The food served in Palm Beach County school cafeterias may be healthier than you think.

Hormone-free milk. Corn on the cob and green beans fresh from a local farm. No fried food.

A documentary shown recently to a Boca Raton parent group had us wondering about what efforts the local schools are making to serve healthier food. Cafeteria Man tells the story of a Baltimore chef tasked with making over the school menus. He partnered with a local farm to supply fresh produce to the schools – for cheaper than some of the canned fruit and vegetables that were being shipped across the country. (Sadly, some of the kids had never even seen a real peach).

Farm-rich Palm Beach County seems a likely place for this idea to take root. And it has.

Jamie McCarthy, nutrition and wellness promotion specialist with the Palm Beach County School District, said its farm-to-table program has been bringing fresh green beans and mini corn on the cob to the school cafeterias since the 2008-09 school year. (See it on the menu for Fridays this month). The food comes from R.C. Hatton Farms near Belle Glade.

(The corn has been popular – except for kids with loose teeth; the green beans, not as much, McCarthy said).

This spring, the district is working to provide some fresh Florida strawberries.

And when bids go out again this year to produce providers, McCarthy hopes that local farms will be able to meet the district’s price for broccoli, yellow squash and zucchini. The district is working with Localeopia, a nonprofit that helps brings together businesses, producers and other organizations to support local product consumption.

Some other steps the district has taken over the past few years to make school meals healthier:

• Removed french fries and eliminated fried foods in the 2004-05 school year
• Began offering only low-fat and fat-free milk choices during the 2003-04 school year
• Transitioned from refined bread products to 100 percent whole wheat bread by the 2007-08 school year
• Reduced the amount of  high fructose corn syrup, saturated fat, trans fat, and food dyes

They use some frozen vegetables, but no canned. They use some canned fruits, in their own juices or light syrup.

Some parents dis the prepackaged peanut butter sandwiches that make up one of the daily vegetarian options. But McCarthy said those are used as a precaution to protect kids with peanut allergies. Making fresh PB&J’s in the cafeteria provides too great a risk for cross-contamination, which could be a serious health hazard to a student with a severe peanut allergy.

The district also eliminated salad bars in 2005 for health reasons.

“The main issue that we had with salad bars is safety and sanitation,” McCarthy said “They are breeding grounds for different germs.”

Instead they serve a variety of entree salads – mandarin chicken, chef’s salad, taco salad, etc., which have been popular in many schools, she said.

Most of the school food program changes required by new federal guidelines will be administrative for our schools. Some portion sizes may change for middle-schoolers. Kids will be required to take a fruit or vegetable with their lunch.

The district is also looking to make over its high school cafeterias. A pilot program at Atlantic High School  turned the lunch room into more of a food court, with six different choices at six counters. As a result, more kids are buying lunch, McCarthy said.

That program may be rolled out in other schools over the next few years.

Read more

Do you know you can not only pay for your child’s meals online, but you can also see what they are buying? Go to School Cash Online.

School lunch menus

The school district wellness program’s annual report

Cafeteria Man was shown as part of Sunflower Creative Art’s Share and Learn evenings. Read more about its programs for kids and parents at www.sunflowercreativearts.org.

Read all about Cafeteria Man

Do your kids eat in the cafeteria, or do you pack a lunch? Tell us your thoughts in the comments.

- CHARLENE PACENTI