By Ed Bruskeaka The Slow cook
Chartwells had its menu writers working overtime on this one. At its website, the company describes this as "sliced oven-roasted turkey on a whole wheat mini sub roll with cranberry mayo," plus "fresh veggie gardenaria with broccoli and carrots," "seasoned green beans," and "local peach."
Veggie gardenaria?
My dictionary (Webster's New Universal Unabridged) doesn't even list "gardenaria" as a word. It looks to me more like frozen broccoli and "sanded" carrots cooked together, although these broccoli do seem to be holding together better than the frozen variety I've seem steamed into oblivion in the past. The "seasoned green beans" are out of a can. And the "oven-roasted turkey" is simply processed turkey breast that arrives sliced and frozen from the Jennie-O Turkey Store in Willmar, Minn.
According to the packing label, the turkey consists of "turkey breast, white turkey, turkey broth, modified food starch."
I'm not sure how the "cranberry mayo" was made, but it sure was pink. The kids debated each other over what they were supposed to do with it. Some were dipping their carrots in it.
The "local peach" seems to be the one item on this tray not suffering an identity crisis. And being local, it also earns the schools a five-cent bonus from the D.C. treasury.
Posts
Ed: I'm curious - when you get whole fruit like the peaches, is it ripe enough to eat? I'm told that when HISD serves, e.g. whole pears, they look lovely but are rock hard and virtually all of them go into the garbage.
ReplyDeleteBettina, I was very curious about that, too. Thge peaches and nectarines are grown locally and they turned out to be delicious, not rock hard. Also the pears, though they are not designated as "locally grown," also were a hit with kids, even though they were not what you'd call soft. But that also had something to do with the variety of pear. It could have been a little riper, but pears bruise easily when they're ripe.
ReplyDelete