Sixth Graders Write Op-Ed to Protest 10-Minute Lunch Period

April 19, 2012

A lot of you sent me yesterday a link to a Minneapolis Star Tribune editorial written by two sixth graders to protest Minneapolis’s public schools’ 15-minute lunch period which, according to the girls, actually amounts to 10 or 11 minutes in practice. Talia Bradley and Antonia Ritter do an excellent job outlining the potential role a rushed [...]

Share
Read the full article →

Spork Report: Is Houston ISD Ready To Get The Junk Food Out of Its Cafeterias?

April 18, 2012

As many of you know, I’ve long been concerned about the quality of the so-called “a la carte” items sold by my district, Houston ISD (the nation’s seventh largest) in its cafeterias and snack bar lines. These foods, offered in direct competition with the federally reimbursable meal and sold only to turn a profit, tend [...]

Share
Read the full article →

USDA Offers “Farm-to-School” Grants; Alaska Tries Out “Fish-to-Schools”

April 17, 2012

We’ve talked before on The Lunch Tray about efforts by school districts to source at least some of their produce from local or regional producers.  The benefits of such a program are numerous:  the food is fresher and less likely to be processed; children can actually meet or learn about “their” farmers and/or visit the [...]

Share
Read the full article →

School Food News, International Edition

April 16, 2012

Happy Monday!  I thought I’d kick off the week with a few school food stories from around the world: England The Southwark district of Central London recently instituted free school lunch for all children, regardless of income level, as a means of reducing stigma in the lunch room.  But Southwark has come under fire by some critics, who [...]

Share
Read the full article →

Nestlé Drops Artificial Ingredients in UK Candy – Why Not Here?

April 11, 2012

While the blog was dominated by LFTB last month, many interesting “kid and food” news items came and went without coverage here.  I won’t try to recapture most of these for you, but a few are important enough that I want to share them now, even if they’re a little dated.  Here are two such [...]

Share
Read the full article →

Two Good Articles on Social Stigma in the Lunch Room

April 10, 2012

While the blog was devoted exclusively to the LFTB issue, San Francisco school food reformer Dana Woldow (creator of the immensely useful school food reform how-to site, PEACHSF.org) wrote two important articles in Beyond Chron about an issue often discussed here on TLT:  social stigma in the school cafeteria. As I first wrote in “A La Carte [...]

Share
Read the full article →

On Grandmas, Food and Memories

April 9, 2012

My paternal grandmother passed away yesterday. She was 96, a truly remarkable woman, and I was lucky to have had her in my life for so long. My cousin was with my grandmother shortly before her death and told me that, amidst recounting snippets of her past (sometimes in Ladino, the Hebreo-Spanish spoken by Sephardic [...]

Share
Read the full article →

A Day Off and a Recipe: Caramel Chocolate Matzoh Crunch!

April 6, 2012

[Ed. Note:  The Jewish holiday of Passover begins tonight and, absent any big development that must be shared,  I'm going to take a short break from posting here.  I will, however, continue to post any new information on LFTB on The Lunch Tray's Facebook page for those following that issue. Before I go, I wanted to [...]

Share
Read the full article →

4/4: Latest LFTB Link Round-Up

April 4, 2012

LFTB posts worth reading from the last few days: A beef processor which makes LFTB files for bankruptcy.  Food Safety News has more. ABC’s Jim Avila and Appetite for Profit‘s Michele Simon go right after BPI’s safety claims. Iowa governor Terry Branstad, who has called for a Congressional probe of the “smear campaign” against LFTB, sends a letter to fellow governors seeking support [...]

Share
Read the full article →

My Response to a Facebook Commenter re: LFTB, Job Losses, “Pink Goo” and More

April 4, 2012

Over the last few weeks, a pro-LFTB commenter named Tiffany has left numerous wall posts on TLT’s Facebook page and when I finally wrote my belated response to her this morning, it seemed worth posting here since many pro-LFTB commenters on this blog have raised similar concerns.  For those who wish to see the exchange referenced [...]

Share
Read the full article →

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →