Turkey Twizzlers, cornflake tart, jam roly-poly, and spotted dick.
August 18, 2017 10:27 AM Subscribe
The Great British School Dinner has significantly changed over the decades, from porridge and bread and dripping, through to pea soup and chocolate concrete with mint custard. Here are 17 dishes from recent decades, what happened to Turkey Twizzlers, the perfect steamy spotted dick, some pink custard, a mention of spam fritters, and mince and dumplings in 1980. Tempted? You can go to a cafe and try some. Nowadays, the options are less stodgier; at "big school" meatballs or curry are sometimes on the menu. Oh, Vienetta. However, not all healthy options are popular. Payment is sometimes complicated and can lead to barm controversy. Though Friday is usually fish and chips day, there's Angel Delight at this school!
Great post, Wordshore!
I enjoyed school dinners, especially if we had last lunch on Fridays and the dinnerladies would give us second helpings of chips because they would go to waste otherwise.
School dinners were also where I acquired my lifelong love for cabbage (served as "greens" -- not sure what was in them). We never cooked it at home because my parents didn't like it, and because all our food at home came from Bejam or the Sainsbury's frozen food aisles.
I have intermittent cravings for jam roly-poly that I haven't been able to get over yet -- I'm sure nothing I could make from a recipe would match that heavy, stodgy sweetness.
posted by vickyverky at 11:02 AM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
I enjoyed school dinners, especially if we had last lunch on Fridays and the dinnerladies would give us second helpings of chips because they would go to waste otherwise.
School dinners were also where I acquired my lifelong love for cabbage (served as "greens" -- not sure what was in them). We never cooked it at home because my parents didn't like it, and because all our food at home came from Bejam or the Sainsbury's frozen food aisles.
I have intermittent cravings for jam roly-poly that I haven't been able to get over yet -- I'm sure nothing I could make from a recipe would match that heavy, stodgy sweetness.
posted by vickyverky at 11:02 AM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat?
posted by Justin Case at 11:13 AM on August 18, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by Justin Case at 11:13 AM on August 18, 2017 [3 favorites]
In no way was I at least partially motivated to do this FPP because I remembered one of the schoolboy (immature) jokes that we repeated over and over when a certain item was on the menu and I wanted to slip it inside the Tags because nostalgia and also because some of us are always thirteen.
posted by Wordshore at 11:21 AM on August 18, 2017 [5 favorites]
posted by Wordshore at 11:21 AM on August 18, 2017 [5 favorites]
Dear god the chocolate sponge with green custard I can taste it now. I used to really crave school dinners as I was strictly on the most wholemeal packed lunches imaginable, so the rare occasions I got to sin with FRIED chips and MEAT pies and PROCESSED cheese it was heaven! Gorgeous post!
posted by runincircles at 11:26 AM on August 18, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by runincircles at 11:26 AM on August 18, 2017 [2 favorites]
(But! who else had "school dinners, school dinners, concrete chips, concrete chips, soggy semolina, soggy semolina"?)
posted by runincircles at 11:27 AM on August 18, 2017 [4 favorites]
posted by runincircles at 11:27 AM on August 18, 2017 [4 favorites]
chocolate sponge with green custard
'Fungus' = crumbling up your sponge pudding then stirring it into the custard until it looked like a Dr Who monster
Oh what fun we had but at the time it seemed so bad.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 11:33 AM on August 18, 2017 [2 favorites]
'Fungus' = crumbling up your sponge pudding then stirring it into the custard until it looked like a Dr Who monster
Oh what fun we had but at the time it seemed so bad.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 11:33 AM on August 18, 2017 [2 favorites]
Most of the dessert items sound pretty yummy to me.
