Category: Recipes for Success

“We want students to feel like they’re at home when they’re eating. Our team creates great recipes incorporating the foods and flavors we serve our own families, and the kids love them.” – Michelle Pruitt Roybal, Nutrition Services Supervisor, Azusa Unified School District

The School Food Professionals at Azusa Unified School District are always looking for new ways to give their students home-style meals. To come up with the perfect recipe for pozole, a delicious and hearty Mexican soup, they held a contest. Staff gathered, cooked and voted on their favorite pozole recipes, and they served the tastiest one in their schools. 

The secret to a delicious pozole recipe is great ingredients – flavorful hominy, high-quality chicken or pork, fresh chilis and a rich broth – that provide a hearty meal that fills students up with flavor, warmth and joy. “We want them to have a big smile on their face,” Michelle says. “We want them to be really happy that they’re coming to school to eat.”

Want to make a healthy dish like this for the kids in your life? Check out this simple and delicious pozole recipe from the Lunch Box!

“Students think they don’t like vegetables, then they try ones that come in fresh from the garden. They love the idea of harvesting, bringing something in and serving it right up.” – Elizabeth Mungia, Cafeteria Manager, Oxnard Union High School District

Nothing tastes better than fresh. When fruits and vegetables come right from the farm or garden and go straight to the tray, they bring a flavor that can’t be beat. In Oxnard Union High School District, fresh is always on the menu through their Harvest of the Month program, which spotlights locally grown,  seasonal produce. The program gets kids to taste new fruits and veggies that they might not otherwise try. “The most recent harvest of the month was radishes,” Elizabeth says. “You can tell the kids liked them because there was barely anything left over.”

Harvest of the Month programs teach students where food comes from while also supporting local farmers in their communities. Best of all, they help kids discover new healthy favorites like radish slaw, a tasty, tangy pairing with entrees like tacos. “It’s all fresh from the ground, and that’s what makes it so good,” Elizabeth says.

Want to make a healthy dish like this for the kids in your life? Check out this simple and delicious radish slaw recipe from the Lunch Box!

“I can provide all the students with home-style meals and get them to taste all different kinds of foods and flavors.” – Esther Huizar, Cafeteria Manager, Oak Valley Union Elementary School District

One of the home-style meals that Oak Valley Union Elementary’s team of School Food Professionals cooks from scratch is a chicken quesadilla. Cafeteria Manager Esther Huizar and her team prepare the chicken with fresh ingredients like tomato, onions and garlic, and low-fat cheese. The key to making sure these quesadillas are nice and soft for students is warming the whole wheat tortillas before adding cheese and chicken for a final five minutes in the oven. 

The best part about these chicken quesadillas? The students at Oak Valley Union Elementary love them. As Esther says, cooking fresh, healthy meals “makes a big difference.”

Want to make a healthy dish like this for the kids in your life? Check out this simple and delicious chicken quesadilla recipe from the Lunch Box!