I'm a bit miffed about this Food Tech ingredients list

[IbizaToTheNorfolkBroads]

Not feeling brave enough for AIBU, and I'm sure the teacher has her reasons, but this is what DS needs to take to school next week. He's 14/Y9, do not into GCSE course yet, and food tech isn't one on his options. Also, he has food tech after lunch, and has to carry his cooking around for the rest of the day, as the fridges are full of heat the morning lessons have made. OK for scones, but for chicken?

Here is the offending ingredients list:

Thai Green Curry - 1 onion, 1 clove of garlic, 80g sugar snap peas, 2 small chicken breasts, 30ml Thai green curry paste. 200ml coconut milk, ½ lime, small bunch coriander.

My concerns - there's about £8 worth of stuff there, many of which (curry paste, coconut milk, coriander) come in bigger packs than required. That doesn't seem to be considerate of the CoL crisis - it's a big standard academy comp in a not-particularly affluent area.

Also - no veggie alternative ingredients offered - so half our household wouldn't eat the results anyway.

DS is not matey enough with anyone in his FFT class to suggest sharing ingredients. Expensive ingredients!

I'm delighted that the school is teaching the kids to make something other than scones and pizza, but there are so many cheaper curries to mark in an hour! They could start by making the curry paste! Or school providing (and charging for) the ingredients the kids won't need need "all" of.

(DS's previous school/DD's school charge for all FFT and RMT ingredients and materials at the start of the year, abs supply everything. I appreciate limited kitchen space doesn't always make this possible).

Just teeing up this thread for all the posters who are showing up to tell you that £8 is nothing and that coconut milk is an absolute staple of their food shop. In fact, they milk the coconuts themselves from some they brought back from Barbados - doesn’t everyone?!

suggestion - can you meal prep to include stuff next week that includes those ingredients? And switch chicken for tofu?

I feel your pain, I wrote in to complain about the cost of one of his recipes which was assessed for GCSE

There have been times in theast couple of years where I would not have been able to afford this. We are also veggie so would need a veggie alternative. Not sure what the answer is but I would be raising this with the school. Plenty of people cannot afford to buy things like chicken breasts at the moment. Food tech at school for me was baking cakes and making things like pancakes and soup. All with very cheap ingredients.

I got annoyed about similar for DDs cooking... transporting 50ml of milk for example. Would make more sense if they could "buy" the ingredients at school.

I'm surprised you have to pay for a supply ingredients.

My DS has never been asked to do this.
It's provided by school.

What happens to those who can't afford it?

I completely agree! We had one memorable week where my ds needed lemongrass…. Which came in a pack but he of course only needed one piece.

id rather pay a contribution and the ingredients be bought it bulk.

I also remember the resulting dish being so vile it went straight in the bin!

If it’s any help asda do small cans of coconut milk in the world food aisle.
some sainsburys have them, but not all.
some shops do Thai green curry paste in small plastic sachets individually. Cheaper than a large jar.

2 small chicken breasts is a lot, I was in my local budgens yesterday and they were £4.99. Not everyone will have access to a lidl or aldi. That’s bonkers for a shopping list.

that lidt doesn't seem too unreasonable to me but there should be consideration for those who can't afford ingredients and I absolutely agree that it is unacceptable to expect all the kids to carry raw chicken around all day without offering refrigeration. I would push them to give access to fridge space or only send the veg components.

Yes actually thinking back, I remember my parents having to provide money instead of ingredients, usually £1-2 and the ingredients were provided.

I know at DDs school its free for children on FSM. But she knows this as the FSM children have to collect their ingredients from a different place.

When I was at school, my best friend was vegetarian. They didn’t give us a veggie food tech option either, but her mum would just send her in with the closest equivalent that their family liked.

Teachers would generally realise they’d fucked up and wouldn’t dare say a word about it - and I can imagine the same would go for anyone who sent the ingredients they could afford in lieu too.

Send him in with whatever your family will eat and that fits your budget.

The first thing we did was a smoothie. We had to bring in our new fruit and paid money for milk.

@PuttingDownRoots @UnicornBoom

It's supplied to all free of charge.

(We are in Scotland if that makes a difference)

It's a curriculum subject so this stuff should be provided. IMO.

Immediate solution. Use the left over ingredients to make a vegetarian alternative for the rest of the family.

Longer term. Talk to the school. Explain exactly what you've said here. Do it in writing as well, copied to the governors. In DS school we had this problem and it was solved by handing it over to the PTA, who funded and bought the ingredients for all foodtec lessons.

1 onion, 1 clove of garlic, 80g sugar snap peas, 2 small chicken breasts, 30ml Thai green curry paste. 200ml coconut milk, ½ lime, small bunch coriander. try lidl - they sell coconut milk quite cheap I think its ridiculous asking kids to carry chicken around though. It needs proper refrigeratoration. And I think the school should provide the onions and garlic and limes in bulk and you pay them back. Much more economical.

But tbh like you say it's good for them to make something other than pizza and it sets them up to decide if they want to take it at GCSE

When DSD was at school this was the bane of my life having to send her in with exact (expensive!) ingredients for a meal that none of us would eat. DD is now at the same stage and we make a payment to the school at the beginning of term and that’s it, it’s so much easier although we still don’t eat the meals that have been carried around school all day generally 😂.

Not being funny but I legit use a tin a week. I make a lot of curries in bulk.

I’d send him in with the veggie alternative, thinking sweet potato, pepper? The other stuff is bonkers. Our school kids pay 5 quid a term (not fsm, but that’s on SIMs so no discrimination), they cook every second week at least. When my sons were there they had to take their own stuff in, was a nightmare.

I agree OP.
At my DC's school if they had done something like that we would have been asked to supply the chicken (and it would only have been one breast), onion and maybe sugar snap peas but the herbs, curry paste and coconut milk would definitely have been provided by school. They recognised that not everyone would have these ingredients - isn't half the point of food tech to introduce the kids to new things - and that nobody wants the rest of a jar of coconut milk left over at home. We paid a fairly small contribution at the start of the year for ingredients. Obviously the school bought in catering size packs as multiple classes would use them, so it was more economical and environmentally friendly than everyond buying their own.
I think it would be reasonable to raise your corncerns.

That’s crazy, I would contact the school.

you can buy a block of coconut
thats what i use
not sure about the chicken, that sounds annoying, having to carry it around all day? dont they ahve a fridge
i dont know where you are getting £8 from?

it wont cost that much

you can buy frozen chicken

My sons school provide all the ingredients.

Parents pay a small fee at the beginning of each term. I think it's less than a tenner. It's a part state run, part academy so not a fee paying school.

They also provide foil trays to transport food home.
It helps with children that struggle to obtain ingredients and saves them having to carry them to school / forget them.

Maybe you could suggest this to them?

Yanbu to be annoyed about the lack of veggie alternative. My son did Food Tech at GCSE and there were tweaks for allergies and diets like vegetarianism.

My son's food was never edible after a day at school. One year he had food tech before lunch so he ate what he cooked which worked well.

Unfortunately due to how subjects are funded in England the food/tech departments are unable to do this.

To answer someone else's ponit

Also the reason why they don't get parents to pay a "fee" and the school provides the ingredients is due to the amount of parents that refuse to pay the fee.