This is why I will pack lunch. I still remember "cafe" burgers, because they were only 20% beef. Ick. They were so gross. And french fries with ketchup counted as two servings of veg!
That sandwich looks scary.

This is why it's so important for me to have my son used to eating real, natural and healthy food...so that hopefully he will be willing, when the time comes, to eat what I pack for him instead of this crap.

i did not realize that the lunches got even nastier than when i was in school! since jr high i never ate the cafateria food. i would eat a cinniman roll and a sprite. every day in jr high. sometimes a doughnut twist. in high school i ate one item from the vending machine and a soda. i never ate breakfast either. i was 30-50 lbs overweight. totally unhealthy. it was not until i was an adult that i learned what eating healthy really was for me. mostly green veggies, lean meat, fruit and very little if any whole wheat breads. not the food pirmaid. that much bread just dosent work with this body. for my kids i enjoy http://www.anotherlunch.com/

and

http://kpolizzi.blogspot.com/

they are more upbeat than this blogger is. but i can see why she would be upset.

Thank you for sharing this! My husband teaches at a school where most of the students qualify for free and reduced lunch. That means that they can't afford opt out of school lunches. Many of them eat a free breakfast at school, too. Raising awareness is the first step to bringing about change. Thanks again for sharing.

That lunch looks so sugary it's making me want to brush my teeth.

I pulled my son off free lunches because of the foul quality of their food. I can go to Allsup's and eat healthier. Yuck! I've been looking into petitioning for better food. You know the kind that requires the lunch ladies to use their new state of the art kitchens instead of asking for an additional microwave every year...

I started packing my daughters lunch at the beginning of this year when she started kindergarten. I've since stopped though bc I could never keep the hot items warm enough, despite thermos. Plus, her public school offers a nice variety of fresh food options- a large salad everyday, hot prepared meals, raw veggies & dip, steamed veggies, fresh raw fruit as well as a fruit cup or baked fruit. The menu also offers fish (only once a month) and the assortments are seasonal so they constantly eat new fruits/veggies! The company our school uses is Food Service which is one of the largest out there.... maybe my standards are just low? I'm pretty happy with it though, especially since it's one meal a day I don't have to make!

But when it comes time to vote, we keep voting in people who support ag subsidies and federal funding of the school lunch program (and education in general), which pretty much guarantees that our kids will continue eating TVP and government cheese.

1: Read blog, look at gross pictures, get angry.
2: Review what other groups are doing, like Slow Food's Time for Lunch campaign
3: Look at what creative parents and schools have done to address the issue, like Alice Water's Edible Schoolyard and her affiliates, Santa Monica's Salad Bar lunch program, Larchmont Charter West Hollywood's partnership with a non-profit farmer's market run kitchen
4: Cheer for the success of the movement, like the recent spending increase that will allow healthier food in the schools and the (slight) increase in standards
5: Engage at your local school, contact your representatives, make connections in the community.

No one needs to eat like this.

That is disgusting and the amount of packaging is even more horrid than the food. I went to school on a military base and although I mostly brought a lunch (except for on pizza pocket days), I would say we were pretty spoiled in comparison to this as our "hot lunch" had nutritional requirements that I doubt any of this junk would pass.

I was lucky as a kid that our school system was piloting a "heathier" program. We had salad bars, sandwich stations - even the hot lunch was shrimp with steamed brown rice... now my son's school - UGH! Hot dogs, baked beans & corn isn't much of an option. He gets Mama's meals (with the only exception being the day they do breakfast foods!). My child loves breakfast! I watched a great show once on how French Schools have the same budget as most of ours, and lunches are served on real plates with real food. Hopefully America soon gets the picture that it s garbage in garbage out. We have to take better care of our bodies!

We have to change our whole cultural attitudes about food. School lunches look so nasty.

my sister is a nutritionist that spent the last year working literally day and night on the committee that recently got the house nutrition bill passed and onto the POTUS's desk for his signature. even with a few more pennies per meal in schools we are light years away from getting the kinds of real meals that children in france get for just about the same price. our country has so many self-made hurdles to better nutrition for our kids. i find it so sad.

i have never allowed my son to eat school lunches and will never unless they somehow drastically change. i pack his lunch and he is very aware of making healthy choices.

My God, I never realized how lucky I was with the lunches in the schools I went to. They weren't great, but at least they were real food cooked on site, not this microwaved crap.

I must have gone to some damn nice inner-city public schools because I loved eating at school. ;) Our meals didnt look anything like the ones this blogger experienced though. Fortunately, I skipped out on having to eat all boxed/processed junk. I'd feel exactly the same if I was subjected to that crap.