What’s for (School) Lunch? Cornbread and Corn Cobbettes
“Frito-Lay traveling nachos with cornbread, served with a corn cobbette” – that’s what’s for lunch today in my old elementary school cafeteria in Richmond, VA.
Every day more than 30 million kids eat one or even two corn-heavy meals like this. Since the Centers for Disease Control has found that 16% of American children are overweight, it’s no surprise that a report released today by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) recommends changes in the US Department of Agriculture standards for school meals to encourage healthier breakfasts and lunches.
“School Meals: Building Blocks for Healthy Children” doesn’t break any nutritional ground; however, its three major recommendations would help bring the National School Lunch Program and the School Breakfast Program in line with the 2005 USDA Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
- Require two daily servings of fruits and vegetables, which must include “dark green, bright orange, legumes, starchy and other vegetables” every week.
- Decrease amounts of sodium and saturated fat.
- Set a maximum number of calories per meal.
It’s hard to argue with implementing such commonsense nutritional advice in schools. (Carrots instead of cornbread is a no-brainer.) The more controversial question is how to pay for it in a food landscape where the most nutritious calories are often the most expensive.
The IOM notes that implementing its recommendations could have “a major effect on the cost of food” to schools, citing particularly the expense of buying more fruits and vegetables. Among its many suggestions, the report calls for an increase in the amount of money the federal government gives schools per meal and suggests money-saving strategies for school food services.
The two tactics that won’t work are serving fewer meals or increasing the cost to students. It will take cooperation among administrators, cafeteria employees, legislators, and parents to give our children more nutritious food at school without excluding anyone, but just because we feed lots of kids isn’t an excuse for feeding them bushels of taxpayer subsidized corn cobbettes.
[Thanks to chalkdog and Flickr for the photo.]
Hear, hear re the *real* question – and barrier – here: money. In our public school district in Oregon, they have $1.10 to spend on an individual school lunch. When was the last time any of us grown-ups ate a lunch – healthy or unhealthy – for that little??
Memories of school lunches from when I was growing up are a part of why I prefer to make my daughter’s lunch. I believe her current school has a small salad bar with lunches, which is a nice improvement, but the other food seems to be about the same.
While I applaud any effort to improve the meals children are served in schools, removing saturated fats is a horrible idea. The low fat diet is a serious contributor to obesity and disease. Our bodies require high levels of healthy saturated fats (cream, butter, Omega 3s).
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/
The knowledge is out there and has been since the 1940s & 50s but has been suppressed by the food manufacturers. Sadly, if everyone did decide to eat in the healthiest way (all organic fruits/veggies & grass fed animal proteins & fats) there would not be enough to go around.
Carrots are a step in the right direction but we should not fool ourselves into thinking that is a solution to the problem.
As long as food manufacturers have corn in silos and meat they cannot sell to main street, they will donate it to our cash strapped school system.
Unfortunately, even some of our best schools have shameful lunches. We also pack every day.
Chef Jamie Oliver has worked in the UK, and has now turned his attention to the US in this matter. http://www.jamieoliver.com/campaigns/jamies-food-revolution-petition.php
Elephant in the room: Shift what the government subsidizes! More $ support for the healthy calories and less for the calories-that-kill and we won’t have to charge more OR compromise nutrition.
Plus, I totally concur with Lisa L– wholesome sources of saturated fat are crucial for brain function, lung function (and protection) and hormonal balance. It’s the damaged, refined fats in processed food that are the problem!
$2.00 for a hot lunch, at my daughter’s public elementary school, here in Columbus, OH. I can buy a bottle of water and a vegetable side (dish), for $2 in my cafeteria at work. Granted, two bucks a day adds up, but put into perspective, is a big red flag!!
Thank you EWG for writing about this! <3 U!
That’s why I send my daughter to school with a homemade lunch. She gets her whole grains, fresh fruit (organic when needed, I use the EWG’s dirty dozen list), fresh veggie, 100% fruit juice watered down 50%, & lean potein everyday in her lunchbox. For a treat, she gets
a small bag of chips. I look for those without hydrogenated oils.
I’ve also taught my daughter to make good food choices, even when I’m not around. She is perfectly healthy, smart girl.
Hooray for the effort to shift school lunches away from corn and towards green vegetables. But I would suggest that the real culprit in terms of fostering child obesity is not necessarily the corn but the bread and flour.
I would also disagree with the recommendation to add, in addition to green vegetables, starchy vegetables. These are essentially sugar and that is the true culprit in child hood obesity.
My school is now a stickler on teaching children to check the sugar content of food as much as they can. Several school districts have followed the example of the Central Consolidated Schools and used the resources about sugar’s relationship to obesity at collectivewizdom.com. I believe the link is
http://www.collectivewizdom.com/Sugar
I am not connected in any way to the site but I do admire it and the work at several other smaller sites which are earnestly trying to change the cycle of obesity in America. All of us who are parents and those who are teachers, as I am, need to start each day with a reminder to our children that sugar is simply to be avoided.
I so appreciate that your organization is trying to make an impact on improving school lunches. I, as a grandmother, am so worried about the health of my grandchildren in the school lunch programs, as they now exist. Any improvement and/or strides that your organization can accomplish is a step in the right direction. We need to make the children understand that what we put in our mouths is the “fuel” that makes are bodies work efficiently or inefficiently depending on how it “acts” to nourish us. THANK YOU FOR YOUR WORK AND YOUR FUTURE ENDEAVORS TOWARDS THIS GOAL. Nana and Pop Pop Emmons