Not exactly easy. The US military (hell just about every army on the planet) spends a lot of money and effort into developing field rations that are palatable enough for infantry sections on the move to eat in it's entirety. I can't imagine developing it for far more numerous school children is going to be any easier.
If you want a successful lunch program (and rations if you have a to-go bag) look no further than the US Navy's sub program.
Given the environment and danger (and having a bunch of humans in close proximity, deep under the ocean, with nowhere to go, hangry, is not going to inspire unit cohesion) they get really, really good food. Which is probably not a bad thing to give people tooling around with enough firepower to take out a few dozen cities.
Whenever I watch a video about American military nutrition, the only takeaway I have is "are these people incompetent?"
Sailors in the USA navy get fat after their first deployment, common knowledge. Why? Because half the time their food is frozen chicken nuggets, frozen tater tots, etc, chucked into the oven, served bulk at mess.
2025's most well funded army, that's the best they came up with? Why not just freeze non deep fried chicken breast? Why not use lentils for carbs? Why not fast-freeze dry vegetables?
In any case I don't see the relevance for schools. Hire a chief lunch lady who has the same job a head chef does - find the local produce and dairy and fish and meat, plan meals and portions, organize supply, and direct meals.
>Hire a chief lunch lady who has the same job a head chef does - find the local produce and dairy and fish and meat, plan meals and portions, organize supply, and direct meals.
Who's going to pay for all of that? Not the American taxpayer, who would consider it theft and waste, and not the poor kids who actually need school lunches, and probably not their parents.
You'll wind up with a Macdonald's kiosk in every school cafeteria, and vending machines full of Monster energy drinks.
I found a twitter thread years ago that talked about how the author had gone to school with a lot of (US) mafia children, and the school had unsurprisingly provided lunch via a local vendor with mob connections. Presumably some of the money wound up going to the mob.
But, the thread pointed out, since high-level mafia officials sent their children to that school, they had no interest in skimping on the lunches. And the lunches were excellent. After a big FBI bust, the mob-affiliated vendor was replaced with a major interstate school lunch vendor, and the quality of the food was rock-bottom.
I've tried to find the thread again, but I can't. If anyone else wants to dedicate an unreasonable amount of time to it, I'm pretty sure I originally found it through a links post on Marginal Revolution.
> The US military (hell just about every army on the planet) spends a lot of money and effort into developing field rations that are palatable enough for infantry sections on the move to eat in it's entirety.
Why? That's not even a real concept. If you want everyone to like everything they have, you can't do that without letting them trade away the stuff they hate.
>The CMNR reviewed many of these studies when they were initially completed and noticed that underconsumption of the ration appeared to be a consistent problem. Typically, soldiers did not consume sufficient calories to meet energy expenditure and consequently lost body weight. The energy deficit has been in the range of 700 to 1,000 kcal/d and thus raises concern about the influence of such a deficit on physical and cognitive performance, particularly over a period of extended use. Anecdotal reports from Operation Desert Storm, for example, indicated that some units may have used MREs as their sole source of food for 50 to 60 days—far longer than the original intent when the MRE was initially field tested.
>
>There have been successive modifications of the MRE since 1981. These modifications in type of food items, diversity of meals, packaging, and food quality have produced small improvements in total consumption but have not significantly reduced the energy deficit that occurs when MREs are consumed. This problem continues in spite of positive hedonic ratings of the MRE ration items in laboratory and field tests. The suboptimal intake of operational rations thus remains a major issue that needs to be evaluated.
Or to summarize it; soldiers weren't eating the full MRE's in Desert Storm, and it a widespread problem. Soldiers that weren't meeting their caloric intake requirements were suffering cognitive issues while in combat operations. Bit of an issue when you've got two groups of people trying to kill each other and not their own side.
So they figured the best option to get the soldiers to eat their rations was to keep improving and updating until soldiers were more inclined to eat the whole damn thing. I don't know if they've succeeded per say but they have been updating the menus pretty consistently since the 90's. I think only the beef stew and a few other meal items have stayed consistent over the last 30 years of MRE's.
