to complain about the state of the school lunches?

[supermaje]

I’m genuinely torn about whether I’m being a bit precious here, so tell me straight. My DC’s (8 and 10) primary school lunches are, frankly, shocking. They come home starving most days because the portions are tiny, and the food sounds grim. Yesterday was “pizza” which apparently was a single slice of bread with a smattering of cheese and a bit of tomato paste. That’s not pizza, is it?! It’s toast.

They also regularly run out of options by the time the last sitting gets served, so my youngest ends up with whatever’s left, which is often jacket potatoes for the third time that week. He’s so fed up he’s asked me to start making packed lunches again.

I get that budgets are tight and schools are under pressure, but for £2.50 a day, I’d expect them to at least get a decent, filling meal. When I mentioned it casually to a teacher at pick-up, they said something like, “Oh, it’s not the worst we’ve seen!” which made me think they know it’s rubbish too but aren’t doing anything about it.

Would I be unreasonable to raise it properly with the school? I don’t want to be that parent, but surely they should be offering better meals than this? Or is this just how it is everywhere now? I don’t want to kick up a fuss if this is standard and everyone else is just putting up with it.

(And yes, I’ve seen the menu they send home. It all looks great on paper. It’s just the reality that’s dire!)

Thoughts?

I used to be a school governor and had to go I to school to assess the meals. They were actually fine and a good sized portion.
Yours sound grim and I would complain if I were you. I don't know how these companies do the food for the budget though, increase in staff costs must be taking up most of the money they get.

Do your school not take orders in advance? That would be my recommendation and that's what our school does. Kids need to order in the morning (or parents can do it in advance) and that way the kitchen knows how much of each item to prepare.

I think portions are bigger for the older children compared to the lower years but it all depends on how much your child eats and how fussy they are. Working in a dinner hall there is a lot of food waste e.g pizza usually comes with sweetcorn and proper chunky wedges. A lot of children won't eat the sweetcorn or the potato wedges and throw them in the bin, which would mean they are hungry as their meal is small through their choices.

You say yourself the menu sounds good on paper, so actually maybe what your children report might not be the case if they do what children I describe above do.

I am in a school canteen everyday.

I advise your child to choose the jacket potato every single day. And make sure they accept a pudding and help themselves to the bread and salad to bulk out the food.

The actual main courses are small and vary in how good they are. The other day I genuinely couldn't cut up the quiche for a child as it was so hard!

I couldn't recognise the 'burrito' initially I assumed it was a spring roll
The Friday fish fingers are soggy and the chips often burnt.

Actually the roasts are pretty popular as is the Mac and cheese.

There is one pasta dish that is so spicy all the kids scraped it into the bin.

If I notice a kid eating absolutely nothing I go and get them extra bread.

Genuinely the only safe and filling option is the jacket potato

Most schools here do orders in advance and children choose each day so they know what they are getting and it stops frood running out so I wouldn't think it unreasonable to suggest a similar idea be implemented at your child's school.

However if the food isn't great this probably won't help the situation so I'd suggest doing packed lunches is the only realistic solution to the problem.

I've seen school dinners ranging from delicious to awful. The best were when the school employed their own kitchen staff but that's more expensive so unusual nowadays.
It's worth checking who the providers are and writing to them. They have to reapply for their contract fairly regularly so making a complaint can sometimes achieve something. MPs can sometimes be interested too.

I work in a school and our dinners are nothing like that, pizza is made with fresh made dough every time for example.
Parents order the meals for their children at the start of the week or the day before so we know how much to make of each thing- we don't run out.
I think a lot depends on what the cook is like to be honest. Ours is very good.

I think the problem is budgets are so tight. £2.50 also has to pay for the kitchen staff etc. I know some school kitchens that cut costs by ordering cheap meat etc. Is packed lunch an option?

I would write formally to the head and the chair of the board of governors.

Good nutrition is essential for good educational outcomes and healthy development.

I worked briefly in a school kitchen and promptly withdrew DS from most school dinners. I was shocked at the quality of the food and the jacket potatoes were by far the best option.

Some stuff was done really well like homemade bread and the puddings were decent. The meat for the mains was awful reconstituted stuff and usually cooked until it was like leather. The fish fingers and fish stars barely contained any fish.

The children barely at any of it, we would be disposing of two bin bags worth of food every single day.

I think school catering is in a very difficult position between offering wholesome food and food children are actually going to eat. They're not particularly well paid jobs and have to adhere to all sorts of food safety ceremony which eats into their time.

My child complains bitterly that the cutlery and plates the food comes on isn't properly clean.

Since the kids have smart phones on them anyway it would be handy to see some pictures.

The funding doesn't really go up but staff costs, fuel costs and ingrdient costs do, so I think the meals gave declined.

Do you know if it's a catering firm. They do vary a bit but schools aren't always in a position to renegotiate a deal.

