Dietician asks: Has council learned nothing from Jamie’s Dinners?

THE Town Hall plans to improve school dinners by spending nearly £250,000 installing microwave ovens at 11 primaries, the New Journal has learned.
‘Regeneration’ kitchens, stocked with banks of microwaves, will be provided at schools which currently have dinners bussed in from other schools.
Labour education boss Councillor Nick Smith has hailed them as the way to improve Camden’s heavily-criticised dinners.
But the microwave plan has come under fire from a paediatric dietician whose children attend the only school in the borough to opt out of the council’s centralised contract with catering giant Scolarest.
Roxanne Harbour, a parent at Brookfield School in Highgate, said: “Regeneration kitchens consist of banks of microwaves.
“They are not designed, as Nick Smith suggests, to cook meals on-site. They enable schools to re-heat on site and prepare simple salads to accompany the re-heated food.
“The council appears to be promoting this method of feeding our children.
She said: “I don’t know how much they hope to save over a proper kitchen but the main savings would obviously be in the number of staff they needed to employ and in the food costs, if they are not working from fresh produce.
“It’s clear that other schools are being discouraged from pulling out of the contract.”
She added: “Has Camden Council learned nothing from Jamie’s Dinners?”
But the Town Hall insists three schools that have already had “regeneration” kitchens installed – Emmanuel in West Hampstead, St Joseph’s in Holborn and Torriano in Kentish Town – are happy with them.
A press official said: “These kitchens have combination ovens. These mean that some food can be cooked freshly on site and therefore prepared later in the morning, closer to lunchtime, rather than being delivered to the school.
“Some food is also re-heated from frozen in these ovens. For example, frozen vegetables or meat that make up a meal, not pre-prepared ‘ready meals’.
“This is a great improvement in providing fresher, healthier meals.” Pat Macdonald, headteacher at St Joseph Roman Catholic Primary, said: “Since the new kitchen was put in, the food has been better than it has been in the 30 years I have been at this school.
“I eat the dinners myself and so do three or four members of my staff.
“That’s never happened before.
“There are plenty of fresh vegetables and our chef here is excellent.”