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School Lunches
Sunday, August 07, 2005

By Christina VanGinkel

My son is going back to public school this fall. He has been in private school. When I asked him if he would miss anything in particular about the school that he was leaving, besides his friends, he immediately answered 'the food'. The private school actually cooked its meals. No processed foods, frozen, packaged meals mind you, but honest to goodness cooked from scratch meals.

His memories from when he was in public school reminded him of the supposedly nutritious, but obviously pre-packaged, boxed, frozen concoctions that were served. I have my own memory of one meal in particular. When I had told him that a fried cheese sandwich with tomato soup could not be as bad as he was making it out to be, he invited me to come have lunch with him on a day it was being served. Let us just say that I never made him eat it again! He was allowed to pack a lunch from home anytime he wanted after that, and that was every single day of that remaining year. He went to private school after that, so it was no longer an issue, which brings us back to this upcoming year.

In middle school now, the kids have the choice of taking hot lunch, cold lunch, or buying food ala carte. We have discussed what he is going to do and he has chosen a combination of cold lunch and ala carte. He will be given a budget to spend weekly on ala carte, along with cold lunch every day. If this sounds like a lot of food, let me explain that we live rurally, and his bus trip one way is nearly an hour, followed by a complete day of school with another bus trip nearly an hour long. Throughout fall, he will be heading directly to the football field in a neighboring town as soon as he is off the bus. He is also going through quite a growth spurt, having put on six inches and nearly forty pounds in the last twelve months. Making sure that he eats enough food in a given day, and that it is as nutritious as possible, is an important part of our daily routine.

This brings us to what we will be packing in his lunch. We are going to make a list of what he will eat, so it will be easier for us to plan what to purchase. He is not a fan of lunchmeat, save for the occasional roasted chicken sandwich. He is also just starting to eat vegetables to a degree that I am content with, so I plan to include fresh vegetables as often as I can without putting him off. He likes cherry and plum tomatoes, so those are going on the list, along with apples and small cans of fruit from Del Monte. String cheese and cheese singles are added, as is the occasional Lunchable from Kraft. He likes the pizza and the taco-nacho ones, and though they may not be as high on nutrition as I would like, they are better than many other things I can think of. He will also need a thermos of some type, as he has said he would like to bring chili, spaghetti, and a few other meals from home. As I assemble the list, I realize that this is much the same of what we already pack for him when he is spending the day at the ski hill snowboarding in the winter! I think I will pour through my magazines and cookbooks for ideas on what to put in his thermos, as I do not want him becoming bored to the point he does not eat. In addition, the countdown has started, with only three weeks to go until the start of a brand new school year.

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