USDA Pushes Calorie, Sodium Limits for School Lunches With New ‘Guidelines’ (See Them Here)
- Posted on August 21, 2012 at 1:46pm by
Erica Ritz
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(Photo: AP)
(The Blaze/AP) — New Agriculture Department guidelines for school lunches will take effect this fall, including the first national calorie and sodium limits for what can be served on lunch lines.
In addition, schools must offer dark green, orange or red vegetables and legumes at least once a week, and students are required to select at least one vegetable or fruit per meal. Flavored milk must be nonfat, and there’s a ban on artificial, “artery-clogging” trans fats.
But researchers are still trying to figure out how to enforce the new “guidelines.”
(Related: ‘You’re Setting Me Back’: Michelle Obama Ribs Olympian Gabby Douglas for Eating Fast Food)
“We don’t want healthy trash cans. We want kids who are eating this stuff,” Kern Halls, a former Disney World restaurant manager who now works in school nutrition at Orange County Public Schools in Florida, summarized.
At a School Nutrition Association conference in Denver this summer, food workers heard tips about how to get children to make healthy food choices in the cafeteria. There, Halls demonstrated some healthy recipes for curious cafeteria managers, while joining White House chef Sam Kass to prepare a veggie wrap using a whole-wheat tortilla.
The Daily Mail has labeled the change a “victory for [Michelle Obama],” who has spent the last four years battling childhood obesity.
Diane Wagner, with Schwan Food Co., hands out samples of food at a booth during the School Nutrition Association conference in Denver. (AP Photo/Ed Andrieski)
The first step, cafeteria workers were told at the conference, is to stop thinking of lunchtime as a break from academics, but rather a crucial part of a child’s school day.
“Your job is not to serve kids food. Your job is motivate kids to be adventurous and healthy eaters,” said Barb Mechura, head of nutrition services at schools in Hopkins, Minn.
(Related: 11-Year-Old Reporter Challenges Michelle Obama on ‘Government’ Role in Anti-Obesity Push)
Her school district recruited parent volunteers to be elementary-school “food coaches,” touring cafeterias and handing out samples of fruits and vegetables. The food coaches would also “demonstrate” eating them.
As the kids graduate to middle and high schools, and adults become less welcome in the cafeteria, schools can tap student ambassadors to be food coaches, perhaps asking the baseball team or a popular student athlete dish out veggies. Or, high school seniors might give underclassmen samples of a new vegetable coming to the cafeteria.
School cafeterias also are using “cutting-edge market research.” They’re filming what kids eat, test-marketing new products before they go on the line and doing menu surveys to find out exactly what students think about a dish’s taste, appearance and temperature.
(Photo: Getty Images)
A Colorado State University professor studied the dining habits of kids in Loveland, Colo., with an eye toward measuring ways to get them to choose healthier foods. Leslie Cunningham-Sabo, who photographed “before” and “after” pictures of kids’ lunch trays, found that kids eat more fruits and vegetables if they have lunch after recess, instead of before recess. She found that corn consumption went up when generic “corn” labels were replaced with colorful cards describing the vegetable as “mellow yellow corn.”
“Don‘t put veggies in opaque containers or give them boring labels like ’corn,’” Cunningham-Sabo instructed the lunch workers, showing diagrams of how to lay out a service line to encourage trips to the salad bar.
Another trick — just like supermarkets place impulse buys like candy and chewing gum by the checkout, lunch lines should place easy-to-grab fruits and veggies by their own cash registers. Her study saw cafeterias double their sales of fresh fruit when they placed it colorful bowls in a convenient place.
“You really have to be in their face with what’s available,” Cunningham-Sabo said.
The marketing doesn’t stop at the cafeteria doors. Lassen View Elementary School in Redding, Calif., got children to eat more fruits and vegetables when cafeteria manager Kathie Sardeson started a recess snack cart bringing the foods straight to the playground for kids to munch on.