My daughter was once given a quarter of a baked potato for her lunch. A quarter. I emailed to complain and was basically told tough shit. I now do packed lunches so I know they are getting proper portions of food.

I do packed lunches for mine because the school lunches are so bad. A number of parents did get together and complain and the school is apparently 'looking at options' whatever that means, but they did address it. Could you bring it up on the class whatsapp and see if any other parents agree and want to raise it as an issue?

I've seen a lot of school dinners as a supply teacher and the vast majority are not great with small portions. I've read some parent's posts on here saying they do not provide a substantial cooked meal for their children in the evening as they have already had a hot lunch at school. I would not be relying on that.

Prearranged visit?

Unless it was a surprise inspection after they'd already started dishing it out, they knew you were coming (and would have had influence upon any decision to renew a contract).

The stuff suppliers do to get or keep a contract bears no relationship to the rest of the contract term.

It sounds exactly like my son's school (NE London) except that they are aware and consulting on it.

The last classes to go in basically get the bits nobody else wanted, there is no choice.

My children said that the food served on my governor visit was entirely different to the food served normally. Teachers agreed!

For 2.50 a head i could make a decent, child friendly menu using cheap cuts of meat bulked out with hidden veg. Puddings could be old fashioned fruit crumbles or pies or sponges, fresh fruit salad with ice cream, or fruit/yogurt if preferred. A real pudding with fruit is not unhealthy as part of a balanced diet for primary kids who don’t stop moving.

the menus these days try too hard to be cool, serving meals alleged to be from around the world when kids just won’t eat them. We’d be better off doing large familiar crowd pleasers like shepherds pie, bolognaise, meatballs in tomato sauce with rice, lasagne, fish (breaded) and chips (oven cooked skin on wedges), ALL of which can be packed with hidden veg and are easy to make in bulk.

I would ask about food OP. The only way things get better is if people question poor standards.

Who are you going to complain to? Your complaint is valid but the teachers have no control over it and the school doesn’t decide how much funding the government puts into meals. The government needs to increase the rate they pay per child.

Ours have really varied by different providers as we've had several. Ranging from back in the day when we had a little old fashioned kitchen and all food was made on site... this was generally brilliant, decent portions and often enough going for the older children or bigger eaters to ask for seconds, to the terrible...roast dinners that we one tiny slice of unidentifiable 'meat', a single bite size roast potato and as much cabbage as they wanted with gravy not allowed at it was so watery it just splashed everywhere and tasted of nothing.

We're middle of the road now. All portions are the same from Reception to Y6 which I don't agree with, it seems mad to me that they expect a 4/5 year old to have the same appetite as 10/11 year olds. Some of the upper KS2 boys are the same height as me!

Online in advance ordering system for parents to do. One of mine will eat them but mostly has the jacket potato or pasta option. The other one won't eat them and I make a packed lunch.

What gets me annoyed is the packed lunches aren't allowed so much as a whiff of anything dessert like unless it's fruit, but the school lunch puddings are cookies, cake and jelly! I wouldn't be sending chocolate and the like anyway, but it's beside the point. But, I digress!

The quality should be reasonable and the quantity decent. Ours also provide as much fresh bread (sliced French stick style), spread, and salad (that any of the children can help themselves to) as they like. Filling up on white bread isn't ideal but if it fills hungry tummies then it's not something that I have an issue with.

My children go to school on a proper breakfast, they're sent with healthy snacks for break and they get decent cooked dinners at home. So if they have the odd lunch that they don't like or is a bit crap then they can fill up on bread that day and it's not the end of the world, I can't get worked up over it.

If it was frequently awful though, I would make a fuss and I don't think that's being 'that' parent. What would worry me is that for many, many children those meals are the only hot meal they get. If they're poor, then it's really not ok.

YANBU.
Quite a while ago now as mine are 19 and 17, but ours were also pretty poor.
I ended up doing packed lunches until secondary school started (where the meals were a lot better). I wouldn't think complaining will get you far. It's likely school know how shit they are, but that's the provider they have to use.

Teacher

I've worked in schools where they are quite good and I ate them on occasion and schools where I wouldn't touch them with a barge pole.

The class teacher has no input into what dinners are served, nor is it a part of their role to get involved so your line about teachers not doing anything is a bit silly. Speak to the office, and the head if necessary, who will be choosing who the contract for catering goes to.

You have to take staff, fuel, insurance and equipment maintenance costs put of your 2.53. Apparently it's about 1.12 spend on food.

But I do agree that simple crowd pleasers work best..

They were terrible when I was a child (2000s) massive improvement in secondary school though. If your child's school doesn't have an actual kitchen you can safely assume the food will be terrible

Do it. I wish the patents at my school could see ours. I think they are awful. Tiny portions and poor quality food. Lots of junk food. Not even plates, just tiny cardboard trays.