Top marks for improvements to secondary school meals
A host of new developments for Warwickshire’s school meals are getting top marks from students.
Warwickshire County Council have been listening carefully to their customers and introduced some exciting new changes to their catering operation in secondary schools.
New menus, free food tastings, sixth form cafés and a state of the art cashless system are just some of the moves, which are proving appetising with students across Warwickshire.
In some schools, a ‘swipe card’ cashless system has been introduced to reduce queuing times and assure parents that their children are taking a school meal. The computerised system, which links in to pupils’ individual electronic accounts, also avoids singling out children who receive free school meals.
Sometimes there is a reluctance, especially with secondary students, to try something new so free tasting stations have been set up in schools for young people to discover that new foods can be delicious and to reintroduce old favourites. Members of the catering development team have also been on hand to take down the young gourmets’ comments so that the menu can be refined even further.
As a result, a delicious range of new dishes has been developed for break- times and lunch. Sweet and savoury breads using fruit, cheese and meat have replaced mid-morning biscuits and cakes and the new lunch menu includes a healthy take on firm favourites. This includes organic beef burgers, quorn curries, noodle dishes, pastas and hot and cold baguettes made to order in some schools. Work continues to identify new dishes which will appeal to secondary students.
County Caterers are boosting healthy diets by continuing to offer free vegetables with main courses and ensuring that plenty of fresh fruit is available at all service points. Seasonal promotions are proving popular, for instance free cups of soup with every sandwich or buy one get one free on jacket potato fillings.
Thanks to government funding, school kitchens and dining areas are being improved with some secondaries investing in new kitchen facilities, dining room furniture, tablecloths and table centre pieces. County Caterers are also piloting new facilities to encourage post-16 students to spend more time in the dining area.
Sandra Russell, Head of Catering for Warwickshire County Council, said: “We are making the dining experience more enjoyable for our customers and we are reducing queuing times through the cashless system. Parents can be assured that their children will have a good appetising meal at school and we want to encourage students who have never tried school meals before to give our new range of dishes a go.
“Warwickshire County Council has based much of its work on a whole-school approach to healthy eating and places greater importance on the dining experience.”
More details are on http://www.warwickshire.gov.uk/schoolmeals