Her school also bought an iPad 2 to raffle away to students who entered by choosing a healthy breakfast yogurt parfait and turning in tickets attached to the bottom. She tempted kids to try unusual flavors by giving out “Fear Factor Smoothies” including unexpected ingredients such as spinach. Sardeson said schools can be persuaded to invest more in nutrition promotions because the payoff is better students.
“Food is one of the most important influences on your everyday brain cells,” Mechura said. Healthy eating habits, she argued, is as important as everything else schools are trying to teach.
“We have to change,” Mechura said. “We have to build an environment that creates excitement about what we are doing rather than fear of new foods.”
Here are all the guidelines, by grade:
Grains:
Grades K-5: 8 to 9 servings per week
Grades 6-8: 8 to 10 servings per week
Grades 9-12: 10 to 12 servings per week
Students should have at least one serving of grains each day, and one-half of offerings must be rich in whole grain.
—
Meats/Meat alternatives:
Grades K-5: 8 to 10 ounces per week
Grades 6-8: 9 to 10 ounces per week
Grades 9-12: 10 to 12 ounces per week
Nuts, tofu, cheese and eggs can be substituted for meat in some cases.
—
Milk:
Grades K-12: 1 cup per day
Fat-free, low-fat and lactose-free milk options are allowable.
—
Fruits:
Grades K-8: One-half cup per day
Grades 9-12: One cup per day
Only half of the weekly fruit requirement can come from juice.
—
Vegetables:
Grades K-8: Three-quarters cup per day
Grades 9-12: One cup per day
Weekly requirements for vegetable subgroups, including dark green, red/orange, beans/peas, starchy and others.
—
Sodium:
By July 2014, sodium levels for lunches should not exceed:
Grades K-5: 640 milligrams
Grades 6-8: 710 milligrams
Grades 9-12: 740 milligrams
A timetable sets targets for further reducing sodium levels by 2022.
—
Fats:
No more than 10 percent saturated fats. No trans-fat, except for those naturally occurring in meat and dairy products.
—
Total calories:
Grades K-5: 550 to 650 per day
Grades 6-8: 600 to 700 per day
Grades 9-12: 750 to 850 per day
Calories can apparently be averaged over the week.
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Comments (86)
Centralsville
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:09pmAs you can see by the picture, too much sodium makes your eyes bulge out. The government needs to do something.
Report Post »lukerw
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 4:47pmThe COMMISSAR of FOOD… has all the Public Interests in Mind!
Report Post »ITGuy
Posted on August 22, 2012 at 9:16am“If you don’t eat yer meat, you can’t have any fat free pudding! How can you have any fat free pudding if you don’t eat yer meat?!”,
Report Post »Leiterfluid
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:08pmCorn is NOT a vegetable! Clearly these people should not be making decisions about nutrition when they can’t distinguish between a grain an a vegetable!!
Report Post »TMink
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 4:02pmGood point. Corn is of course a starch. As are the grains they are pushing. Carbohydrates make people fat, not calories. This is clear from the research. So the government is pushing and promoting a diet and ingredients that will make more children fat.
Typical.
Trey
Report Post »lukerw
Posted on August 22, 2012 at 4:22amLab Rats… do not know… they are Experiments!
Report Post »WellingtonStarr
Posted on August 22, 2012 at 9:55amHigh carb on purpose.
Report Post »COFemale
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:05pmI have no problem in schools offering more healthy choices, but to tell a child they have to eat something, that is where I draw the line. If a child does not want to eat fruit, you can’t make them. The more you try to push something on them, the less likely they will make the choice on their own.
Liberals just need to get out of our FN lives and mind their own business.
Report Post »johnjamison
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:50pmNot only are they doing this but they‘ll take away student lunches made at home if they don’t meet their requirements. They‘ll literally tell you that you can’t feed your kids and we’re feeding what we want……..Time to sharpen the ax and start severing heads this november.
