But Will Mikey Like It?

The boys and girls at Galtier Magnet Elementary School don’t know it yet, but they’re about to become guinea pigs in an experiment that could have ripple effects throughout St. Paul’s public schools—and possibly beyond. As they slide their trays through the school’s cafeteria line, each receives a bowl of beef barley soup and two pieces of bread, one wedge-shaped, the other square. A team of women in clinical white smocks hovers at the edge of the room with clipboards, poised to record what happens next.

“It’s a big day here,” says Jean Ronnei, director of nutrition and commercial services for the St. Paul public schools. The wedge of bread was made by the district’s regular supplier; the square slice was baked in district ovens, using heart-healthy whole-grain flour, but looks as white, fluffy, and familiar as Wonder Bread. “We’re very interested in finding out which kind of focaccia the kids like best,” Ronnei explains.

If focaccia was a foreign concept in the school cafeteria where you cut your teeth, chances are you also survived your formative years without partaking of a substance known as Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. Before the item was banned from the Galtier lunchroom, this bright red nutrition-free menace was a major source of calories for kids—and a major source of concern for principal John Garcia. More than 80 percent of the students at this magnet school two blocks off University Avenue in the heart of St. Paul qualify for free or reduced-price lunches. More than 60 percent also take part in the school’s subsidized breakfast program, running in from the morning bus and eating so ravenously that, says Garcia, “it’s clear a lot of kids haven’t eaten a real meal since lunch the day before. They come hungry.”

As he watched his students eat—wolfing down fatty, sugary treats and turning up their noses at fresh fruit and vegetables—something else became clear too: “For many of these kids, everything they’re learning about food and nutrition, they’re learning at school.” With an estimated one-third of the nation’s children overweight—the rate is even higher among low-income and minority students such as those who attend Galtier—the school decided it was time to improve its nutritional lesson plan.

That’s why the women in the white coats—“quality control specialists”—were moving through the cafeteria in the spring of 2007, urging some students to try another spoonful of soup (never mentioning the fantastic fiber content of barley) and encouraging others to dunk their focaccia in the soup the way they’d dunk a doughnut in milk. (Doughnuts, yet another high-fat, low-nutrient menu item, have also been mostly removed from the Galtier lunchroom—to the chagrin of many teachers.) Though parents generally support  Galtier’s nutritional push, some send their kids to school with maple syrup on French toast day, apparently believing that the fruit toppings served in its place may simply be too great a sacrifice to expect from sixth-graders.

The notion that kids will reject healthy food is commonly held, often by parents trying to rationalize another trip to a McDonald’s drive-through. But Ronnei believes that kids will develop a taste for what’s good for them—if we regularly put good stuff in front of them. “They like green beans—I’ve seen it myself,” says Ronnei, who was recently honored at the annual meeting of the School Nutrition Association. As if to demonstrate her point, two girls sitting at the next table sniff suspiciously at the focaccia before taking tentative bites from each piece. After a couple of mouthfuls, the wrinkles in their noses smooth out.

“I like the square one,” says the girl with pigtails. “So do I,” says her friend.

“See there,” Ronnei says. “Two votes for the healthy stuff.”

Unfortunately, these results, as they say in the fine print, may not be typical.