Posted on 12/17/2011 8:33:29 PM PST by Steelfish
L.A. Schools' Healthful Lunch Menu Panned By Students For many students, Los Angeles Unified's introduction of healthful lunches — part of a campaign against obesity, diabetes and other problems — has been a flop. The district says the menu will be revised.
By Teresa Watanabe December 17, 2011 It's lunchtime at Van Nuys High School and students stream into the cafeteria to check out the day's fare: black bean burgers, tostada salad, fresh pears and other items on a new healthful menu introduced this year by the Los Angeles Unified School District.
But Iraides Renteria and Mayra Gutierrez don't even bother to line up. Iraides said the school food previously made her throw up, and Mayra calls it "nasty, rotty stuff." So what do they eat? The juniors pull three bags of Flamin' Hot Cheetos and soda from their backpacks.
"This is our daily lunch," Iraides says. "We're eating more junk food now than last year."
For many students, L.A. Unified's trailblazing introduction of healthful school lunches has been a flop. Earlier this year, the district got rid of chocolate and strawberry milk, chicken nuggets, corn dogs, nachos and other food high in fat, sugar and sodium. Instead, district chefs concocted such healthful alternatives as vegetarian curries and tamales, quinoa salads and pad Thai noodles.
There's just one problem: Many of the meals are being rejected en masse. Participation in the school lunch program has dropped by thousands of students. Principals report massive waste, with unopened milk cartons and uneaten entrees being thrown away. Students are ditching lunch, and some say they're suffering from headaches, stomach pains and even anemia. At many campuses, an underground market for chips, candy, fast-food burgers and other taboo fare is thriving.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
I graduated high school in 2006 and the only days I would buy lunch would be on Pizza Hut days and when they served the chicken nuggets.
Who the hell wants beef nugget teriyaki with rice?
Gee, force schools to have healthy lunches and the kids don’t eat it?
I’m shocked, shocked I tell you!
If Moochelle thinks this politically correct task is that easy (really, for most kids, just not going overboard on refined sugar is enough) then she should try coming up with stuff for these school menus that the kids won’t ditch and waste for Cheetos.
From the look of her, she’s been doing too much “fine dining.” She has a rear end like a Government Mule!
Bookmark
If they didn’t try to do it ultra low sodium too, it might be half decent.
My recollection of school lunches involved such entrees as Macaroni and Wallpaper Paste, Mystery Meat Slabs, and Apple Snots. But there was chocolate milk, so it was ok.
Poor lonely arugula. Nobody wants you.
What’s a black bean burger? A vegan creation? Are they trying to turn students into vegetarians?
Herein is the real reason for the panic. Schools receive literally billions in Federal dollars based on participation in the School Lunch Program. This is a direct threat to the money flow and they can't have that. They'll have the little feral beasts eating nachos again so fast your head will spin.
Pizza, as far as fast food goes, is quite healthy.
But big-food/big-government wants us eating soy-based “phood (tm)” that they synthesize in a factory where they can get the raw material cost down to $0.02 per ton and sell it as breakfast bars for $87 per ounce by reducing portion size down to the size of a pebble.
After all, our farm output, as a wealthy capitalist country, is owed to the third world. Right ? Meat, corn, wheat, they all go to China, since they are not capitalist. /SARC
Try giving school athletes a black bean burger when their system is screaming for meat.
Give honkies like me an alternative to the nachos and everyone will live in perfect harmony.
Black bean is narsty anyhow. Why not at least pinto bean.
Isn’t this the school district that Jamie Oliver (the Naked Chef) infiltrated and tired to get them to switch to healthier food? Looks like it’s been a disaster.
Serve them cheeseburgers with 100% real beef and burritos every day. This menu - good meat, cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, pickle, bread - has all the nutrients they need.
And fried chicken, too, fried in real canola. If a piece of baked chicken plus a roll with margarine is healthy, why isn’t fried chicken? Same ingredients.
Apple Snots: ‘Snot half bad, really.
The Naked Chef? No wonder. All the kitchen employees covered their eyes. So they couldn’t learn anything about the new recipes.
Bring back Apple Snots!
Johnnie L Cochran Middle School??? You can’t make this stuff up!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.