Report Post »lukerw
Posted on August 22, 2012 at 4:28amDr Frankenstein… did what he did… because Science demands that Theory be tested and produce Proof… regardless of any Collateral Damage!
Report Post »deeberj
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:03pmFat free milk usually has preservatives that make kids act up.
Low fat products typically have more of some fake flavor to make up for the no fat, and it makes kids act up.
Low sugar means they are likely adding fake sugar, which makes kids act up and is just not good for anyone.
Flavored milk has artificial flavors and colors that make kids act up.
Michelle‘s version of healthy food isn’t mine. I want my family to eat food as close to natural as possible. This does not include low fat artificially colored and flavored milk. Jamie Oliver is trying to get real food at schools, as are other groups.
http://www.jamieoliver.com/us/foundation/jamies-food-revolution/news-content/
Report Post »lukerw
Posted on August 22, 2012 at 4:30amA great Smile… helps the Poison go down!
Report Post »mfspradley79
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:53pmMy child has a special health condition that requires a high fat diet. Cutting whole milk out of her diet is a major problem and that combined with a low fat meal could absolutely result in her losing weight! Instead of trying to make a one size fits all plan, the government needs to back off and let parents guide their children’s nutritional choices. I guess we’ll be packing lunches instead of eating from the cafeteria!!
Report Post »The Jewish Avenger
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:11pmonce again, more regulations suppresing the public all in the name of “prtecting the fat kids from the parents who dont know better than they do.”
Funny when religious parents try to point out the moral rights and wrongs of the world, they are chastised but boy oh boy… lets let the left control our food.to protect the “fat” kids and dont you DARE speak against it!
Report Post »Sosorryforyou
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:28pmMost children with special diets already bring their lunch from home. And I’m sure you agree, while your child may need a high-fat diet, that type of food would not be good for the average child to consume. Unfortunately, it is nearly impossible for any school to provide special diets for their students and that it is the parent’s responsibility, not the schools, to provide their child with the appropriate and safe foods they require.
Report Post »Bigolfascist
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 6:35pmThen your child must die! Obviously your child does not meet the criteria for survival and must perish to make from for useful eaters! (I am not serious, but the eugenicists will be!)
Report Post »Balpit
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 7:46pmActually, since kids are still growing, they need more fat in their diets than adults. Not getting enough fat in their diets will have serious repercussions on their brain development (the organ is mostly fat). Fats and carbohydrates are essential for brain growth and metabolism, and low-fat diets for kids will hinder their growth and could potentially cause neurological issues in the future. On the other hands, excessive amounts causes obesity, which in turn causes heart problems. There should be a healthy balance, and eliminating all fatty foods is NOT the answer.
Report Post »IMCHRISTIAN
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:52pmIt seems daddy (government) needs to dictate to other peoples kids. For the most part what is needed in the younger kids is exercise. Turn off tv and all electronic items and send them out for a walk or play for a few hours each day. Government changes every so often as to the value of the same food. Let parents be parents and Government can tend to our security.
Report Post »johnjamison
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:54pmIt really simple orginize and take the schools from the government. No where is teh USDA granted this power and no where does the Constitution grant these power to congress either. Only local government has the power to control education of it local children. Look to your local government get involved be the change that takes government out of the lives of children.
Report Post »perry1980
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:50pmMooShelle dictating what your kid can eat and drink at school.
If they get 4 more years they will dictate Everything you do.
November 6th is coming fast. Make sure you have registered to vote.
Report Post »Rothbardian_in_the_Cleve
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:49pmWe’ll need healthy serfs to toil for humanity. Eat up kiddies.
Report Post »mtsnj
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:46pmHow about that, the $politics$ of meat is taking sort of a backseat to vegetables and fruit. Waaa no more junk food that’s making you fat and sick.
Report Post »JohnLarson
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:45pmIf our tax dollars are going to help pay for these school lunches, why shouldn’t they be healthy?
We already have an extreme childhood obesity problem.
