What Does "Local" Mean for School Food?

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

D.C. Schools are set to start two pilot meal programs that would require food vendors to supply at least 20 percent of ingredients from sources in the Mid-Atlantic region, defined as Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, North Carolina and the District of Columbia.

Making school meals with local produce has been promoted as a way of serving fresher, more appetizing fruits and vegetables to kids and was embraced in "Healthy Schools" legislation recently approved by the D.C. Council. "Healthy Schools" also encourages schools to use produce grown according to "sustainable" farming methods.

The "Healthy Schools" act requires all public schools in the District to identify the sources of their meal ingredients and rewards the use of local products by providing a five-cent bonus for every meal that contains locally-sourced ingredients.

Up to now, fruits and vegetables in D.C. Public Schools have been provided by the school system's contracted food services provider--Chartwells--which relies for its purchases on a national food distribution system.

The salad mix served in D.C. schools, for instance, consists of shredded iceberg lettuce, carrots and purple cabbage grown and processed in California. Apples sometimes come from as far away as New Zealand. When I spent a week as an observer in the kitchen of my daughter's elementary school--H.D. Cooke--a mix of broccoli, carrots and cauliflower came from Mexico.

One of the reasons schools don't use more local produce is because local farmers are not connected to a large-scale distribution system. Keany produce, one of the area's larger distributors, located in Landover, MD, does offer customers locally-grown selections. D.C. Central Kitchen, which provides thousands of meals to the needy every day, and provides foods for some schools through it's catering arm, Fresh Start Catering, sources much of its produce from a food auction site in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley.

What difference does "local" make for school meals?

Most of the vegetables served in D.C. schools are never eaten because they are cooked to death and served as dull-looking side dishes that kids reject. Simply replacing those vegetables with locally-grown produce won't make any difference at all. Broccoli, after all, is still broccoli, whether it's grown in California or Maryland. It all comes down to kitchen skills and presentation.

In Berkeley, CA, where I worked for a week as a "kitchen lady" to see how one of the country's most progressive school food operations worked, vegetables rarely were served as side dishes. Instead, they were mixed into sauces and soups, or tossed into pasta and other dishes. Even so, the kids I served in the food line often went to great lengths to avoid vegetables.

Under the proposed pilot schemes, the 20 percent figure does not refer to a quantity of local produce, but is calculated according to price. In other words, local products are to represent 20 percent of the cost of food ingredients. Thus, if the local goods are more expensive, kids might see proportionately less of them on their trays.

This is just one more wrinkle food vendors involved in these pilot programs will have to deal with in order to comply with food service contracts loaded with new standards and requirements, but paid for with the same old budget. It's a tall order.

Getting Kids to Like School Lunch with Pennies to Spend

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

D.C. Public Schools are scheduled to contract two new pilot meal programs when school resumes in August--one pre-made or "portable" meals reheated, the other meals made from scratch--each serving seven schools across the city.

Yesterday we looked at the many ways school officials expect the hired contractors to upgrade the quality of food and adhere to numerous standards that don't apply to the schools' current food service provider, Chartwells, and all for the same meager allowance--$1.74 for breakfast, $2.68 for lunch--the federal government provides under its subsidized meal program.

Today we're going to look at how school officials expect the chosen contractors to drive up the number of students who participate in the meals programs. Increasing the number of students who choose the subsidized meals offered in schools--as opposed to bringing food from home, eating out of vending machines or off-campus, or perhaps not eating at all--brings more money into the program.

One strategy for helping school food budgets, for instance, is to serve breakfast in the classroom rather than in the cafeteria. Because breakfasts can be made easily and cheaply, a high participation rate in breakfast--as when the kids are all gathered together in class--can generate lots of federal reimbursement dollars that then can be used to improve the quality of lunch.

In Berkeley, CA, where I spent a week in the central kitchen earlier this year, the percentage of students who ate the breakfast provided at school exploded when the schools switched to serving breakfast in the classroom, from less than 9 percent to 61 percent system-wide. But breakfast is not served in the classroom in high school, since high-schoolers have schedules that change from day to day. Among elementary and middle schools, the participation rate skyrocketed to 96 percent.

