Whole Wheat Bagel Ingredients

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

No sooner were the pixels dry on this morning's post about a whole wheat bagel breakfast than I managed to scrounge a shipping carton listing the ingredients.

Like the hamburger bun served at my daughter elementary school last month, the bagel is made by a company called Bake Crafters in Collegedale, Tenn. And, like the hamburger buns, the English muffins arrive frozen and only need to be thawed to be served. The listed ingredients are these:

Whole wheat flour, bleached bromated enriched wheat flour (niacin, thiamine mono-nitrate, ferrous sulfate, potassium bromate, riboflavin), water, brown sugar, granulated sugar, contains 2% or less of the following ingredients: salt, yeats, vital wheat gluten, mono- & diglycerides, dried honey (honey, invert sugar, corn syrup, wheat flour, wheat starch, soy flour and silicone dioxide), dried molasses (molasses, soy flour, corn starch, and silicone dioxide), guar gum, corn meal, malted barley flour, corny syrup solids, caramel color, calcium propionate, soybean oil, ascorbic acid, L-cystene, soy four, enzymes.

Obviously, that's why it tasted so good.

According to the Bake Crafters website, one whole wheat bagel is the equivalent of two bread servings in the school meal program. Unfortunately, the website does not give calore information for the bagel.

Local Peaches Mystery Solved

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

On Tuesday I contacted D.C. schools wondering why the "local peach" that was supposed to be on my daughter's breakfast tray looked so much like canned peaches instead. I also inquired where parents needed to look to find the ingredients for school menu items, as required by the new "Healthy Schools Act."

Yesterday I received a kind of robo e-mail from the Office of the Chief Operating Officer (Anthony Tata) clearing up the mystery of the canned-versus-local peaches, plus much more that I thought might interest parents. Here is the complete text of that e-mail:

"Good Afternoon, Mr. Bruske:

"Thank you for your email about your student’s peaches, and for bringing your concerns to our attention. Jeff Mills [food services director] followed-up on your concern and visited the school to discover that Stoddert was indeed off-menu. We double-checked with all our schools, and Stoddert was the one school to serve canned peaches that day, which is unacceptable. A formal complaint has been lodged with Chartwells, and we are re-doubling our efforts to ensure that this does not happen again.

"Thank you for being a watchdog for your student’s school. Parents like you keep us, and our vendors, accountable. We want to make sure your blog readers know the process for lodging a menu complaint if they have concerns at any time about the food served at their schools: they should email officeoftheCOO.inquiries@dc.gov, which is checked regularly throughout the week. Each email is taken seriously, and we always appreciate when parents and community members bring things to our attention.

"In regard to the nutritional information you asked about, we are still working to upload all the information and working with our vendors to ensure that it is correct. In a few months we will be revamping our entire menu website to be more interactive. We will be sure to let you know when we’re about to launch.

"Thanks, as always, for your inquiries"

I feel a little embarrassed making Jeff Mills go to all that trouble. It's scary to think that a few missing peaches can ruin his whole day and draw him away from all the important work he's doing trying to upgrade the food for the D.C. Public Schools' 45,000 students.

Still, I can only report what I see. And if we're truly concerned about the food kids are eating, the only thing that really matters is what actually ends up on their cafeteria trays.

What's in This Burger?

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

Under the "Healthy Schools Act" passed by the D.C. Council earlier this year food service must post the ingredients "for each menu item" in a place where the public can see them.

When I asked a spokeswoman for the schools on Tuesday where I could find this information, she sent me a link [PDF]that took me to a site that lists nutritional information for some menu options, but no ingredients. I asked again about the ingredients, and am waiting to hear back.

D.C. schools are also supposed to tell where produce served in the meals originates, and that information is available on the link provided above.

As you can see from this photo, some things never change. The burger and bun are still highly processed, manufactured in distant factories and shipped to schools frozen to be re-heated. Ditto for the potatoes. Even though this tray looks a bit dreary, however, the sliced cucumbers and tomatoes are something new and fresh, as is the cantaloupe from Arnold Farms in Chestertown, Md. It arrived whole at my daughters school and one of the cooks removed the rind and seeds and cut it into these bite-size pieces. It doesn't get much fresher or more local than that. (And the fact that it's local entitles the school meal program to a five-cent bonus from the city.)

Another thoughtful touch is this "homemade" dressing. Chartwells bills it as a "Greek herb mayo." That translates as mayonnaise with some dried oregano and vinegar stirred in by our own school kitchen. That's quite a departure from the prepared Kraft dressings previously served with mile-long ingredient lists of preservatives and industrial additives.

In case you were wondering, the "whole grain" hamburger bun comes from Bake Crafters Food Company in Collegedale, Tenn. The ingredients listed on the shipping package are these:

"Water, whole wheat flour, unbleached unbromated enriched wheat flour (wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, ferrous sulfate, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folice acid), sugar, wheat gluten, contains 2% or less of: yeast, salt, soybean oil, hydrated monoglycerides, wheat lactylate (CSL), calcium propionate (for freshness), calcium stearoyl, ammonium sulfate, enzymes, ascorbic acid (dough conditioner), azodicarbidamide (ADA), L-cysteine hydrochloride, calcium peroxide."

The "fully cooked char-broiled hamburger patty" comes from Don Lee Farms in Inglewood Calif. It lists the ingredients as these:

"Ground beef (not more than 20% fat), seasoning (salt, hydrolyzed soy protein (caramel color), dehydrated onion and garlic, maltodextrin, spice, sugar, torula yeast, autolyzed yeast extract, disodium inosinate, natural flavoring)." It may contain soy, and contains "commodities donated by the United States Deparment of Agriculture."

Cooking instructions are 12-15 minutes from the frozen state in a 350-degree convection oven.

Now, try to imagine listings like this for every menu item the schools serve for the entire year.