Things we ate in school that seem horrible now, but at the time, were our favorites, west Texas in the 1970s edition: "pizza," bready squares with plain tomato sauce and cheap processed cheese and nothing else; tapatillas, round crispy tortillas with canned refried beans smeared on, cheap processed cheese and a few slivers of iceberg lettuce. And stewed prunes for dessert. I could get as many of these as I wanted from people who wouldn't touch them. Still like them.
posted by Bee'sWing at 12:04 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
Things we ate in school that seem horrible now, but at the time, were our favorites, west Texas in the 1970s edition: "pizza," bready squares with plain tomato sauce and cheap processed cheese and nothing else; tapatillas, round crispy tortillas with canned refried beans smeared on, cheap processed cheese and a few slivers of iceberg lettuce. And stewed prunes for dessert. I could get as many of these as I wanted from people who wouldn't touch them. Still like them.
posted by Bee'sWing at 12:04 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
I haven't thought about these in years, but I definitely remember the chalupas served at my grade school (Los Angeles, mid-to-late-1980s). Boat-shaped corn tortilla shell, ground beef and cheese on the inside. That, a hot sauce packet, a small carton of milk, and I honestly can't remember what else it was served with. Possibly an apple?
posted by wanderingmind at 1:15 PM on August 18, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by wanderingmind at 1:15 PM on August 18, 2017 [3 favorites]
I last had a school dinner in the 70s, but I was surprised by how little seems to have changed, especially the puddings. We had yellow, ginger and brown (chocolateish) sponges in varying combinations with yellow, pink, white or brown (chocolateish again) custards, as well as the one with jam and coconut, plain sponge with not enough apple or syrup at the bottom, and the dreaded dead man's leg or jam roly-poly. The favourite was that cornflake/syrup pie thing, and the least favourite was the range of horrible milk puddings made with rice, tapioca or sago (frog-spawn), all served with not enough nondescript jam.
I don't remember much about the savory stuff, except the spam fritters, and the cheese bake which consisted of lots of lumpy mashed potato with not enough cheese on top. Oh, and the peculiar stews with horrible floppy bits of fat that I was made to eat before I could have my sweet. Sometimes the stew was converted to a curry, by adding curry powder and sultanas and serving it with rice.
The end result was that I grew up able to eat absolutely anything.
posted by Fuchsoid at 2:01 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
I don't remember much about the savory stuff, except the spam fritters, and the cheese bake which consisted of lots of lumpy mashed potato with not enough cheese on top. Oh, and the peculiar stews with horrible floppy bits of fat that I was made to eat before I could have my sweet. Sometimes the stew was converted to a curry, by adding curry powder and sultanas and serving it with rice.
The end result was that I grew up able to eat absolutely anything.
posted by Fuchsoid at 2:01 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
Cumbria, mid nineties: chips were served in a bowl. For the gravy. Often with a burger on top.
Also stotties. My memory is that you could get a half stottie or a whole one. But that surely can't be right because those things are the size of dinner plates.
posted by Helga-woo at 2:59 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
Also stotties. My memory is that you could get a half stottie or a whole one. But that surely can't be right because those things are the size of dinner plates.
posted by Helga-woo at 2:59 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
Was pink custard not blancmange in disguise?
Google has no images of our regular lunch (South Wales in the late seventies, early eighties) - cob & chips - but now I see that we were trendsetters.
Our version was to buy a fresh cob (loaf of crusty white bread) from Dic the Shop, tear it in half, throwing away the inside bread and cram half a bag of chips (thick French fries) from the chipshop next door. Plus a can of Coke, long before diet or zero sugar versions were invented.
And we can't be alone in always referring to this hideous regular on the menu as teabags in blood?
posted by humph at 3:03 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
Google has no images of our regular lunch (South Wales in the late seventies, early eighties) - cob & chips - but now I see that we were trendsetters.
Our version was to buy a fresh cob (loaf of crusty white bread) from Dic the Shop, tear it in half, throwing away the inside bread and cram half a bag of chips (thick French fries) from the chipshop next door. Plus a can of Coke, long before diet or zero sugar versions were invented.
And we can't be alone in always referring to this hideous regular on the menu as teabags in blood?
posted by humph at 3:03 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
Humph, my dad always used to talk about doing something similar with a loaf and chips when he was growing up. That was in the NW late 50s/early 60s.
posted by biffa at 3:49 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by biffa at 3:49 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
We certainly didn't get pasta at school though.
We did get semolina with six raisins in one corner. If you said you didn't like semolina you just got the six raisins.
posted by biffa at 3:52 PM on August 18, 2017 [3 favorites]
We did get semolina with six raisins in one corner. If you said you didn't like semolina you just got the six raisins.
posted by biffa at 3:52 PM on August 18, 2017 [3 favorites]
If you said you didn't like semolina you just got the six raisins.