"Contractor shall continue to increase breakfast participation at all grade levels of the program with emphasis on Breakfast in the Classroom," reads the schools' request for proposal [RFP] for portable meals. "The program shall include expansive marketing and a strong communication plan. In addition, the Contractor shall increase the participation in the national school lunch program at all grade levels."

To promote the new meals, the RFP states: "Contractor shall perform aggressive marketing and promotion campaigns aimed at meeting participation goals (through menu changes, new products, etc.)"

For the "portable" meals program, these are the schools involved and the targeted increases in participation rates:

* Amidon-Bowen Elementary, 401 Eye St. SW: from 45 percent breakfast participation to 85 percent, and 93 percent lunch participation to 95 percent.

* Hearst Elementary School, 3950 37th St. NW: from 13 percent breakfast participation to 70 percent, and 54 percent lunch participation to 80 percent.

* Anacostia Senior High School, 1601 16th St. SE: from 11 percent breakfast participation to 50 percent, and 43 percent lunch participation to 75 percent.

* Eastern Senior High School, 1700 East Capitol St. NE: from 8 percent breakfast participation to 50 percent, and 34 percent lunch participation to 75 percent.

* Johnson Middle School, 1400 Bruce Pl. SE: from 29 percent breakfast participation to 70 percent, and 80 percent lunch participation to 90 percent.

* Wilson Senior High School, 3950 Chesapeake St. NW: from 7 percent breakfast participation to 65 percent, and 15 percent lunch participation to 65 percent.

* Peabody Elementary School, 425 C St. NE: from 25 percent breakfast participation to 70 percent, and 80 percent lunch participation to 90 percent.

These are the schools scheduled to begin receiving meals made from scratch, and the targeted participation rate improvements for those:

* Kelly Miller Middle School, 301 49th St. NE: from 25 percent breakfast participation to 50 percent, and 66 percent lunch participation to 80 percent.

* Thomas Elementary School, 650 Annacostia Ave. SE: from 57 percent breakfast participation to 72 percent, and 92 percent lunch participation to 95 percent.

* Burrville Elementary School, 801 Division Ave. NE: from 41 percent breakfast participation to 70 percent, and 89 percent lunch participation to 95 percent.

* Alton Elementary School, 533 48th Pl. NE: from 40 percent breakfast participation to 70 percent, and 79 percent lunch participation to 90 percent.

* Kenilworth Elementary School, 1300 44th St. NE: from 64 percent breakfast participation to 75 percent, and 92 percent lunch participation to 95 percent.

* Marshall Elementary School, 3100 Ft. Lincoln Dr. NE: from 52 percent breakfast participation to 70 percent, and 69 percent lunch participation to 85 percent.

* Propect LC, 920 F St. NE: from 60 percent breakfast participation to 70 percent, and 87 percent lunch participation to 95 percent.

Even a cursory look at the schools involved in the two pilot projects reveals trends that generally hold true for all schools: more kids in disadvantaged and largely minority areas of the city participate in the federally-subsidized meal programs than white kids in more affluent areas. And participation falls off sharply as kids get older, regardless of ethnicity and economic status.

The participation targets in these proposals don't appear to be anything more than wild guesses. It will be a challenge to convince more affluent white families who may be sending meals from home to stop doing so and instead choose the food served in the cafeteria line.

Can better food drive droves of students to reconsider joining the subsidized food line?

There doesn't seem to be any reason why D.C. schools can't achieve nearly 100 percent breakfast participation if breakfast is served in the classroom, and that could provide a bounty of cash to make lunches better, especially if those in charge of school meals focus on making breakfast simpler, rather than the current fiesta of sugary, processed choices.

New School Food: Would You Buy a Used Car from this Man?

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

Two new pilot meals programs in D.C. schools purport to vastly upgrade meals served in the cafeteria, but at the same price schools are paying for the industrially processed convenience foods currently being served by the system's hired food service contractor, Chartwells.

It sounds a bit like taking your beat up old Chevy to a car dealer and asking to trade it in for a Rolls Royce. Wouldn't that be a great deal if you could get it? But how many car dealers like that do you know?

The two pilot programs, scheduled to begin when school resumes next month, each would serve seven schools, one delivering "portable" meals to be reheated on site, the other making food from scratch. The requests for proposals [RFPs] circulated earlier this year by D.C. Public Schools called for the price to be "revenue neutral" and as close as possible to current federal reimbursement rates, or $2.70 for lunch. Under the "Healthy Schools Act" recently passed by the D.C. Council, schools would receive an additional 10 cents support for lunch, plus five cents for meals that contain local produce.

