International School Meals Day 2024! 

International School Meals Day: the caterer innovations that have made Scottish school meals better  This International School Meals Day, Food for Life Scotland and ASSIST FM are celebrating the inspiring innovation of Scotland’s school caterers, who, despite external pressures, work tirelessly every day to provide a high quality, nutritionally balanced and sustainably sourced school meal. […]

International School Meals Day: the caterer innovations that have made Scottish school meals better 

This International School Meals Day, Food for Life Scotland and ASSIST FM are celebrating the inspiring innovation of Scotland’s school caterers, who, despite external pressures, work tirelessly every day to provide a high quality, nutritionally balanced and sustainably sourced school meal.  

Around 450,000 meals are served every day across Scotland’s 32 Local Authorities. In 15 local authorities, those meals meet the Food for Life Served Here award standards at either Bronze, Silver or Gold. The award has a long history in Scotland, with the first Scottish local authority – East Ayrshire – receiving the certification in 2008.  

Across the school meals sector, caterers continue to evolve and innovate – providing services well beyond a meal on a plate!  

Good food on school meal plates 

• Scotland has the most stringent school food standards of any UK nation. The Nutritional Requirements for Food and Drink in Schools (2020) sets out the amount of salt, sugars and fats recommended in school meals along with building on a health promoting culture with the school community.  
   
• The amount of Scottish produce featured on school meals continues to grow year on year, with all local authorities building strong relationships with both local and national suppliers to provide the highest quality produce to pupils. 
   

• Many school caterers and local authority catering teams in Scotland show their commitment to fresh, local and sustainable school food by achieving the Food for Life Served Here award at Bronze, Silver or Gold. A Food for Life Served Here award is a nationally recognised mark of quality.  
   
  If you see a Food for Life Served Here logo you know that the majority of the food on the menu will be freshly prepared, and it will always be free from undesirable trans fats, sweeteners, and additives. Caterers making Food for Life Served Here-certified meals use free-range eggs and farm assured meat that can be traced back to the source, as well as ingredients from sustainable and ethical sources. 

• Through Universal Free School Meals (P1-P5), caterers have been working hard to deliver even more lunches than ever before to Scottish pupils, ensuring a wide and varied choice is available to schools and building life and social skills through shared dining. Caterers use pupil and parental feedback to help shape services for many years to come.  
   
• Local authorities are finding innovative ways to include more organic produce on school meals menus. FFLSH Gold award holder East Ayrshire Council’s partnership with local organic farm Mossgiel Farm not only means that primary school pupils in East Ayrshire receive local, organic milk, but also involves an innovative approach to reducing waste, with milk dispensers installed in schools reducing the need for plastic containers. 
   
• East Lothian Council achieved the FFLSH Silver award by buying organic flour from Mungoswells Malt and Milling, based in Drem East Lothian. The catering team balanced the cost by working with the Food for Life Scotland team to make savings in other areas of the menu. This fantastic example of innovation shows what’s possible in delivering great Scottish school food that supports health, the environment and the local economy.  

 

The role of the Caterer 

• Catering teams are an integral part of the whole school approach to health and wellbeing. They are at the front line, ensuring that our children and young people are given the right facts and information on the importance of making positive food and drink choices as they develop and grow. School catering teams are some of the most passionate in the hospitality industry, many of them spending their entire careers devoted to public service.  

• For many school pupils, their school meal could be the only hot meal they have that day. School caterers take this responsibility seriously, finding ways to support every pupil that uses their school meals service. In Food for Life Served Here Bronze award holder Inverclyde, for example, nursery staff at Newark Primary School provide a table setting for each of their nursery pupils each lunchtime. They decorate the table with a vase and artificial flowers and sit with the children, who enjoy the meal together. For many pupils, their main opportunity to share a meal in this way is at school. 
   
• The schools catering service does not simply end at lunchtime. It contributes in numerous less visible ways to the local community. Local Authority caterers are proud to support local suppliers. They also contribute to the creation of local employment and community wealth building – research shows for every £1 spent on school meals a minimum of £3 is returned to the local community, while every £1 invested in Food for Life brings a social return on investment of £4.41. 
   

New ideas 

• Technology now forms a large part of school meals services, keeping them sustainable and agile – systems such as online ordering, cashless catering and pre-ordering in both high schools and primary schools, helps to reduce waste and removes stigma from the lunch service. Modern cooking technology is used in kitchens to create healthier recipes. And Food for Life Served Here Bronze award holder Argyll and Bute Council have even trialled using drones to deliver school meals to its island-based schools.  
   
• Caterers work closely with suppliers to innovate and adapt products.  All local authorities are continually looking at removing packaging waste (for example by using re-usable vegetable crates or swapping to cornstarch veg netting). And caterers are innovating and adapting with the recipes themselves. Caterers serving FFLSH meals served farm assured meat, which may cost more – so they take a less but better meat approach to their school meals menu, working closely with the FFLS menu and catering skills team to adapt dishes by removing some of the meat and replacing it with things like pulses. Costs are reduced while dishes remain fresh, nutritious – and delicious!  
   
• The service has a wider role in supporting positive community benefits such as supporting school growing projects, working with schools, teaching pupils culinary skills and food provenance, supporting the local community through food larders and skills training hubs and working out with term time to support holiday clubs and activity programmes. For example, in Stirling – which holds the FFLSH Silver award – caterers at Dunblane Primary School run a Chef’s Apprentice Programme, bringing P6 pupils into the kitchen to learn skills including fresh food preparation and baking.