Fed Up with Lunch, by Sarah Wu

There are some stereotypes that cannot die out, and one of them is “the lunchlady”.  She is a large woman dressed in a greasy uniform, with a hairnet and a perpetual expression that suggests she’d like nothing better than to throw you in next week’s Mystery Meat as the main ingredient.  I went to enough schools to understand the source of that stereotype, but since my own kids have been in school, I’ve come to see the reality – these ladies (and I’ve only ever seen women in the cafeterias) love being around children.  If lunchladies today seem harried and harrassed, perhaps it’s because their roles have changed over the years.  That change is one small part of the school lunch scandal that Sarah Wu reports on.

Wu, a Chicago elementary school teacher, forgot her lunch one day.  Thinking she’d make do with the cafeteria offering that day, she picked up a tray of “food” – a bagel dog, Jell-O, six Tater Tots, and chocolate milk.  The experience of eating bland unappealing food of questionable nutritious value appalled her.  After debating with herself and trying to work out the work and family ethics of the experiment, Wu started to anonymously observe cafeteria food for one year.  Each day, she would purchase lunch, photograph it during her free period, and write about the meal when she got home that night.  Her blog attracted attention from advocates for nutrition, green schools, the locavore movement, and student cooking, even as she struggled to maintain her alter-ego, “Mrs. Q”.

That first day’s meal was a revelation, but by no means was it an exception.  The above meal was packaged for efficient shipping, not for genuine nutritional value.  The hot dog was wrapped in a bread-like substance and sealed in plastic.  The tater tots, which count as the vegetable, were microwaveable.  The chunks suspended in the plastic Jell-O cup masqueraded as the fruit.  And of course, the chocolate milk was the dairy.  Not exactly the Food Pyramid that kids learn about in that same school, is it?  Strangely enough, the US Department of Agriculture, which created the food pyramid, also represents corporate farming operations and multi-national food service companies, and treats school lunch programs as a profitable outlet for their clients.

So teachers get children who’ve been hopped up on processed sugar then sent back into the classroom.  Students get unappetizing food served without input from real cooks.  Parents get the illusion that their children are eating healthy and filling meals.  The community gets immense amounts of waste from individual packages, utensils, and wasted food.   Food service contractors get the profit from turning food into a disposable commodity served almost literally on the run.  (In many school systems, students have less than 30 minutes to make their way to the cafeteria, stand in line to be served, eat, and still have some form of relaxation time. )

Thankfully Wu’s book not only details the failure of the school lunch program, but identifies people and organizations creating ideas for better school nutrition.  She also talks about how parents can get involved in transforming the culture of bottom-line bottomfeeding into a system that replaces the current foodlike substances with nutritious and attractive alternatives.  And she writes about school systems that are leading the way back towards affordable and healthy school lunches centered on the needs of growing children.  The most important partner parents can call on? Lunch ladies.

Check the WRL catalog for Fed Up With Lunch