Besides delivering foods free of hormones and antibiotics, free of artificial colorings and preservatives, free of high-fructose corn syrup and trans fats, and loaded with local produce and whole grains, the contracts call for the vendors to comply with a series of standards, including those contained in "Healthy Schools," Institute of Medicine standards circulated in 2007, and the "gold level" standards in the U.S. Department of Agriculture's "HealthierUS Challenge."

Today we're going to look at those various standards to see what D.C. is asking these vendors to do for $2.70 (or $2.85).

"Healthy Schools," for instance, sets minimum and maximum calorie levels for meals at breakfast and lunch, and according to two different age groupings. Likewise, sodium is restricted at different levels for breakfast and lunch, and according to age. Vendors are required to provide the ingredients and nutritional content of each menu item, and list where their fruits and vegetables come from and whether the growers are engaged in sustainable agriculture practices.

The 2007 Institute of Medicine standards would apply to what it refers to as "Tier 1" foods in school meals. These are "food and fruits, vegetables, whole grains and related combination products and non-fat and low-fat dairy that are limited to 200 calories or less per portion as packaged and:

* No more than 35 percent of calories from fat

* Less than 10 percent of total calories from saturated fats

* Zero trans fats (less than or equal to 0.5 grams per serving)

* 35 percent or less from total sugars, except for yogurt with no more than 30 grams of total sugars, per 8-oz. portion as packaged

* Sodium content of 200 mg or less per potion as packaged."

The "gold" standard for "HealthierUS Challenge" requires the following:

* Students have at least one quarter-cup serving of vegetables to choose from every day of the week. Dark green or orange vegetables must be offered three or more times per week, and of the three at least two must be different. Cooked dry beans or peas (legumes) must be offered each week.

* A different fruit must be served every day. Under the "gold standard," the fruit must be fresh at least two days. Otherwise it can be frozen, canned or dried, or served as juice.

* Fruit juice (100 percent) can be counted as the "fruit" offering only once per week.

* At least one serving of "whole grain" food must be offered each day.

* Only low-fat and fat-free milk can be served.

After accounting for labor and overhead, most schools have less than $1 to spend on the ingredients for their meals. Do you think you could do all this on that kind of budget? Ever wonder why anyone would want to get into the business of catering school food?

More on Congress' Excruciating School Lunch Reauthorization Process

Does childhood obesity pose a national security threat?

Former top military brass say we need to address school meals because too many young people are too fat to qualify for service.

You can read the second half of Jill Richardson's coverage of House hearings on reauthorization of the Child Nutrition Act at the La Vida Locavore blog.

You can watch videos of the hearings here.

Boston and the Impossible Math of Outsourcing School Food Services

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

Boston has found itself in almost exactly the same place the District of Columbia was in two years ago: running big deficits in school food services and trying to erase them by privatizing school meals.

According to a report published by Boston's public radio station, WBUR, most Boston schools have been using the same company D.C. used--Preferred Meal Systems--to supply kids with re-heated factory meals much like airline food. Officials want to upgrade the food, but are saddled with $3.6 million in annual deficits, meaning school lunch--bad as it may be--is draining money from the general budget.

Thinking a large professional food service company was the only solution to the deficit issue, Boston schools put out a request for proposals (RFP) to take over the catered meal service. But closing the $3.6 million budget gap proved to be an insurmountable hurdle. Only one company replied to the RFP--Sodexo. Parents and a number of Boston's elected officials howled at the idea of processed Sodexo food in Boston cafeterias. So the schools pulled the plug on the bidding process.

Said schools Chief Operating Officer Michael Goar: “When we say that we want someone to take all the risk of $3.6 million, and also say to them, ‘By the way, you cannot touch any of our employees, oh, oh, by the way, we want you to provide more fruits and vegetables, and the last thing, we want you to partner with our local small firms in the city of Boston,’ it became a challenge in terms of finding the degree of competition that we wanted.”

Goar says he has whittled the deficit projection for the coming year down to $2.5 million and would re-open the bidding. But others, such as Boston City Council President Mike Ross, believe the schools should simply replace Preferred Meal Systems, which ships its factory meals from Philadelphia, with a local company, City Fresh Food. "They [City Fresh] don’t freeze their food, they flash freeze, so it’s just long enough to get to the school," Ross says.

