David Seymour’s $3 school lunch programme: A restaurant critic’s verdict

• The Government’s new school lunches programme, spearheaded by Associate Education Minister David Seymour, has launched in more than 1000 schools.
• The programme aims to save $130 million annually, reducing costs to $3 per lunch, down from the previous government’s $8.68 per lunch.
• Seymour visited Ōtahuhu College yesterday for a media call, where students – and the Herald – gave their verdicts on the new menu.

The smell stretches the length of the school hall: industrial mince, with a dash of student flat.

Up front, hundreds of Ōtāhuhu College teenagers sample the Government’s new school lunch programme. Down the back, a former restaurant critic with a masters in gastronomy (first class honours) steels herself.

Who doesn’t love a beef pasta bolognese in classic tomato sauce?

But day three of deliveries by the School Lunch Collective and the student verdict is already in.

“Could do better,” says Divya Kumar, from a group assembled to assess the day’s halal, vegetarian and meat-based options.

Sample comments: “Mush ... you can’t really say if this is pasta or rice ... I thought it was cauliflower ...”

How much would they pay for these $3 meals from the Government’s new cut-price school lunch partner?

“I wouldn’t buy it ... like, 50 cents ... Not even 50 cents.”

From left, Ōtāhuhu College students Divya Kumar, Afiya Khan, Annam Khan and Heremoko Iakimo, give their verdict on the School Lunch Collective menu. Photo / Michael Craig

There is no such thing as a free lunch unless you have a masters in gastronomy (first class honours) and a Ministry of Education official is directing you to an insulated box containing recyclable aluminium containers of beef pasta bolognese in classic tomato sauce.

All of the food provided by the School Lunch Collective is cooked in Hamilton, frozen, and then sent to the 25 kitchens around the country, tasked with reheating and daily distribution to schools. Today, it’s beef pasta, tomorrow, chicken curry.

I make my selection, plunge a thermometer through the plastic lid, and watch the temperature rise. So far, so safely edible. Students supplement today’s offering with free apples and snack packs of corn chips and bhuja mix, but the main event is this hot mince, or a vegetarian approximation.

Earlier, Associate Education Minister David Seymour had said: “This is an operation of getting 230,000 meals on time at the right temperature to children in communities up and down this country.”

He knew they would not appeal to every palate.

A vegetarian option from the School Lunch Collective's delivery to Ōtāhuhu College. Photo / Michael Craig

“It doesn’t matter if you’re at a fast food joint, a Michelin style restaurant, or your nan’s home cooking, there will always be a variety of opinions about the quality of the food.”

He said government and its free lunch providing partner were committed to continuous improvement, “so that students will be able to say, ‘actually, it may not be the best meal I’ve ever had, it’s definitely not the worst, altogether I think it’s pretty good’.”

That, along with an annual projected taxpayer saving of more than $130m, would be “a good piece of policy and a good piece of partnership ...”

Was it, however, a good lunch?

If you eat with your eyes, then I suggest you close them.

I have opened a container of sadness and carrots. A tomato-ey sludge on a pile of structurally challenged penne. I’ve seen worse – but I also spent the bulk of my high school years eating dinner in a state-run hostel before the invention of Instagram.

I’m not ready to talk about today’s vegetarian option, but if I was a lentil, I would immediately distance myself from the current Government.

Deconstructed school lunch: Contents of the beef pasta bolognese in classic tomato sauce, from the School Lunch Collective meal provided to media at Ōtahuhu College, Auckland.

The student panel scores their various containers between zero and two for flavour. I think that’s harsh. There’s a salty depth and a decent hit of savoury in my first bite of beef that deserves at least a four out 10.

But the cooler the container gets, the more the pasta congeals. A fatty mouth feel suggests this is definitely not lean mince. And (while accepting an Italian would shriek) my personal take on what is essentially spag bol sans spag, would nearly always include visible mushroom, celery, capsicum and onion.

“Vegetables?” A group of boys point me to the crispy fried peas in their bhuja mix, before listing tomato and carrot. So. Much. Carrot.

It is not the best meal I’ve ever had. It is not the worst.

I count roughly 67 small cubes of carrot, 29 pieces of penne and two tablespoons of tomato-infused mince.

They say that some kids only go to school to eat their lunch. I’d happily eat this if I was hungry. But if I had an option, I’d probably rather do calculus.

Kim Knight is a journalist with New Zealand Herald’s premium lifestyle team and a former restaurant critic for Canvas magazine.