To think that this is dangerous, and a home economics teacher should know better?

[SaggyOldClothCatPuss]

DD had food tech first lesson this morning. She made chilli con carne, with rice. It has spent the whole day, in a tupperware container, on the worktop in the classroom, and she wasnt allowed to collect it until the end of the day.
Now, having been to catering college, and studied food science, it seems to me that having cooked rice sitting out the whole day is really stupid, not to mention dangerous, and is not a good thing to be teaching anybody?
And owing to the fact that DD was unable to acess the chilli at lunchtime, when it would have probably have been safe to eat, it has now gone in the bin, therefore wasting the £7+ that the ingredients cost me!
Factoring in the other lessons, where I have paid for ingredients, and then on the day the teacher has been absent, causing the meat and dairy ingredients that she needed to end up in the bin, I have half a mind to contact the school, and tell them that DD wont be participating in future!

Very poor practice imo. Don't think the school should be cooking dishes they can't store safely. And teaching food hygiene is surely a key part of any home economics course (as is being economical and not wasting food).

Loads of expert advice on here which echoes what my dsis used to say (she worked in industrial catering and she always said it was the rice cooked in vast quantities that was usually the problem due to the length of time it took to heat up and cool down)

purity - I am alive and well. I will be rather more anal from now on

I would be contacting the school on both issues - the food safety one and the cost of the wasted ingredients. £23!! For the love of god have these people no sense that they would expect parents to come up with such expensive ingredients for school cookery?

This isn't the first time I've seen this complaint on MN. Whjat is wrong with these Home ec teachers? I did Cookery in the 70's ...

So did I but even in the 70s I remember some ridiculous wastage. We had one lesson where we had to cook and server a full cooked breakfast. We had to eat it in the lesson as it couldn't be taken home afterwards. No thought was given to the time of day. I had my lesson last thing so at about 3:30pm I was expected to consume the full works - orange juice, bacon, sausage, egg, beans etc and toast and marmalade - and consume it quickly so I could then run and catch the school bus to go home for the tea my Mum had cooked

Worse though was the Christmas Cake fiasco. We all made fruit cakes with lots of expensive ingredients then the teacher told us to put them in the oven and she would get them ut when they were ready. She clearly didn't check in time or regularly enough because at least half the class went in next day to find their cakes burnt and spoiled.

"I don't think you had botulism from eating dodgy chinese, Bunbaker."

Yes you are right. I was in a rush this morning and didn't read the post properly. I also think it was B. Cereus. I felt absolutely dreadful, really ill. Luckily it only lasted 24 hours.

I was discussing this thread with DD last night.
She says the boys who made chilli were told they weren't to do rice to take home.

Anyone who wanted it for their lunch was to cook rice at the end of the lesson and stay and eat it. No cooked rice was to leave the room.

They do catering and DD says they are very strict in food hygiene rules.

SaggyOldClothCatPuss Any response from the school yet?

I don't understand why a school would let kids cook stuff then not eat it immediately? It seems such a waste.
I agree rice is dodgy if left to cool then re heat and meat also sat there slowly cooling. Ffs the kids should cook it and eat it, I would be pissed off as its a total waste of money.

monkeysbignuts

"I don't understand why a school would let kids cook stuff then not eat it immediately?"

Tidying up, washing up, putting away,next lesson.

Have you got a reply to your email op?

If they are cooking the first lesson of the day, they aren't really going to eat a savoury supper dish at 10am.

If they are cooking just after lunch, they won't want to eat two meals in as many hours.

Their dish is likely to be 2 - 4 portions.

No reply yet. I had an auto reply to my email, and her head of year rang and said that he would make sure it would get to the attention of the head, but no actual feedback. I will be back to update as soon as I hear anything!

UPDATE:
I have today received the following from the head of DD's school:

^Dear Mrs Catpuss,
Thank you for your e-mail dated 11 October, regarding your concerns with ***'s food lessons. I apologise for my slow response.
I have investigated the issues you have raised and I share your concerns regarding the health implications of food not being correctly prepared or stored correctly once it is cooked. Therefore I have asked the technology department to review its procedures. This includes the purchasing of additional fridges.
In response to your second concern we intend to implement a method of e-mailing and texting parents if the food teacher is absent on a day the children were intending to cook. This will hopefully reduce, if not eliminate, children bringing food into school and it subsequently not being used.
I hope these actions will reassure you that I have taken your concerns seriously.
If you have any further concerns please do not hesitate to contact me.

Yours sincerely,
Head Teacher.^

Im impressed!

That's a great response! Must be a good school...

That's brilliant, well done! Ours would say 'mrs nit. Thank you for your feedback, feedback is always welcome. Best wishes, headmaster'.

I AM NOT MRS NIT!

That was a good response.

Agreed - great response.

Would much rather they took a week or two to investigate the problem and to come up with sensible solutions, then tell you about them, rather than take a couple of days to do something briefly but actually not achieve anything to resolve the issue.

Good response there OP. I must say this has been one of those "what I've learned from MN" threads. I am perfectly old enough to know all this, but I have never come across all this about rice before. Suffice to say, I did some rapid chilling tonight for the first time ever, just in case. I also learnt from another thread that you shouldn't shower or swim in contact lenses - another thing I've had nearly 30 years of doing without realising the implications!

Tiger, what are the implications of showering or swimming in contact lenses??

Yes, why not?

Rumbelina and Saggy www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-19356558 just for example. Makes me squint with pain just reading it.