about Food Tech? And the cost?

[AlwaysInBed]

I think Food Tech is way too expensive.

DD's first term of doing Food Tech (she missed a term and a half of school last year, due to a serious illness, so missed a term of Food Tech) is next term. Today we got sent out the recipes/ingredients osit (why now?) and we can't afford it, end of.

AIBU to think there should be a way of receiving financial support? Alternatively, in each class, every student pays in x amount and then people receiving (for example, FSM, tax credits, etc;) don't have to pay as much or anything.

There's £5 worth of ingredients, roughly, per project, and cooking is once every two weeks. How does that work out? I will end up having to get food off my mother, who's not exactly well off either, but for many people, their mother isn't an alternative. What do they do?

I don't know. Most of the meals (from some friends who are doing their term this year- it's rotating, she does DT one term, FT next term, Computer and Photography stuff the last term, and there's all different orders so some do FT now etc;) seem to be stuff like sausage rolls, rock cakes etc; but there are still weeks to go. It's £5 per meal or so, not £2.50 iyswim, ey have a prep lesson, a making lesson, a prep lesson etc; and I just think that £5 just seems a lot for one meal.

I will try to get her to team up but I know she'd be embarrassed too. But, tbh, I think not having the ingredients would be more embarrassing! Thanks for the (hopeful) solution. I don't know their parents but she has some very strong friends who she trusts with everything practically, so I'm sure she will find someone

So are you saying a fiver a fortnight? She's your daughter - can you rustle up a fiver for a bottle of wine? Do you smoke? Could you get a job during school hours? Could she get a job/babysitting, etc.

It's a small amount of money towards preparing her for a GCSE. What would you do if she was musical and needed to learn to play an instrument?

I think this is so so sad.

My ds cooks in school he enjoys it and tbh it doesn't really cost that much. If he makes a meal that's what we have for dinner, stretched out if its not enough bulked up with other things. i make a big deal about him having made the dinner himself and it has done wonders for his self esteem.

i cant see how either of the examples you have given cost anywhere near £5 to make. surely if you know whats coming you can budget the ingredients buying them gradually.

I dont think any of us are suggesting that £2.50 per week/fortnight is not manageable .
But, like Saggy i have had one list that cost around £20 and ingredients normally work out at about ten pounds, and yes I do buy morrisons own when possible dd peels the labels off

We don't have to pay/buy anything apart from the odd raisins/nuts to jazz up the standard recipe for their final project. Which is just as well as I don't get to see/eat any of it as they scoff it down before they get home!

we are lucky in that case, the school provided most of the materials, at a cost of 50p, sometimes . occasionally i would have to provide mince, toms, but not costly and that may be due to the fact that dd forgot she had food tech.

YANBU

the cost can be big and I know it might not seem a lot to some people but it's a real struggle for us

One time the ingredients list insisted on four chicken breasts as well as lot of other ingredients, it ended up costing about £15 and then it didn't get sent home so we couldn't eat it. That is a lot out of our weekly budget and while we didn't say anything to the dc it made things really difficult for us

I don't think it's fair to suggest subsidising people- what if most of the kids parents get tax credits? That's one of my pet hates mind you- BIL is very very wealthy and the rest of the family think he should pay for all meals out, etc. I don't think it's fair, so we take turns, only eating at expensive places if he chooses.

I'm surprised at people managing to eat any of the results either- by the time we get them home they've been in a Tupperware container in a backpack for any amount of time.

Must be different here in Scotland ours don't make big proper meals, just individual servings.

dd2 in Year 7 did fresh fruit salad - she was asked to bring in at least 6 types of fruit with two being "exotic" - that was expensive! and they ate it at school...

why dont you call the school and ask if there is another way you can pay what age is your dd I dont understand how it is compulsary but if she is in a junior year then I can see why . fwiw dd has always done food tech so i have paid a lot of money int he last 5 years but it is a one off payment and the children who have not paid still get to cook just not what they payers get to cook, I was £50 the start of term you need to find out the recipies she will be doing and see if you can buy in bulk

shona dd get to keep her cooking in class in her early years i didnt eat them cos they looked like they had been poked but i taste it now but 1st 2nd year nah i didnt touch it

Why wouldn't they eat what they cooked at school as lunch? That way there's no lugging it around half hot and festering - and it would save the cost of a school lunch.

(Mine are still primary age so the wild world of secondary school is a mystery to me)

well it depends what period they cook really , and tbh some of it is rank,

Ay my school they have big fridges to store pupil's creations and cook a variety of things, not just cakes. So the food can be safely taken home and eaten. I would check this out with the school though as I know some don't. £5 for a meal that can be eaten safely at home is very different to food that has to be eaten at school or thrown away.

And on the school trip thing about subsidising - maybe the rules have changed but when I last organised a trip some parents did end up paying for others. Theoretically the shortfall should come from school funds but what school has spare money to subsidise a trip, even if its a really education one? Any profit would be paid back to parents but I was told I had to allow extra in the money charged to parents to pay for any that wouldn't/couldn't pay.

These threads always surprise me. We never paid anything (I think the food was delivered in bulk) and there was never any problem with food going bad as we collected it from the class at the end of the day so it was refrigerated if necessary (teacher was always there for collection). Seemed so simple!

Don't know if they had fridges at their school- they dropped food science a couple of years ago. As for eating what they made for lunch, it depends when their class is, am or pm, and also what they'd made- cake not great for lunch.

Here is this weeks list of ingredients needed by dd3, I have left off the herbs and spices as most of them I have had to buy on other occasions, and she dosent like pine nuts so have left them out too.

300-500 g of fresh chopped chicken breast.
1 onion.
1 Leek.
1 garlic clove.
2 carrots.
2 large tomatoes
1 bottle/sachet of sweet chilli sauce.
1 bag of fresh rice or egg noodles.
1 small bottle of oil for cooking.

I cant see that coming to much less than ten pounds
And its not pay day till next Monday

I think you should talk to the school and explain that you cannot afford to provide this food. If your child is allocated Pupil Premium (I think this applies to children who have been registered for free school meals within the last 6 years) , then this is exactly the sort of thing that pupil premium should be used to pay for.

If you can adjust the items included, can't you adjust the quantities? I'd send her with enough chicken to serve one.

Yes Shona, thats exactly what I'm going to do and I think i've got a slightly aged garlic clove left from the last lot too
I wouldn't get any assistance as working full time, minimum wage topped up with wtc.and I certainly dont expect other parents to contribute towards my childs ingredients, I just wish the schools would choose slightly more 'budget' menus, maybe with something more exotic once a term.

It depends really. I would only pay if a) - they had storage for it. So the stuff can be refrigerated properly.

And b)- that it's something edible. I wouldn't waste money on a meal blatantly thrown together using nothing but jars and packets. From that list to be honest it looks like maybe some kinda stir fry/sweet chilli chicken. Surely the noodles would be better cooked at home. That doesn't look a recipe tbh that would suit being kept and re heated. What's wrong with teaching a shepherds pie or a chili or a chicken and veg pie or cakes and biscuits. A curry perhaps where tbh if you can't afford to supply exotic additions you can sub with carrots or potato or cans of chick peas.

Can u use skinless/boneless chicken thighs? Be cheaper.

I would just like to add that I would never eat anything that ds1 or dd cooked at school so you don't actually get a family meal for £2.50.
They are both good cooks, they regularly cook dinner at home.
But the food at school sits in their bag for an entire day.
And they cannot add any extra ingredients to it, to make it taste nice. My dd got a detention because she seasoned her chicken the night before. This was not part of the recipie

A detention? Seriously? Ffs. Seasoning meat lands a detention. I'm speechless