This is a topic that is so interesting to me. I'm Swedish, have lived in England for a long time, and have worked in schools. It shocked me to see the standard of food served here. It is not healthy, and the argument that 'they wouldn't eat it otherwise' is not necessarily true - children often eat what other children eat, so school is a great place to create good eating habits. It is very common for Swedish children to happily eat 'strange food' in nursery school - but to be difficult to please at home: they will eat what everyone else eats.
A long time ago I worked in a school kitchen for a short while. I told my then colleagues that chips and crips would never ever be served in Swedish schools - they are not healthy. 'But don't you ever eat potatoes' I was asked. Oh yes - boiled potatoes. Much healthier. Sometimes mash. They looked at me like I had three heads 'children would never eat that'. Well some do!
In Swedish schools, desserts are offered maybe 1-2 times a term (so 3-4 times a year). There is always a salad bar with kidney beans, sweet corn and other vegetables and crisp bread (not soft bread daily). (This is the description of the salad bar in the city of Lund: 'There are at least five different vegetable components, at least three of which must be rich in fibre, at least one pulse and at least one salad vegetable or fruit. The aim is that each child eats 100-125 grams of vegetables or fruit with their school lunch'.) Rarely fried food. Never anything deepfried. School dinners are nutritionally balanced, calculated to meet 1/3 of the daily requirements over a period of time. And yes, school dinners are free for everyone, nobody brings a packed lunch.
This is a recent list of the most popular school dinners served in the city of Malmo in south Sweden, a very multicultural city with 350 000 inhabitants:
- Broccoli soup (veggie) [particularly interesting to see this one at the top given that a previous poster in this thread said that children would never eat that].
- Pastasauce with tomatoes and herbs (veggie)
- Filet of fish with vegetables and herbs
- Italian macaroni gratin (veggie)
- Lasagne, vegetables, cheese (veggie)
- Breaded fish with potatoes (boiled!) and cold sauce
- Spagetti with chicken mince or soy mince sauce (veggie and meat)
- Tacos with chicken mince or soy mince (veggie and meat
- Pasta gratin with salmon
www.magasinmaltid.se/vegetarisk-skrall-i-malmos-skolor/
Yes, there are mince dishes on the top list - but not only. And 7 of the 9 dishes are veggie or pescetarian.
Bad health due to poor choices is a massive issue. I wish schools would start serving healthy food and not blame 'they don't want it', and that parents would support schools in this. But given Jamie Oliver's failure to show people how important this is, it won't happen in a long time at least. It is sad that so many children get a bad start.
I do think it is a bit better than it used to be though, but many schools seem to still treat vegetables as 'extras', so not included in the (almost inevitable) mince dish - much easier to avoid then. I web searched a random school and listing one option as 'sandwiches' does not really give me confidence that that would be a balanced meal. Chips at least once a week. Green cabbage - I'd happily eat it, but the way vegetables just seem to be boiled/steamed and added here does not make them appealing. Dessert every day. It could have been worse, but it's not a great menu.
www.victory.southwark.sch.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/VPS-Aut-2021-Menu.pdf
Today's food in Malmo's schools is fish in creamy mustard sauce and boiled potatoes or pea mince with boiled potatoes and carrot tzatziki. Yesterday's food was potato and leek soup, soft wholemeal no-additives-or-E-numbers bread with spreads.