Celebrate National School Lunch Week
Honor thy lunch lady. Photograph from ricko on Flickr
Despite the stomach-churning memories you might have of elementary school lunches, The Healthy School Lunch Campaign is around to make sure that mystery meat is healthy, safe, and hopefully edible. The organization formed in 1946 as a response to Harry Truman signing the National School Lunch Act.
They've decided this week is National School Lunch Week, which means anthropomorphized mascots like Petunia Pita Pocket and Gloria Grilled Cheese, but also means awareness about what goes onto the little munchkins' plastic trays. (I'll always remember the pizza served in rectangular boxes.)
What's your favorite school lunch or lunch lady memory?
Bonus: After the jump, an ode to the lunch lady, which we found on Flickr user ricko's photo stream.
An Ode to the Lunch Lady
Teachers come and teachers go,
It's the lunch lady who you get to know.
She ladles the gravy, she scoops the peas,
You can get an extra portion if you just say please.
Five days of the week, the lunch lady is there,
Handing you a tray with a pizza square.
Although some of the food might look a bit scary,
You can rest assured it's sanitary,
Because the lunch lady serves her food with pride,
Even if she's not sure what's inside.
Potato nuggets, corn dogs, pudding and pie,
Cassroles, medleys and something that's fried.
She fills your plate with a smile and a wink,
And reminds you to pick out something to drink.
Lunch lady, lunch lady, you're the diva of the school,
I don't care what my friends say, I still think you're cool.
Related
The Most Disgusting School Lunches
Cooking With Kids: School Lunch Revolution
How Was Your School's Hot Lunch?
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17 Comments:
Best school lunch I ever ate was fried chicken. Was greasy, but tasted fresh and peppery.
Worst school lunch I ever tasted (so bad I couldn't eat it), pizza. It was a poptart looking dry cracker with a thin layer of dried ketchup and a slice of worse than vevelveeta choose food product. All of it barely warm.
In general, kids are much better off bringing their own lunch. Even peanut butter and jelly on white bread with some carrot sticks is much better than the slop they serve at most schools. Plus you get the huge advantage of not being tied to the lunch room, you can spend lunch at clubs, band, sports, basically ANYTHING else you can find to avoid the mindless roar of the school lunch room.
peekpoke at 9:41PM on 10/14/08
My very favorite school cafeteria food was that square pizza, hamburgers, and nachos.
JigsawJones at 10:00PM on 10/14/08
If you were nice, my elementary school lunch lady would give you an extra half grilled cheese sandwich. For years my dream school day was getting to wear my Snow White costume and grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch. I don't know what substance that cheese was, but it sure was tasty.
Matcha at 10:37PM on 10/14/08
My favorite memory has nothing to do with school lunches but an ad:
Back in 1988, fast food chain Roy Rogers had an ad campaign set to the song "See You in September" that poked fun at school lunches while actors dressed as cafeteria workers displayed trays of unattractive food to the camera. Aside from poking fun at school lunches, the ad voice over reminded students there were just a few weeks left before school (and school lunches) started so head to Roy's.
The ad failed on so many levels: making fun of lunch ladies; promoting fast food over school lunches, which try to be nutritious (unless you're my 12 year old who eats pizza and mashed potatoes at the same lunch) but more importantly, eating breakfast and lunch at school is the best meal some kids get all day.
Roy Rogers, which is owned by Marriott, pulled the ad in response to pressure. I doubt there's even a copy up on YouTube but I haven't looked.
corinne at 10:47PM on 10/14/08
As a child I would swear that the lady next door was spying on me, then in third grade she got a job as a lunch lady and put my doubts to rest.
PeteRepeat42 at 10:52PM on 10/14/08
One of my lunch ladies (who also happened to be a crossing guard...and playground attendant...) was Grandma P.J. That's right, she even has a name tag. She had to be 100 years old, and she had one tooth, and it was brownish-yellow.
She was my best friend and I's mortal enemy.
My best friend was assigned the duty of tray scraper, where she would scrape the remnants of every kids lunch off the tray into the trash and give it to Grandma P.J. It was spaghetti day, so the huge trash can was filled with spaghetti and other gross things. some kid threw his silverware away, and Grandma P.J told my friend she had to dig it out of the trash.
she refused. she totally didnt cave, and eventually was sent home in triumph.
delilah at 1:15AM on 10/15/08
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sv5iEK-IEzw
The star wars characters will make me go off topic. This video is funny as all hell. Enjoy.
We loved hoagie day. Those lunch ladies Wednesday would make the best damn hoagies. My senior year we got a milkshake machine.
JerzeeTomato at 2:20AM on 10/15/08
oh wow...it's gotta be a tie between the spaghetti with meat sauce and the turkey supreme (some turkey gravy concoction) served over rice. so good.
caroliiine at 3:20AM on 10/15/08
The hot fresh rolls were my favorite. Second to the chicken fried chicken with gravy.
gammypie at 7:33AM on 10/15/08
I loved the square pizza, but Friday's grilled cheese sandwiches always ended my week perfectly.
poke87 at 8:25AM on 10/15/08
I remember liking the fried chicken, in that bland-but-crispy-skin-oozing-with-grease way, beef tips and rice, turkey chop suey, but my fav has to be the salisbury steak patties (perfect ovals with the faux grill marks), gravy and mashed potatoes. Mmmmm!
hungryinhouston at 8:47AM on 10/15/08
The square/rectangular pizza was always my favorite in elementary school. This day was, of course, divided into its own levels of greatness. I always got pepperoni, and usually there was a single slice laid in the middle of a pizza. On some magical days, the powers above decided it was just "my day" and I would find 2 slices accidently stacked ontop of eachother, thus allowing me to spread them out and have fabulous flavor throughout. Aaahhhhh, memories...
Wolverines at 9:46AM on 10/15/08
Definite favorite memory was getting hot chocolate chip muffins in the morning. Countless terrible memories include breakfast for lunch (waffles were cut with scissors) and when they would give us twin popsicles but dip them in hot water and then split em.
kiteless at 12:28PM on 10/15/08
Favorite foods were the chocolate milk cartons, square pizza, tater tots, and chicken patty sandwiches.
In high school french fries were pretty tasty and we used to rotate who would be the person to leave a few fries in the container, stick a hair in there, and act like the hair came from a worker in order to get a new full order of fries. Not quite ethical, but cheap and tasty!
bobcatsteph3 at 12:37PM on 10/15/08
We used to take the hotdogs at lunch, peel the outer skin off, and say they were Freddy Kreuger's penis. Then we ate them. I was 6, what was wrong with me!?
O_Leaozinho at 4:02PM on 10/15/08
We had knishes in our school cafeteria, the classic square ones. I loved those. Clearly I grew up in New York.
faycat at 2:32PM on 10/16/08
The school lunches in Bloomington, MN used to be so good (In the 60s) that they made a cookbook, which I still have and cook from occasionally. Some Favorites:
Creamed tuna over shoestring potatoes
Pizza burgers
Chow Mein
Lasagne with garlic bread
Soft yeasty butter brushed dinner rolls.
Sweet, spicy cowboy bread
Made-from-scratch cinnamon rolls (although why these were and still are served with tacos, I'll never know)
Roast turkey, gravy, and mashed potatoes (served with above mentioned dinner rolls)
Hamburger gravy over mashed potatoes.
aharste at 3:26PM on 10/16/08