Skip to main content

School lunches - German way



It has been a really interesting experience to compare lunches served at American (more specifically Avonworth near Pittsburgh) and German schools.  Full disclosure – most of the time that Andrei went to Avonworth he preferred to buy lunch and we didn’t mind because it was easier and fairly cheap.  We are fully aware that it is not healthy, good for you, and etc.

In German schools (and we have 3 different schools to compare it to) if you ARE at school during lunch time, you are required to pay for your lunch. It is actually not called lunch, it’s called Mittagsessen which literary means "middle of the day meal". If a child doesn’t want to eat it, well then you are wasting your money but you still have to pay it.  Bringing a lunch is not an option.  We do send snacks every day but that’s for a different time.   Also depending on the school, snacks might be required to be sugar free.  For example, Ilya is not allowed to have chips, cookies, juices and many other things.  Many days he eats pretzels and an apple for snack.

German lunch is more equivalent to American dinner.  Ilya does not get to choose what he eats since his entire school goes to a local restaurant where they are served whatever the school and the restaurant agreed to.  Anton has the same deal but his food is catered and we get a menu every week.  Andrei has a choice of 2 things every day, one choice always being lactose and gluten free.  For example, on Tuesday Andrei has an option of meatballs with dill sauce and potatoes or fish filet with tomato sauce and potatoes.  Included also is a fruit of the season.  Wednesday – pasta with zucchini sauce or chicken nuggets with rice and peppers.  From our experience, kids tend to eat and try a lot of new stuff when presented food this way and for our American kids, it’s also a great way to get some new and different tastes of German cuisine. 



P.S. At Anton's new kindergarten we will have to pack NO food - no snacks, no breakfast, nothing at all and I am super excited by that fact! It also minimizes the fact that somebody will bring food with nuts and accidentally cause an issue.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

School update

It's been almost exactly 2 months since the last time I wrote here.  Our summer has come and gone as well as 3 weeks of school have passed.  The life has been busy but I knew that since all the kids are in new schools and our schedules are completely different from last year.  We are still trying to figure stuff out but anyway ... Our house looked like that most of the summer  Night before school Anton has started 1st grade.  He goes to school for kids with hearing issues and from what I understood the kids in his class are all over the spectrum regarding their issues.  Anton does not have a problem with hearing but his brain does not process what he hears at normal rate and Anton's teacher knows how to work with him which has been good so far.  The school is a little bit further away but he gets picked up and dropped off right in front of our house and it's going good.  He leaves the house at 7:15 and comes home at 15:40 3 times a week and earlier on 2 other d
11 comments
Read more

Random notes

Wrote this last week but never published :( My plan was to write about Anton and his school a bit. Or about how German language acquisition is (after being in Germany for 4 years).  However ... life!   Last week Andrei was home Tuesday and Wednesday because the teachers held parent-teacher conferences for those 2 days and kids had no school.  First time it's happening this way because in other schools meetings were always held either before or after classes.  After having him home for 2 days and meeting his classroom teacher, I learned pretty much nothing new - his grades are good but he needs to talk more in class.  That's what I got out of a 30 minute meeting.   Friday Anton was home because his school starts Carnival celebrations early.  Monday and Tuesday all the kids were home because again Carnival - Rose Monday and for no reason for Tuesday.  Anton's extended celebrations continued into Wednesday.  I am not a fan of Carnival and neither are the kids. All of
5 comments
Read more

Grocery shopping

After living in Germany for 4 years and having German fridge and freezer for 3 of those years, I feel like my grocery shopping habits have changed and sometimes I have to wonder what would happen if we were to move back to the States.  Because German fridges and freezers are pretty small it was pretty necessary to go to the store at least once a week and often times more than once because one week worth of food for 5 people wouldn't fit.  Moreover, the freezer would not fit more than a box of pizza, fish sticks and 1 container of ice cream - freezing meats/chickens/... was not an option.    About a year ago we upgraded our kitchen and bought a new fridge and it comes with water and ice! Did I mention that nobody in Germany uses ice except my husband but he was and is super happy?!?   Anyway, there are 4 stores in our town - they are all pretty much next to each other.  One is a bio Whole Foods type of market (Tegut), we have two discount stores (Lidl and Aldi), and one re
2 comments
Read more