Do your kids enjoy their school meals?

[Mamabearwhere]

Sorry if this isn’t the right place for this question but just wondering how many peoples kids enjoy their school meals? My child is in year 1 at a good school however the school meals are really not great and most days she comes out of school STARVING because she’s not had much to eat since breakfast at 7:30am. The lunches vary from curries and lasagnes to jacket potatoes and sausages. She’s not a particular amazing eater but it just breaks my heart thinking of how hungry she is all day at school :( they don’t allow packed lunches so it’s not like she can take her own food. I try to give her a big filling breakfast to try and keep her full for as long as possible. I’d be really interested to hear other parents experiences. Haven’t said anything to school and frankly what can I say? “Please serve plain pasta or fish fingers and chips so that our kids eat”. I just don’t know how many year 1 and 2 kids are eating ‘pineapple pepper fajitas” or “tuna and canelli beans” !?!

Also if anyone has suggestions of meals that their schools offer and the kids enjoy please share as that could be something I suggest to school

Well our school don't serve those meals you mentioned!
As to whether mine enjoys them... I would say it's a mixture of both. She'll eat some and on other days choose the jacket potato option as she doesn't like the other options.
But I would prefer her to have a hot meal cos I don't always serve one at home
But yes she does she sometimes (often? Not sure) doesn't get enough of it. Which is strange to me that they don't serve enough!!

@purpleme12 yes that’s another thing, the meals mine does enjoy she says was not enough (and she’s not a huge eater so I know it must have been really little for her to say that) I appreciate they don’t want wastage but I do think the meal sizes are small

Most schools have a meat option,a veggie option and a cold sandwich option. Some go the extra mile and add a jacket potato to the offerings.

Wednesday is roast dinner day.
Fridays is fish and pizza day.

Have you gone through all the menu options with her and let her choose? Are you able to change what she picks or is she stuck with the same option for the term?

Can you send in a fruit snack for playtime?

DD (who is fussy as fuck) likes the roasts(chicken/beef/pork) ,fish, burger, mac and cheese, chicken pie and jacket potatoes but only with cheese not beans, chicken mild curry.

She's had days when she really didn't like the food and just ate the pasta or potatoes or pulled the hot dog/ham out and ate the bun , veg ,side and pudding.

We just have normal meals thankfully so don't have this issue - ours are fish fingers and chips, hot dogs, pizzas, chicken curry, roast dinner etc. although they're obviously called fancier names and made healthier, but the premise is the same. There's always a jacket potato option which mine normally chooses anyway.

I’m thinking probably the key here is to get her to like jacket potatoes because that’s the safe option always on offer. She doesn’t like it at the moment but will work in making it more appealing for her so she has that to fall on it all else fails.

I wish my DC's school did school dinners...there is no such thing here unfortunately I hate making school lunches

Misses point, but, Why does she have breakfast so early ?

Mine LOVED their school dinners, but they were never served the couple of odd examples you've mentioned, that I am aware of.
School dinners have always had a choice though, why doesn't she choose the other one ?

Also, you could challenge the "not allowed a packed lunch" rule - going back 30 years the school I taught in tried to hold out as long as we could saying they weren't allowed (for very good reasons - we knew in our catchment that school dinners were usually the only cooked food some of the children got and certainly the only vegetables), but it wasn't legal and we had to allow packed lunches if parents insisted.

DS1 is in Y1 and is a fairly picky eater. He finds something he likes on the menu most days - they have a pasta option 3 days a week and jacket potato twice a week and he often has these. He also likes the pizza, sausages, veggie sausages, chicken burger, fish and chips, and will occasionally choose the roast dinner on a Wednesday. He is more adventurous at school than at home.

My ds is in reception and really enjoys his school dinners. They have a choice of meat/veggie and always jacket potatoes available. He picks the strangest things sometimes, the complete opposite to what I think a 4 year old would eat! But im blessed with a very good eater.

Mine are jacket potato every day in reception.

Also bear in mind in general the portions are tiny - she may well be eating it but they're all always starving when they come out of school.