This is just common sense, something cons don’t seem to understand.
Report Post »Sosorryforyou
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:05pmAbsolutely. I see no problem with this at all. I have school-aged kids, and am thrilled with these healthy changes to what they will be served. If a parent has a problem with these healthy guidelines, then have their child bring lunch from home or send them to a private school. This so-called argument that the government is “taking over” is totally bogus. Our government lead by both sides has been making decisions like this for years and years, and in this case and many others, it’s a good thing.
Report Post »deeberj
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:07pmHealthy doesn’t mean fake processed low fat food. Healthy means REAL food. That is the problem with this healthy school food initiative of Michelle’s. She doesn’t get what healthy means.
Report Post »Smokey_Bojangles
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:08pmIf Your kid is getting fat from the ONE meal a day at school, then you are a bad parent.
Report Post »uncivilized
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:36pmSure, except you can lead a kid to veggies and fruits, but you can’t make them eat. I’m all for OFFERING healthier options, but to REQUIRE a kid to select something that he doesn‘t like or doesn’t want – guess where it’s going to end up? The trash.
Report Post »Next up – no more bag lunches. (They already want to regulate what the kids bring from home…)
Griffin06
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:43pmJohn, the problem is that they won’t stop with cafeteria food. We‘ve already had incidents where students were forced to eat cafeteria food because their bag lunches weren’t good enough, and where certain food were banned from schools altogether. It’s an issue of personal choice, and this is just one more area for the nanny state to get involved in.
Report Post »wahoowa96
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 6:16pmThese rules are dreadful. Sugar and grains have no place in a healthy diet. They are going to push low fat chocolate milk which is typically sweetened with high fructose corn syrup. They are going to push corn and whole grains which raise blood sugar just as much as a snikers. Somebody commented that both sides have been doing this for years. You are correct. More proof that busybody government types from either party have no business telling me or my kids what to eat. Furthermore, you cut saturated fat from developing brains and your are going to blunt the growth of said brains. Good move big brother.
Report Post »TMink
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 6:20pmJohn, read Gary Traubes book “Why We Get Fat and What to Do About It.” Then you will see that the government is pushing a high carbohydrate, low fat diet that will make the children more obese. The government is running their nutritional guidelines on clinical lore that is not supported by the scientific literature. That is a HUGE problem!
Trey
Report Post »WellingtonStarr
Posted on August 22, 2012 at 10:03amThey’re pushing high-carb diets, you idiots! Do you ever read? And as for bringing lunch from home (as I did for my first 6 years of school), they don’t like that and will in many instances confiscate it and substitute the idiotic high-carb government-mandated swill. Wake up! Of course, you people are obvious libs and so are thoroughly “demoralized” as per the KGB techniques (search on “Yuri Bezmenov”) that no amount of proof will change your minds.
Report Post »standuppeople
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:42pmTo quote Rahm Emanuel: “Leave the kids alone.”
Report Post »Sirfoldallot
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:39pmThis means NO packed lunch, u can only eat what the Gov says u can eat . There goes another freedom.
Report Post »Smartiecat
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:35pmThe people make me crazy with their calorie intake for school lunches. I agree that they need to be healthy BUT in some of the schools I have taught in what the children ate at school was ALL they had all day. You cannot teach a hungry child. I have spend hundreds of dollars and have had church groups to help provide a snack for children either in the morning or afternoon or both. When you know, as a teacher, you are sending a child home who will not have dinner or even a snack until they get back to school the next day this pandering by the First Uninformed Lady makes me angry. She is so out of touch with what America’s children are going through and just running her own agenda. VOTE THEM OUT!
Report Post »Skippy_John_Jones
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:24pm“The Daily Mail has labeled the change a “victory for [Michelle Obama],” who has spent the last four years battling childhood obesity.”
Yeah, she’s been working on childhood obesity and completely ignoring her own bulging derrier. Hypocritical cow. Go eat another double cheeseburger, fries, and an extra large milkshake and STHU.
