School Lunches
School Meals
We believe that school lunchtime is a great opportunity for all our children to sit down together and enjoy their healthy and tasty meals while developing their social skills.
The school will provide a clean, sociable environment indoors for children, staff and visitors to eat their lunch. Children will be taught table manners and encouraged to leave the area where they have eaten their lunch reasonably clean and tidy.
We, therefore, hope that all parents will take up this offer of a free school meal for their infant children. We do understand that some children will want to bring their own packed lunch.
Our school lunches are provided by Hampshire Catering Services.
At Hampshire Catering Services, we believe your child should have healthy, flavoursome food, so that’s exactly what we provide. You don’t have to worry about the calories either: our lunches are always set up to provide one-third of your child’s daily allowance.
Want to know more about Hampshire Catering Services?
https://www.hants.gov.uk/educationandlearning/hc3s/education-catering/schools-colleges
The school’s midday supervisory assistants supervise the children during the lunch break.
New Year R Hub
Healthy packed lunches
It is important that children are eating a healthy, balanced lunch at school. This means plenty of foods that contain the nutrients that children need and fewer foods that are high in sugar and saturated fat. Foods such as crisps and cakes/biscuits are allowed but should be given in moderation (we recommend no more than 1 of each item if you are going to include these in the lunch box).
Natural fruit products such as Fruit Winders are acceptable but, please leave these items in their packaging to allow us to identify what they are as many look like sweets. Small packets of popcorn are also permitted but, if sweet popcorn is included then please do not include any other sweet products such as a cake or a bar.
Packed lunches that are brought to school must be healthy and balanced and should NOT contain any of the following:
- Sweets and chocolate bars
We understand that it can be difficult to decide if chocolate products are acceptable to include in lunch boxes when there are so many on the market. A simple rule is that, if a chocolate bar contains wafer or biscuit such as a snack size KitKat, snack size Twix bar or Penguin bars, these are acceptable. Solid chocolate bars and bars containing caramel such as Mars Bar and Freddos are considered sweets. Full size chocolate bars such as a 4 finger Kitkat or a 2 finger Twix are NOT acceptable and are also considered as sweets.
- Any form of chocolate spread
- Fizzy drinks
- Food containing nuts and peanuts INCLUDING PEANUT BUTTER
We advise that fruits such as cherry tomatoes and grapes are cut in half to avoid them being a choking hazard.
If your child brings in an item from the list above, we will ask them not to eat it and will inform you of this by sending home a letter or via a phone call.
For lunch box ideas, please find some sites below that offer ideas and advice:
- https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/742750/Eatwell_Guide_booklet_2018v4.pdf
- www.nhs.uk/livewell/childhealth6-15/pages/lighterlunchboxes.aspx
- https://realfood.tesco.com/search.html?Collection=Kids%27%20lunchbox#!q=’perpage%3D30%26Collection%3DKids%2527+lunchbox’
DUE TO ALLERGIES, WE ASK THAT NO NUT PRODUCTS ARE BROUGHT INTO SCHOOL.
Water and fruit
All children should bring a water bottle each day to school containing water ONLY.
Children are able to bring in other drinks but, these are for lunchtime ONLY.
Water bottles are provided by the school for all Year R children. You may wish to provide your own for Year 1 and 2. Water bottles are stored in the classrooms and are sent home daily.
Free milk is provided for all children under the age of 5. All children are provided with a piece of fruit or vegetable every day.