My son is a good eater and not fussy but he doesn’t like school meals. Says they are too small, too dry and just not nice. He does like the puddings though! He usually takes packed lunch but every so often we try a dinner and he comes home starving

I’m a nanny for two fussy boys. One of them being really fussy comes out ravenous. He has a massive bowl of cereal and anything else he can pack in before dinner 2 hours later and he eats all the dinner too.

The third one is so not fussy he LOVES food and can picture him enjoying the menu to its fullest 😂

Nope - dd hates hers. They serve a lot of 'wet' food, I assume because it's easy to keep warm but she just won't eat it. Her school hate me for it, but I just send a packed lunch. If they offered a sandwich option I would send her in for that but they only offer a jacket potato and she won't eat potatoes in any form.

I'd suggest ringing the school, we have the option on the phone to press a number that goes through to the school kitchen

They are always happy to offer a sandwich or something simple instead of the main meal if we ring the day before

DS Y3 takes packed lunches now he’s in KS2 but does sometimes have a school lunch if I can’t be bothered making them.

DS enjoys his school dinners but he is a very good eater and loves food, will eat anything.

There are 4 options. The school meals are always fish fingers on Friday. The rest of the time it is mild curry (sometimes chicken or a veggie one), pasta dishes, fish pie, gnocchi, sausage and Yorkshire pudding, all day breakfast, paella, cottage pie. A real mixture

9 times out of 10 there is a sandwich/wrap options snd if not, there’s a jacket potato option.

Really interesting some of your school offer lots of options and sandwiches. Ours don’t offer sandwiches at all, and the only other option is jacket potatoes that my daughter doesn’t like. When I’ve asked the school they always say pasta is another option but my daughter swears they don’t have pasta as an option. So I’m not sure if the school told me the truth.

@BackforGood because her school starts at 8:30. We’re awake from 7, breakfast at 7:30 and out of the door at 8/8:10.

I think 7.30 is quite normal for breakfast for a school day anyway. I certainly wouldn't say it's especially early

Instead of filling her up with a huge breakfast would a more normal breakfast make her more likely to eat her lunch? If she is hungry at lunch will she eat more even though it's not her favourite?

Do you know what time they have their lunch? My reception child goes down for lunch at 11:45! My Year 3 is 12:30 so if they had a huge breakfast I don't think they would eat much. As it is they enjoy their school dinners very much - lasagne, curry, roasts, pizza etc. Neither of mine like Jacket Potato either but they manage fine with either the meat or veggie option everyday. They are always allowed extra bread and salad bits (all separate so they can get get cucumber for example if they want). Plus there is pudding everyday too.

Mine are hungry when they finish school, I think that's normal especially as lunch is so early but they haven't been starving all day or anything.

Mine mostly enjoys them. At the moment, they only offer sandwiches (with some sort of healthy lentil puff crisp things, fruit, small pudding like a flapjack or piece of cake), because KS1 & KS2 students can't mix. The KS1 students have the option of a hot meal.

But when they were having normal hot lunches, yes, she liked them most to some of the time. They do have choices: meat or veg hot meal option (is usually sausages and mash, roast on wed, pork and apple burger, curry, fish on fridays, sort of things), plus jacket or sandwich. I tried to choose what she liked, but some days there wasn't anything very exciting and she didn't love it.

I'm very much a 'if you're hungry, you'll eat' parent though. I don't make special meals, unless dh and I are eating something unsuitable for dc. Mine has asked to switch to packed lunches more as I think she thinks she'll get more treats with a packed lunch (she doesn't). But school lunches are easier and I'd rather her learn to eat what's offered with her friends.

Some more than others. Ds (6) gets to pick from 3 or 4 options. Today was steak pie, mashed potato and peas or macaroni cheese with peas and carrots or tomato & pasta soup with a tuna mayonnaise wrap.

There is a good range of things and ds usually has no issue picking something. If I had one complaint it would be that the soup and sandwich option features mayonnaise too much as ds hates it.

We currently have the menus until the end of September though and can choose to send them with a packed lunch at any point. They just ask as he enters the building (smallish rural Scottish primary). They also get to take a break time snack and the days ds is dubious about lunch, I send him with a bigger snack.