Tribal school lunches - Montana

[peacetraveler22]

There's a certain childhood rite of passage I never experienced - eating cafeteria lunches. I attended a small, religious school from 5th - 12th grade, surrounded by the same faces until graduation. There were rarely new students who transferred to the school, no new boys to flirt with, or mysterious strangers who suddenly appeared at the desk beside me. In one word, I would describe my school experience as boring. The same can be said of my daily lunches, which my mom diligently packed every morning. Usually, the lunchbox consisted of a peanut butter or ham and cheese sandwich, some type of chips and a piece of fruit. I always envied kids who had the joy of entering the canteen each day to have old ladies with hairnets shovel different food onto their tray, sometimes completely inedible and sometimes a fun game to guess what the mystery meat or slop was. It all seemed very exotic and exciting for someone who was insanely bored being around the same kids and learning environment for so many years.

During my visit to the Native American reservation in Montana last week, I met with a teacher at the local tribal school and ate with the young kids in the cafeteria. The tribe would not let me photograph the students for privacy reasons, but you can see they are eating healthy and tasty lunches. Salad with tomatoes, two servings of fresh fruit, a roll and some type of spicy soup with black beans, corn and ground beef. Btw, last week someone scolded me for using the term Native American "reservation," implying that this is a derogatory term. Perhaps this is the case in Russian, but in English this word has no negative connotation. It is used to refer to the sovereign lands upon which Native American tribes now live in various parts of the U.S., and the Indians I met also referred to their home as "the reservation." Next week, I will write a big report about their lives.

What was your favorite meal? :) Do most Russian children bring packed lunches from home, or eat in the school canteen?

Comments

[inescher.livejournal.com]

I don't know what's going on in Russian school now. During my childhood, in USSR, we didn't bring our own lunches in school. It was prohibited. Kids could bring the snacks only. But sometimes it was the sandwiches with different type of meat products (bologna typically but some kids from richest family could have salami), or cheese+ fruit (apple 90% of time). This snack could cover the lunch for some kids. But little kids had to use school lunches (in my school it was mandatory).
The typical school lunch contended soup (I hate it. I like homemade soups but what they did in cafeteria... :(((), some kind of "meat" portion (kotleta, meatball, frankfurter, etc. Interesting, but boiled chicken was available for our teachers only.) or fish (fried fish, like pollock with bones, or fish kotleta), some garnish to this (pasta, mashed potatoes, barley, rice, wheat), and "salad". In my memory there were only 2 types of salad. One is sour cucumbers/pickles with onion and sunflower oil; another one (my favorite) fresh cabbage, cucumbers, sunflower oil. Also the meal offer a drink. Sweet tea, or kompot (the drink similar to fruit punch but sometime made from dry fruits). Also sometimes we had kisel (the drink with potato starch in). Oh, yes, I forgot about 1 or 2 pieces of gray bread. This is typical school meal from my childhood.

[peacetraveler22.livejournal.com]

What do you mean? Rich kids ate different foods than the ordinary students in the school? Fresh cabbage and cucumber salad sounds tasty! I'm very picky with meats, so I would probably avoid them in school cafeterias.

[inescher.livejournal.com]

Yes. Rich families could give their kids more "expensive" and rare food in school. In my childhood not everybody could buy/get salami but the bologna wasvery often product to buy.
Yes, fresh cabbage salad was good. :) I liked it so much. But with the meat part... Shannon, if you don't have any other choice... We ate whatever we've got.
I worked in my school later, after I graduated a college and talked to our cooks. There were real meat in our kotletas but to raise the quantity they put a lot of bread in. Finally from 2 lp od meat instead of 20 kotlets they've got 40.

[peacetraveler22.livejournal.com]

This is a horrible idea to have different foods based on the social class and wealth of the student. :( Of course, when you are hungry, you will eat what is given.

[inescher.livejournal.com]

No, the food were the same in school cafeteria. The different was a food from home.

[peacetraveler22.livejournal.com]

Got it, thanks for the clarification!

[inescher.livejournal.com]

No problem, Shannon.