School Lunch Found Guilty!

GUILTY

FoodTeacherAmy says: Hi Everyone! During our last full week of school, we had some Internet glitches that affected our final posts. But, as you can imagine, our lunches were just more of the same. Looking back through the posts since we began this project, it’s pretty shocking to discover just how limited the lunch choices were. Take a look at the breakdown of what was served in our cafeteria:

Beef Patty/Empanada: 3

Pasta (spaghetti, ravioli, lasagne or other): 16

Grilled cheese: 10

Chicken Patty: 15

Chicken: 16

Ground Beef with Chips: 4

Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich: 9

Cheeseburger: 11

Tuna Sandwich: 1

Turkey and Cheese Sandwich: 2

In the fall, we are scheduled to have a working kitchen in our school, which means our lunches will be prepared on-site, rather than delivered from a satellite location. On the plus side, this should mean that our menu options will expand. However, due to all the rules and regulations set up for school kitchens, the food itself will pretty much be the same. Like most school food, it will simply be defrosted and reheated. I hope that we can change this, not just in our school, but in all schools.

I can’t say what will happen with this site come fall. It may continue exactly as is, it may continue with a different focus, or it may change altogether. I can, however, say that we at TYWLS of Astoria will continue to strive for fresh, tasty and healthy school lunches for all kids. I’m so proud of what we’ve accomplished with this site already. Thanks for reading, and for joining us on our mission. Have a great summer!

FoodTeacherAmy says: Hi Everyone! Please enjoy a break from lunch today, Thursday and Friday. It’s the time of the school year when special events and altered schedules take us away from the cafeteria quite a bit. Today we were in the park for Field Day, tomorrow we have a half-day of school, and on Friday TYWLS of Astoria will be out and about on our Mystery Trips. So much fun!

Be sure, however, to rejoin us next week for our last full week of school!

Guilty

Gabriella says: I wasnt surprised when i saw that they were giving chicken patty…again! Some people like the chicken patty sometimes but i dont like it. They always give the same thing over and over again, they gave chicken patty like two days ago. I think im not the only one who wants some variety. The potatoe salad isnt that good and i would choose my moms potatoe salad over this potatoe salad anyday! It tastes sour and bitter, the only good part about this lunch was the peach. also why do we even have the trays if the food comes inside the foil trays, its wasting trays! I declare this horrible lunch GUILTY!

FoodTeacherAmy says: Hi Everyone! Students have no school today (teachers do), so there will be no lunch. However, I wanted to share a bit of great news! Earlier this week, I found out I won this Good Egg Project: Back to Breakfast Challenge grant for our school! It was granted to 12 teachers nationwide, and comes from Scholastic and the American Egg Board. It will be put to use during the 2010-11 school year. Woohoo!

half guilty

Mayra says:todays lunch was horrible (except for the chips).I thought today’s lunch was horrible because the meat did not look like it was ready to get eaten. I know it does not look ready because the meat looked pink in the inside, I usually see that the meat is brown and good looking to be eaten. So instead of eating the meat I just ate the chips cause I know it is good to eat. I wish that there was salad because salad is healthy and good. Know I am starving IF ONLY THERE WAS SALAD I WOULD NOT BE STARVING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.:(

FoodTeacherAmy says: Today is one of my favorite days at TYWLS of Astoria, so I’d like to take a break from school lunch and share a bit of it with you — especially with you teachers out there wondering how to work food and cooking into your classrooms. I give you… Government Cake Day.

Each year, as a culminating project to show what they’ve learned about the history, formation and aspects of the United States government, the 7th-graders at our school design a representative cake. They exhibit their design on a display board and explain it to their classmates in a formal presentation.

Students are not required to bake the actual cake, but many of them do. The structure of the cake, shape and size of the layers, and sometimes even the flavor of the cake are all based on their understanding of how our government is organized. For example, many students make marble cake to show Federalism or to show the checks and balances of the goverment. Students who know that people are the most important part of a government might make them the structure of the cake (real or imagined).

Greg, my work neighbor and the teacher in charge of this project, says that working on the cake gives students a lasting memory that will hopefully create a spark later on in life when they see government at work in the real world. Because the students are hearing their classmates’ presentations on the same topic, he also believes that repetition of information will make it stick.

I think this is a genius project, and I think it (and many other cooking projects) could be re-envisioned for other subjects as well. How about a layer cake to represent the layers of the earth for science? You could experiment with pizza cutting to learn about fractions in math! Build peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to show sentence structure in English class! The options are limitless…. I know I’m mixing history and nations here, but I think Marie Antoinette had something when she said, “Let them eat cake!”

Happy Government Cake Day!

Half guilty

Juanita & Elizabeth say:

The chicken looked okay

It was better than the other day

The bread was yummy

I could taste it in my tummy

The yogurt was refreshing

We wish to have this

another day.

INNOCENT

TashiraC and GabbyM say: We are getting tired of the same things over and over again.It’s important to have different foods because we need a variety.No one wants to eat things several times in1 month! Being at school with people who come from many backgrounds, it is important to have different foods. Also people don’t eat certain things because of their religion,culture,or they just don’t wanna eat it.