Cold weather closings force schools to change menus

• Fresh produce makes changing menus more of a juggling act
• Menus rearranged to take into account which produce might last longer
• Waste limited as some food was precooked and frozen

GREEN BAY, Wis. — At least one good thing came from recent school closings because of subzero weather in Wisconsin in January: Green Bay school officials learned elementary school kids love kiwi.

The school district's food services department bought the fuzzy fruit for a special program. But when schools were closed for an unusual three-day span Jan. 6-8 because of extremely cold temperatures, the fruit had to be used quickly, so it was served to the district's small students.

Schools also were closed Jan. 28 because of freezing temperatures.

"We had a lot of students say, 'We really like kiwi, can we have this every day?' " said Kathy Walker, food services director for the Green Bay district. "So you never know."

Many families might have planned meal menus and grocery shopping more carefully as temperatures dipped dangerously low. It gets more complicated for those serving 10,000 meals a day.

"We do a lot of planning ahead of time," Walker said. "We think about how it impacts menus. We even come up with alternative menus."

Because its 26 elementary schools generally have small kitchens, the Green Bay district delivers from a central location packs of food to be heated up. It also delivers fresh fruit, produce and other items.

Food is packed for the following day. So food service workers were preparing meals for Monday, Jan. 6, the previous Friday. Those meals kept and kids ate them on Jan. 9, a Thursday, when they returned to school.

"We kept a close eye on things," Walker said. "If schools would have been closed for a week or a few more days, we would have had a lot more waste."

Districts also provide more fresh fruits and vegetables based on guidelines under the federal Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, making the juggling act a little more tricky than years past.

Using fresh produce means food service managers rearranged parts of menus to use fruits and veggies that don't hold up as well as others, Walker said.

"If it's bananas, they don't last as long as oranges," she said. "Sliced cucumbers are not going to last as long as baby carrots. We're trying really hard not to waste food, so we had to rearrange things."

Other Green Bay area districts also made adjustments.

"Our primary goal is to avoid waste," said Betsy Farah, child nutrition coordinator for the Ashwaubenon School District. "At the same time, we don't want to do anything that would impact food safety."

Food services, like others, attempt to keep menus pretty consistent. Meal selections are posted online, and many families rely on them because of food allergies. Walker said school administrators and nurses also are made aware of menu changes for students with medical issues or allergies.

"It is a long process," Walker said. "We were talking about what happens if schools close on Jan. 6 on the Friday before, and we even planned for if schools were closed another day, and made two menus. But then they were closed three days."

For Ashwaubenon, that meant throwing away meat that was going to be used for tacos. It had been taken out to thaw Jan. 3. Many times the district uses foods that are precooked, so it is frozen and cooked. But when food services makes something from scratch, such as the tacos or soup, items are fresh.

The district also offers salad stations, and they were loaded up with an extra variety of fruits and vegetables that weren't used on days the district was closed, Farah said.

A menu of burgers and baked beans for Jan. 7 was dropped because foods were still frozen or in cans and would keep. They were used two weeks later.

The closing also meant working with distributors to move or cancel orders, she said. The district buys food "just in time," and Walker said it doesn't have the space, including space in coolers and freezers, to store a lot of product.

"So we were constantly working with vendors," she said.

Ashwaubenon also had to work with vendors to change orders, or to make sure building maintenance employees were on hand to open doors for those dropping off items.

"I think it went really well," Walker said about the modifications. "There was real dedication of staff and food workers, and a concentrated effort to not waste food."