Huh, in my day if you said you didn't like semolina, a scary dinner-lady would just stand over you until you ate it anyway.
posted by Fuchsoid at 4:12 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
Huh, in my day if you said you didn't like semolina, a scary dinner-lady would just stand over you until you ate it anyway.
posted by Fuchsoid at 4:12 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
It seems strange to not like semolina, it's like not liking rice--it is so bland and inoffensive. Now, not being excited by it, I can understand.
posted by Bee'sWing at 4:46 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Bee'sWing at 4:46 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
We had Vienetta growing up (northeast Florida)! I hadn't thought about that in forever. Meanwhile I'm both horrified and highly amused by the idea of a "jacket potato" ...
(is that a potato in your jacket or are you just happy to see me?)
posted by zebra at 7:28 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
(is that a potato in your jacket or are you just happy to see me?)
posted by zebra at 7:28 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
There was that one time that the Dinner Ladies served us lamb hearts and mash. (An economy measure, perhaps?) I don't think any kid ate their meat that day.
I do miss the ancient British puddings, though. Mum never made them at home, so school was the only place that had them.
posted by monotreme at 11:10 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
I do miss the ancient British puddings, though. Mum never made them at home, so school was the only place that had them.
posted by monotreme at 11:10 PM on August 18, 2017 [1 favorite]
*burps blue*
To commemorate Finland’s 100 years, Finnair is proud to showcase and celebrate the world’s best school meals onboard its long-haul flights starting July 5th 2017. The meals were selected during a workshop with elementary school students. Did you know? Finland was the first country in the world to serve free school meals to its students in 1943
posted by infini at 9:22 AM on August 19, 2017 [2 favorites]
To commemorate Finland’s 100 years, Finnair is proud to showcase and celebrate the world’s best school meals onboard its long-haul flights starting July 5th 2017. The meals were selected during a workshop with elementary school students. Did you know? Finland was the first country in the world to serve free school meals to its students in 1943
posted by infini at 9:22 AM on August 19, 2017 [2 favorites]
As a non-British person (and a person who went to schools where kids brought their lunches instead of getting lunch service) this is all delightfully new to me, so in addition to looking up Vienetta, I had to also go find out what Eton mess is.
posted by kristi at 12:12 PM on August 19, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by kristi at 12:12 PM on August 19, 2017 [1 favorite]
So I just remembered if anyone dropped a tray the whole dinner hall would erupt with an absolute mayhem of shouting ('Woahhh!!!!') and banging knives and forks on the table.
I remember primary school meals as being generally good but at secondary school they slowly got worse and worse (mainly watery stew, watery lumpy mash and cabbage - which I hate) as the local authority ran about of money until nearly the whole school was bringing in sandwiches and they switched to a canteen system of buying what you wanted from a menu (mainly chips, pizzas, beans, sausage rolls I remember)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:10 AM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
I remember primary school meals as being generally good but at secondary school they slowly got worse and worse (mainly watery stew, watery lumpy mash and cabbage - which I hate) as the local authority ran about of money until nearly the whole school was bringing in sandwiches and they switched to a canteen system of buying what you wanted from a menu (mainly chips, pizzas, beans, sausage rolls I remember)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:10 AM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
"pizza," bready squares with plain tomato sauce and cheap processed cheese and nothing else
Oh, man. I loved pizzatangle day. (Arkansas 70s kid here.) Almost as weirdly good were those burgers that were obviously 90% soy protein and filler.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 4:10 AM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
Oh, man. I loved pizzatangle day. (Arkansas 70s kid here.) Almost as weirdly good were those burgers that were obviously 90% soy protein and filler.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 4:10 AM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
so what do you people call jacket potatoes? In Ireland you went home for lunch, 70s-80s, it was that close, or you brown-bagged it. We never had a school cafeteria. Don't know about now
posted by Wilder at 5:42 AM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Wilder at 5:42 AM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
Wilder In the US we mostly call them "baked potatoes". Even when (as is the case in many industrial or high-volume, low-cost settings) they're steamed instead of actually baked.
posted by rhiannonstone at 1:05 PM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by rhiannonstone at 1:05 PM on August 20, 2017 [1 favorite]
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