Report Post »zaches
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:18pmHome School.
Report Post »Searchingforthelight
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:11pmSome Hawaiian Schools grow their own foods for classwork. They learn agriculture, teamwork, and self preservation while enjoying the healthy fruits of their own labors. The whole school benefits at lunchtime.
Report Post »netmail
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:19pmYou found some ‘LIGHT’….fantastic!!
Report Post »IdahoAdrienne
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:08pmWTHell? 850 calories for a 12th grader??? Picture, if you will, a growing 12th grade boy who plays on the football or basketball team eating 850 calories per day.
Allow me to say again: High carb, low fat, low protein = a guarantee of being fat!
Report Post »Rothbardian_in_the_Cleve
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:47pmLOL, I thought the same thing! My son is a sophomore football player. He’s 6-4, 240. He practices 3-4 hours a day plus has an hour of weightlifting. His caloric intake is a sight to behold. He buys double lunches at school and takes food with him.
Thankfully we live in Texas so feeding a football player is something we’ve got figured out.
Report Post »TEIN
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:08pmSpot on Idaho!! A growing high school child let alone one involved in sports or other activities need more calories than that…And agreed that the problem with obesity has become more severe with low fat high carb’s diet…..
Report Post »stumpy68
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 3:18pmCutting protein during the time a child is developing their muscles doesn’t sound like a good idea to me.
Report Post »Btw is less than 12 oz of meat a week correct?
Gonzo
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:07pmJust another government agency justifying it’s existence.
Report Post »RedMage
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:06pmYou can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink, comes to mind.
Report Post »Why don’t they just serve good food instead of the mass produced junk they now serve in schools.
netmail
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:16pmand grocery stores and restaurants….The crap is everywhere and hanging off the majority of people I see each day. The health crisis in 20-30 years is like a vision of hell the way I see it. They’re just priming the pump with these lunches… up is down these days for sure.
Report Post »Clutch64
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:03pmWhy can’t these Food Nazis leave kids. They want “cafeteria workers were told at the conference, is to stop thinking of lunchtime as a break from academics”, but that’s just what it is. For some of the kids it’s their only break in the day when they can relax. I‘m all for kids eating healthier but trying to force it down their throats isn’t going to work. It will just drive the kids to bring in their own lunches till they outlaw that.
Report Post »Lothmar
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:03pmIs that kid using a tong to get milk? Ok maybe I can see why if the milks in a big ice pit – but still…
Report Post »semihardrock
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:02pmAwe…..The little prisoners are growing up so fast……
Report Post »Spinolio
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:01pmOkay… so they have “new rules”, were the “old rules” wrong. Will these “new rules” be wrong in the future? This is just political. The liberals training us to be good citizens and take orders from above. What a bland future people will have, tasteless, colorless gruel.
Report Post »DimmuBorgir
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 1:57pmMichelle Obama is doing something her husband couldn’t. She is actually stimulating growth in one sector of our economy…
Lunch box sales will be through the roof.
Report Post »ThemDemsLie2much
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:08pmI hope they got approval from the Parents to film and study their children. Shouldn’t they be paid?
The Feds job is Highways & Borders! Stop dipping into our personal lives. This is no more than another scam by the Gov to support more Lavish lifestyles for crooked Chicago Mob politics. A bunch of Obotts will get high paying cusioned jobs at the tax payers expense for feeding future voters for their poverty traps. Unreal!
Report Post »Texas Hills Patriot
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 1:52pmSoon they’ll be requiring that students chew a given number of times with respect to each food type before swallowing. I put nothing past these over educated idiots anymore.
Report Post »netmail
Posted on August 21, 2012 at 2:09pm‘Over educated idiots’ who don’t know SH@@ about nutrition or care enough about how ALL food is processed and manufactured these days. School lunches, grocery stores, restaurants are all poison outlets and like it or not, that’s the truth. The govt is a complete joke.
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