School Food (was Re: [Sca-cooks] OOP request: Jelliedsalad???) still OOP

[Anne duBosc]

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While I will agree that it is highly unlikely that "all" school food is universally bad, let me point out that in my school career, I attended 3 elementary, and 3 secondary schools, and 2 universities, while my children attended 14 various schools.  Of these 22 schools, the best that could be said of the food was that it was uninspired, underseasoned, and texturally blah.
While most of them were in the Southeast, the latest were in the Southwest, so I don't think it is stictly regional, either.
I think one problem is that institutional food MUST be acceptable to such a wide variety of tastes, that mediocrity has to be the norm.  Here in the Southwest, for instance, most of the students are used to heavy doses of capsaicin pepper at home, but there is also a large percentage of Snow Birds and their descendants who think salt is all the seasoning a dish needs, and not much of that.
Because of historical issues of Salmonella, Botulism, and even trichinosis, meats must be overdone to avoid the attendant risks.  Yes, these restrictions can be observed, and still serve interesting and nutritionally sound meals, but it is so much easier to serve overcooked, underspiced food.  Very few "lunchroom ladies" are there because they are artists (yes, I know, some are, but very few.)  The pay very often is not enough to attract skilled artisans, and that is what it takes to create artistry out of such limited resources.
For a very short while, I cooked for such an institution, and the sheer frustration of trying to serve tasty food on the very limited budget I was given was why I quit.  Believe me when I say that I can take flour, water, fat, salt, and pepper, and make a tasty meal, but it soon palls, and is not nutritionally sound.  To add complex carbohydrates and proteins to such meagre fare seemed to be beyond the expense account of that particular bureacracy.  Bottom line, I guess, in too many cases the problem is the bottom line.
Mordonna
 Nick Sasso <NJSasso at msplaw.com> wrote:
I need, then, from someone an alternative explanation for why the food
at the schools I attended ranged from acceptable to good, was
economical, and had a waiting line for nearly 45 minutes if a student
did not come in the first or last 35 minutes of the service times for a
meal. If I am "wrong" in my generalization that not all school food is
universally bad, then there needs to be a hypothesis to explain these
apparent anomalies in 4 schools I attended, plus 4 others I visited that
presented satisfactory to excellent food service programs. Sure, it's
small sample, but my 8 out of 10 schools seems to challenge your
assertions that "dorm food" is generally "awful" . . . then there is the
fact that the schools aren't going bankrupt on food service.

I also need someone to explain why, if college food service is
universally and unarguably awful, the Universities of Georgia and
Georgia Technical Institute have had their food service student and
staff satisfaction survey results published in professional publications
for University professionals in the later 80's and early 90's. Locally,
in Atlanta, many students publicly laude the food at Agnes Scott
University . . .

The argument continuing to appear is that I cannot possibly be correct
in saying that "all food service food is NOT universally horrendous". I
accept that there are lots of personal experiences of not liking food at
universities/colleges, or having actual atrocities or health hazards.
Sweeping generalizations either way seem misplaced except that if there
were an epidemic of health and safety issues of the proportions of some
of the anecdote here, I suspect that CNN or some other news organization
would have grabbed it and sensationalized it beyond all recognition
(note Heraldo Rivera and his buds). I am not hearing anything, from the
people telling me I am flat wrong, that tells us anything to suggest
that food dissatisfaction is related to anything more that adolescent
peccadillo, authority disengagement and cultural indoctrination that is
prevalent in 18 to 20 year olds in so many other venues and
circumstances in the world. To ignore that simple explanation and claim
nationwide catastrophic epidemic of food atrocities seems a bit
histrionic/melodramatic. Ohkam's Razor seems to suggest a simpler
reason.



Lady Anne du Bosc
Known as Mordonna The Cook
Atenveldt, Atenveldt
mundanely Pat Griffin
Phoenix, AZ


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