Washingborough Academy is dedicated to providing an environment that promotes healthy eating and enabling pupils to make informed choices about the food they eat. 

Catering Facilities

The school has held the ‘Food for Life Gold Served Here’ Gold Standard award since 2015. 

When I became the school chef in 2016, the school already had a fully equipped modern kitchen. My aim was to continue to keep the standard up and increase the percentage of children eating a cooked lunch as opposed to packed lunches.  This I achieved during the six years I have been with the school. 

Our lunchtime arrangements are made up  of 3 sittings, serving over 280 children. Foundation Stage 2, KS1 and then followed by KS2. Our Foundation Stage 1 meals are delivered to the children in their setting.

We have since introduced ice-cream machine, making a milk-based ice cream with fruit from our garden.  We also make fresh jam such as crab apple jelly and other fruits taken from the orchard, these are sold to the parents of the school to raise funds for the school.

The school was recently introduced to a food dehydrator which will provide us with the facility to offer the children a different texture of food from the garden.

Food focus meetings are held twice a term for all age groups and we discuss what fruit and vegetables will be planted in the garden for my menu planning and the children are given the opportunity to discuss their likes and dislikes, which is reflected in the menu planning.

I meet with parents of any child with a food allergy to discuss the menu with them to provide advice and reassurance and also offer alternatives that we can incorporate.

In September we are introducing plant food to the menu 3 days a week, Monday, Wednesday and Friday and introducing more fresh fruit instead of hot puddings.

What was the catalyst of sourcing locally?

We are in the ‘Breadbasket of England’ and have so many fantastic food producers on our doorstep. The move to use local produce was not one of just convenience but also of sustainability. We also wanted to increase our offer of organic produce as well. This also reinforces the criteria that is required for the Soil Association’s ‘Food for Life Gold Served Here’ Award that we hold (the only in-house school caterer to be awarded this prestigious accolade). This does, at times, prove difficult trying to source locally as not all of farmers in the area provide organic produce, this can also reflect on the cost.

To further support this, we use fresh fruit and vegetables from our 300m² school garden, polytunnel, Lincolnshire Heritage Orchard and honey from our own apiary. A local butcher in the next village and suppliers us with meat that is Red Tractor assured.  Our Lincolnshire sausages and free-range pork is provided locally from Redhill Farm. The organic meat comes from Derbyshire, organic flour comes from Shipton Mill, and any additional fruit and vegetables come from Boston. However we now provide 25% of our fruit from our school grounds and last September made a saving of over £350 by the children harvesting fruit and vegetables from our own gardens. 

Budget

£0.85 food costs per pupil per lunch, however I am hoping that this will be increase in September to at least £0.95 as the rising cost of food is having an impact.

This budget can be challenging to maintain per child, but I create my weekly menus to balance the costs per week making everything fresh and maintaining portion control, following the school food standard recommendations. This is also supported with my strong working relationship with our school gardener and regularly meeting with our SNAG group (children form across the school who meet regularly to discuss food matters). We can plan our menus far in advance and then ensure the children are involved in planting the fruit and vegetables we need for the meals.

Cost out example:

Roast chicken dinner (per portion)

Roast Red Tractor Chicken fillet - £0.64

Mixture of veg (e.g carrots, cabbage, leeks) - £0.04

Potatoes - £0.06

Gravy - - £0.02

Fresh fruit salad - £0.15

Of course the vegetable costs are negligible when we harvest from our own school grounds.

Menus

Michael serves 2-3 mostly school grown organic vegetables a day:

The school’s menu offer includes:

• Home-made fish fingers which are certified sustainable cod fillets covered in school-made dried breadcrumbs and baked in the oven
• Free-range honey pulled pork wrap (with honey from our own hives)
• Home-made wholemeal bread
• Lincolnshire Hash Pie made from Lincolnshire sausage meat, organic minced beef, school-made baked beans and Lincolnshire Potato mash
• Always an offer of fresh fruit salad made daily
• Dehydrated fruits to snack on

Future plans:

Our menu from September 2022 will be around 50% plant based with three days having just plant-based options. The children are spearheading this initiative as they are very aware of the impact their food choices can have on the environment. We have calculated the carbon footprint of our current menus and are looking to reduce this with the menu we offer for the next academic year.

We are also partners in an Erasmus project (http://learn4earth.eu/learn4earth/) where we are working on reducing our food waste from our lunchtimes. In partnership with The University of Gastronomic Sciences (UNISG) our ‘Guardians of the Earth’ committee are sharing ways for the children to eat foods that they would normally throw away such as potato skins.

Lessons learnt and top tips

• Essential to train your staff on all aspects of the school food standards
• Work with your local suppliers
• Listen to the children as their suggestions are really insightful
• Be open to suggestions
• Need have flexibility to change menus
• Being involved in different food focus groups, such as TastEd Lincolnshire Food Partnership and Food for Life

A final word from Michael

I always look forward to the children coming up to the hotplate with enthusiasm and excitement and their willingness to try the different options we have available. It is also great to see how the school’s Food Education lessons have such a positive impact on the children’s willingness to expand their palates and try different vegetables that they may not be exposed to at home.

It was a honour to set our kitchen up as a community resource during the pandemic lockdowns where we were provided over 60+ roast dinners to the self-isolating over 70s I the three neighbouring villages. These were delivered by volunteers and ensured tat the older residents did not only get a healthy meal but also much needed social interaction. It was humbling to be awarded the Community Award from High Sheriff from Lincolnshire for my work in this project.