A CAMPAIGN is underway across North Yorkshire to encourage more families to take up school meals as an affordable and healthy way to feed their children.

The county council says the move comes as family budgets are under more pressure, with initiatives to boost take-up, especially to those who can receive free school meals.

Initiatives include letting children try food before they are served, street food options for older students, menus designed with children in mind through consultation with school cooks and promoting special meals to mark Chinese New Year or World Book Day.

The council serves million of meals every year and says its school meals service ensures food is as fresh as it can be and supports the local economy.

The fresh meat and poultry is UK-sourced Red Tractor meat, reared to the highest welfare standards, and fish is sustainably caught. The fruit and vegetable are sourced locally, where possible, the eggs are free range from Yorkshire and most cheese comes from Cheshire.

The meals are also free of harmful chemical additives, are nutritionally balanced and cooked from scratch in school kitchens each day.

Stuart Carlton, the council’s director of the children and young people’s service, says there is a good uptake of free meals but parents increasingly need such support.

The council says school catering teams understand that often parents and carers opt for packed lunches over concerns their children won’t like the food on offer at school, or are picky eaters or due to peer pressure. This can create unnecessary costs and lead to poorer nutrition.

Stuart continued: “Our catering teams are very used to dealing with this and making sure children are happy and fed at lunchtime. They often find that children are willing to try foods they see their friends and classmates enjoying.

“When education has been so disrupted, as during the Covid pandemic, a fresh, nutritious school meal is a healthy way for children to settle down in the school day and enjoy their food together rather than just snacking.”

“We just want to ensure all our children are able to get the best out of teaching and learning and part of that is having access to good nutrition every day.”

In its campaign, North Yorkshire County Council is using Overdale Community Primary in Scarborough as a case study, with its pupils appearing in a You Tube video.The new £6m school has a central hall big enough for all to dine in. Two-fifths of its pupils receive free meals with a quarter more ‘on the cusp.’

Cook, Trina Cornwall, cooks her meals from scratch, fresh every day. This includes bread and pizza made on-site, with plenty of salad and vegetables.

There are feast days too and staff, including the headteacher Vicki Logan will eat with the children to check the meal’s quality.

Trina says more children are taking the meals, now 150 out of a school if 219, a number she expects to rise further.

She said: “I love my job. I love working with the children, knowing that my food is healthy and made by us on the premises; that it is as fresh as it can be; that it is benefiting them. .

“The world is a terrible place at the moment but we are doing our bit here to help our families.“

Year 6 pupils Ali Ozcelik and Talia England say they have started eating fish and they like the vegetarian choices. Bella Taylor, 11, says there’s always new things to try.

Talia who has a free school meal, talks about the benefit for her family. She said: “I like to have my meal at school because it helps my family – it means they don’t have to pay so much for food.”

Talia’s mother Kelly England, has four children, one now at university, and they all attend or have attended the school. Because her oldest son had diabetes she was anxious about taking up school food but she praises the care and choice at Overdale to accommodate all children with special dietary needs.

She said: “I am a big fan of the school meals here. The fact my children have a healthy meal in the middle of the day gives me peace of mind. They are now willing to try many different foods; they are less fussy and that’s important.

“I would say to parents who are eligible for free school meals ‘anything that helps your child helps you’.”

Kelsey Newsome and Sam Houghton both send children to Overdale and take up free school meals. “It’s nice for them to have a hot meal during the day when they are not at home,” said Sam “and they are much more willing to try different foods at home now.”

Kelsey said her daughter Nelley, 7, asked her to cook a chicken korma at home because she had seen it on the menu at school and wanted to try it. She now eats it at school when it is offered as well.  “It’s the variety of hot meals they get that is so great,” said Kelsey.

“When you are working like me it’s also good to know they are getting enough to eat and that their main meal is at school.

“My little one, Nancey is 4 in July and she loves to go into the big hall at school for dinner with her sister. She has come on leaps and bounds learning to use a knife and fork, It’s just brilliant for her.”

Details of the schools meals service and how to apply for free meals can be found at www.northyorks.gov.uk/free-school-meals