1 min read
It’s midday on a Friday and children are pouring into the lunch hall at Greenside primary school, an inner-city state school in west London.
Rather than fish and chips or pizza, often served on the last day of the week, enormous trays of chickpeas and spicy rice are emerging from the kitchen, alongside roasted sweet potatoes, green beans and spinach braised with garlic. According to the excited four- and five-year-olds queuing up, the best thing is that all this can be crammed into a burrito with a choice of toppings served at the table. “I like the olives and cheese best,” says five-year-old Sumaya.
For anyone still hungry, homemade loaves of focaccia are lined up by the ovens, filling the hall with a sweet, malty aroma. “Every Friday, it’s ‘breaducation’, which means all the pupils get involved in making some kind of bread, and we link it back to whatever they are learning in the curriculum,” explains chef Jo Ilbury, who heads up the school’s catering team. “Anything left over is sold to parents at the end of the day.”
