Editorial

When students are asked to think of school lunch, some words that come to mind are nasty, rubbery, fake, and the list goes on. For as long as kids have been going to school, elementary through high school, the cafeteria food has been sub-par. So why do students continue to consume processed, fake, and unnatural foods? They shouldn’t. Contrary to popular belief, there are other options out there for what the school could, and should be providing us for lunch.
Some schools have experimented with providing students with lunches that have been made from fresh food, nothing frozen or processed. The result; healthier, better tasting food, and it cost less. A perfect example of this is Chef Dominique Valadier at Lycee de l'Emperi, the French public high school where he is the cook. Every morning he gets fresh seafood and ingredients at the local market; everything is fresh, nothing frozen. Each day he prepares wonderful, healthy, and appetizing meals for the students at Lycee de l'Emperi (about 800 students). The students are served from a menu that includes muscles, turkey, rice, all made fresh. The best part is that this meal is cheaper than the fast-food lunches the students previously bought.
So what can we learn from our friends in France? Great lunch can be made at a reasonable price. Projects like this have been done all over the U.S as well, and have had great success. Another plus of this meal plan is that the lunches they cook create much less waste, which is what helps it be so cost-effective. At Eastview especially, where we are restricted to whatever is in the lunch room (closed campus lunch), it is only fair that we are served something we might actually want to eat; something that is healthy, and that is appetizing too.