St Margaret Clitherow Catholic Primary School

We offer all children a hot school meal at lunchtimes.  The meals are cooked on our school site using fresh ingredients by cooks from the school catering company, Chartwells. We recognise the importance of a healthy, balanced diet as central to a healthy lifestyle and fundamental to a child’s concentration, energy levels and self-image.  By teaching healthy eating skills, we aim to contribute greatly to promoting family health and the social pleasure and interaction which this fosters.  We wish children to understand food from growth to cooking, serving and eating.

We recognise the importance of a healthy, balanced diet as central to a healthy lifestyle and fundamental to a child’s concentration, energy levels and self-image.  By teaching healthy eating skills, we aim to contribute greatly to promoting family health and the social pleasure and interaction which this fosters.  We wish children to understand food from growth to cooking, serving and eating.

Objectives

• To work with the school caterers, governors, staff, children, parents and carers to monitor school lunches and encourage children to eat a selection of healthy food,
• To encourage children to be adventurous with fresh fruit, vegetables and new tastes for instance by offering them food from the salad bar and putting hot vegetables on plates, also by offering fruit at break time whenever possible,
• To monitor the percentage of pupils eating fruit and vegetables each day at school from time to time,
• To increase the social pleasure of meals by letting children sit with friends,
• To increase knowledge of the value and function of different types of food through lessons in all classes and through food preparation and cooking generally
• To encourage children to drink lots of water throughout the day,
• To make children aware of hygiene issues and to wash hands before meals and food preparation,
• To ban sweets in packed lunches time as well as in the playground before and after school,
• To support initiatives like Healthy Living Week to raise awareness of these issues and to continue the dialogue with parents on healthy eating with the support of school caterers,
• To be a healthy school

Allergies, Cultural Sensitivities and Personal Preferences

• All teaching staff have a list of children’s medical conditions and food allergies/intolerances and the latter are kept in a folder for the catering staff to access.
• Vegetarian and vegan choices are available at lunchtime as part of the school meal service.
• Nuts and nut products are not allowed in school or in packed lunches.

From September 2023 for one academic year, all children in London primary schools are entitled to a free two-course meal (main course and dessert) as part of the Mayor of London's Universal Free School Meals Programme. 

Information about school meals for your child will be sent out via the Jotter each term and is available from the school office.  

If your child has special dietary requirements, please contact Mrs Robinson via the school office. Please make sure that your child's records regarding his/her dietary requirements are updates so that we can pass this information to our catering staff.