A study has found that although youngsters are offered a range of freshly prepared hot meals every day, sandwiches and pizzas are by far the most popular items in school canteens.
Researchers from the University of Sheffield analysed the lunch choices of 2,660 students from two large Yorkshire secondary schools over a period of seven months.
Both schools had National Healthy Schools status and both offered three healthy dishes of the day, such as roast beef with Yorkshire pudding, shepherd’s pie and vegetarian curry. Pizzas, pasta, sandwiches and jacket potatoes were also available.
At the first school, sandwiches and pizzas accounted for more than 71 per cent of the meals chosen, while less than nine per cent of meals were “more nutritionally valuable” dishes complying with government nutritional standards.
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