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April 7, 2010

Corn Syrup Disguising as School Lunch

by Elizabeth Puccini and Anisa Romero, at 9:50 am

Mayor Bloomberg made the landmark decision to ban trans fats from city restaurants to protect the public’s health. He should take the same bold step of banning corn syrup from foods in our schools that don’t need to be sweetened.

If a student chooses a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich with chocolate milk for lunch (an option that is offered every day in our schools), he’ll essentially be eating corn syrup disguised as a meal. That’s because the wheat bread and buns served in our schools contain high-fructose corn syrup; the second ingredient in the peanut butter is dextrose (another form of corn syrup); the first ingredient in the jelly is corn syrup, not what you might expect, fruit; and the second ingredient in the chocolate milk is high-fructose corn syrup.

doe-pbj
By some estimates, corn syrup makes up as much as 20 percent of children’s daily calories, and its consumption contributes to childhood obesity and diabetes rates. Plus, the production of corn syrup is devastating to the environment. This is all especially tragic because bread, peanut butter, and milk do not need to be sweetened. These hidden sugars in foods that don’t need them are silent contributors to the health crisis we see. It’s time for Mayor Bloomberg to take the lead again on public health issues and replace these foods containing corn syrup in our schools with healthier options that do not.

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  • http://thischildleftbehind.blogspot.com Bonnie Ng

    Whoa. That’s insane. And yet not terribly surprising at the same time.

  • http://fairfoodfight/fighters/vintage-eats Jen

    Sadly, this is not at all surprising. This reminds me of something interesting happening in a school I know in Massachusetts. Ever heard of fluff? If you’re not from around you, you probably haven’t. Fluff is essentially spreadable marshmallow, made up entirely of oil and a sweetener. Schools around here serve peanut butter and fluff sandwiches as an alternative to provided hot lunch. A friend of mine worked for months to have it removed from the menu, only to see it put back on just recently. Why? Because of PARENTAL demand.

    Come on, parents. Why is feeding this crap to your kids acceptable?

  • Roget

    Ever hear of fluff. The whole system runs on fluff. Start with the press releases on the test scores–a tale told by David Cantor, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing!

  • Redpoint

    I have fond memories of fluffernutter sandwiches, and though I don’t actually eat them anymore I do have an old jar in my pantry.

    I was very surprised to hear fluff had any oil in it–so I checked. Don’t malign the fluff: no oil. Lots of sugar, a little egg white. Fluff is kind of like marshmallow meringue. Here’s the list: Corn syrup, sugar, dried egg white, vanillin.

    (Of course I don’t think it should be served in schools)

  • Ellen

    But wait….what happened to the chef that was hired to such fan fare? Wasn’t he suposed to stop this type of “fluff”?

  • Roget

    He got a better offer in the DOE’s Press Office, working alongside fluff master Cantor.

  • CarolineSF

    Here in San Francisco, our school district’s Student Nutrition Services director successfully lobbied the milk vendor, Berkeley Farms, to reformulate the chocolate milk and replace the HFCS with sugar. Now Berkeley Farms is also being asked to reduce the sugar. Our district does still serve chocolate milk — partly because there’s so much feedback that some kids will drink no milk unless chocolate is available, and partly because of the chronic squeeze between the National School Lunch Program’s limit on fat and minimum (floor) required calories. (Yes, there’s a MINIMUM amount of required calories but not a maximum! With the limit on fat and chronic funding shortages, that requires some juggling to achieve. Please rush to get Hunter College Prof. Janet Poppendieck’s great book “Free For All: Fixing School Food in America” to learn all about this.)

    Anyway, if San Francisco Unified, with a mere 56,000 students, had enough clout to pressure its milk vendor, New York, the nation’s largest school district, certainly should.

    Our district doesn’t serve peanut butter in the lunches because of allergy concerns, by the way, so there’s no jelly to be found either. All the breads and rolls are whole wheat. I think there may be HFCS in some condiments (in those single-serving packs), so I can’t say we’ve gotten rid of it.

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