Except that 40 percent of Boston schools prepare food in their own kitchen's. What would happen to them?

D.C. was in very much the same position when Michelle Rhee took over as public schools chancellor and announced she was privatizing school meals here by hiring Chartwells, a huge food service company like Sodexo. Until that time, D.C. schools had been purchasing meals from Preferred Meal Systems, made in a factory in suburban Maryland and trucked to individual schools to be reheated.

At the time, D.C. schools were running a $10 million annual deficit in food services, a number that has never been adequately explained and makes Boston's troubles seem downright trivial. The D.C. school system's contract with Charwells called for it to take over meal service in 122 schools and reduce the deficit to something closer to $5 million over time in exchange for a $1 million administrative fee plus fees on every meal served totaling an additional $1 million or more.

Last fall, Chartwells switched from Preferred Meals to something it calls "fresh cooked," meaning meals made predominantly from frozen, industrially processed convenience foods requiring minimal skill and time to prepare. Note to Boston: this is what you get from a big food service company when you spend pennies per meal.

Rhee and her designated chief operating officer, Anthony Tata, used the same deficit rationale as Boston to justify hiring a for-profit company to run school food services, but threw in a philosophical sop for good measure: making food, they said, was not a "core competency" of schools. (Meaning schools can drive and maintain a fleet of buses, fix plumbing, heating, and air conditioning systems, landscape acres of property, manage hundreds of employees, write contracts and deal with labor unions, and teach children, but can't cook.)

Now D.C. has a new food services director who finds himself in the same awkward spot as Boston City Council President Ross: looking for alternative contractors who can make first-rate food on a beggar's budget.

Anyone have a magic wand they want to loan?

Congress' Excrutiating School Lunch Reauthorization Process

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

Our federal government has unlimited billions of dollars to wage wars in foreign countries, but when it comes to feeding our kids decent food members of Congress suddenly become all about saving money. Every five years we get to watch this spectacle play out again when law makers take up re-authorization of the Child Nutrition Act, which funds school meals, among other things.

This year President Barack Obama has requested an increase in spending of $10 billion over 10 years on child nutrition programs. It sounds like a lot, but when you do the math it works out to something like 10 cents more for school lunch, which barely covers the cost of an apple. The best the Senate has been able to come up with is a 6-cent increase. And in the House, much lip service is being paid to improving school food, but congressmen say they just can't find the money to do it.

But the best part of this year's re-authorization proposal wouldn't cost any money at all. It would simply give the country's agriculture secretary authority to remove unhealthy foods from schools that currently go unregulated.

The House held a hearing on the bill yesterday with U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack the feature speaker. Jill Richardson has a detailed recap at her blog, La Vida Locavore. And you can go here to see videos.

Are Pilot Projects the Way Forward?

By Ed Bruske
aka The Slow Cook

If improving school food were simply a matter of writing better contracts for meal purveyors, everybody would be doing it, no?

D.C. Public Schools got some rosy press recently when they announced two pilot programs that would be serving meals vastly upgraded from the industrially processed convenience foods kids are eating now. Each program would feed seven of the city's public schools, one with "portable" or catered meals, the other with food made from scratch.

The food requirements are state of the art: hormone- and antibiotic-free milk, no high-fructose corn syrup or artificial preservatives, colors or flavors, no canned fruit in syrup, no trans fats, beef no more than four times per month. The meals must meet proposed Institute of Medicine standards, meaning minimum and maximum calorie limits along with increased portions of orange and leafy green vegetables. And 20 percent of all produce must come from local sources.

And all of this is supposed to be provided at or near the current levels of federal reimbursement for school meals, meaning around $1.70 for breakfast and $2.70 for lunch. (Recently enacted "Healthy Schools" legislation provides a bit more: an extra 10 cents for breakfast and for lunch, and a five-cent bonus for meals that contain local produce.)

Sounds like a tall order. The deadline for food service companies to submit their proposals was June 1. And that's to begin meal service when school resumes later in August. As far as we know, the proposals are still under review, so the process is wrapped in secrecy. But we'll be looking at these two pilot programs in more detail in the coming days, and hopefully have even more to share when the winning bids are announced.