia. Ed believes in self-reliance, growing food close to home and political freedom for the residents of the District of Columbia."
Sure enough, in the conclusion to a multi-post series on his blog, Bruske was taken aback by this so-called "fresh cooked" approach:
Was I ever in for a surprise. As I soon discovered, there wasn’t much “fresh” about the food being served at H.D. Cooke Elementary School. When I passed through the doors of the “Kid’s Stop Cafe,” I walked straight into the maws of the industrial food system, where meals are composed of ingredients out of a food chemist’s lab, where highly processed food is doused with all sorts of additives and preservatives in distant factories, then cooked and shipped frozen so that it can be quickly reheated with minimal skill and placed on a steam table.
Like many of the parents who’ve been reading this series for the last five days, and communicating with me via our school listserv, I was perplexed by the sheer banality of so much processed, canned and sugar-injected food being fed to our children on a daily basis; disappointed that no one seemed to take issue with this sort of food service; chagrined that pizza and Pop Tarts and candied cereals were being served so routinely alongside Mountain Dew masquerading as milk–and all of it here in the nation’s capitol, right outside Michelle Obama’s door.
Are these really the lessons we want our kids to learn about food?
While I and other parents were feeling a little let down by what this witness account revealed, it would have come as little surprise to any of the thousands of school food service directors around the country. What I saw in the kitchen at H.D. Cooke reflects a culmination of trends that have been converging for decades in school cafeterias, a perfect storm, if you will, of industrialized food methods, meager school food budgets and federal government policy.
From there, Bruske explains how public school administrators nationwide have managed to get themselves stuck in this morass — as well as the difficulties of extracting themselves from it. It's a good, passionate read, and I'd advise you to take a somber look at one school's lunch program through Bruske's eyes.
9:34 am
Well, I guess little Miss Bruske is gonna be bringin' her own spouts and mung beans to school for lunch from now on. And some tasty Kefir. Also.
9:42 am
Please spare me the Won't someone please think of the children. If you want your child to eat healthy, why aren't YOU feeding them? Why would the government be feeding your children anyways? Have all public school parents abdicated their responsibilities? And why would you be surprised they serve crap? Look at the whole school system for gods sake, its a disaster, the food would be no exception
4:08 pm
This is so great! Students definitely need more fruits and other healthy foods. And the government needs to support healthy behaviors. When Congress renews the Child Nutrition Act it must encourage schools to serve healthier meals. Low-fat, cholesterol-free vegetarian foods need to be more affordable, and schools that serve nutritious foods (fruits, vegetables, vegetarian options) should receive additional funding. There’s a group that’s collecting signatures to try to get vegetarian options in school lunches. You can find it online at http://HealthySchoolLunches.org.
4:22 pm
The findings of the blog posts are frightening, but I have to say that I agree with Greg here. Let's face it, the kids probably aren't eating ANY better at home, and those that do aren't eating school lunches anyway.
The blog posts only touched on one of the biggest problems with feeding kids good food: 1) Most children hate vegetables in any form (dress them up if you want, they ain't going anywhere!), 2) Children love sugar in any form (my kids can sniff out a dessert from twenty paces, but try to hide a carrot in a pasta sauce and they are on to you, buster).
Kids don't make good choices when it comes to food and they are not going to start eating their veg. But what's more troubling about the food they are serving at school is how much crap is in it. When did eggs need to come with so many additives? Eggs is eggs, for crying out loud!
Ban the additives and fillers and people will be healthier.