Every day 2400 students eat lunch and sit down to enjoy their meals, but there is a lot more than people know behind the scenes. The way every day they work hard and make possibilities happen every day but one special thing they do is the lunch specials.
The lunch specials are buzzed about topics in the school cafeteria. Students look forward to knowing what the special will be each day, a daily topic of conversation between peers.
Trevon Carrington, a senior at EHS is in the culinary program and was allowed to work as part of the lunch staff during his culinary periods.
“I started making the lunch specials once I was approved to do a co-op opportunity during my Culinary periods. Which is why I’m there on A days,” Carrington said.
The lunch specials are also a passion of Tre, a senior student who finds joy in cooking for the school and city community and his aspirations to be a chef in the future.
“My favorite meal to prepare I think is pasta,” Carrington said. “I love seeing the rush and I love people talking about it during their lunch period or even in their classrooms afterwards. It’s funny when you get those that know you and they say give me extra not for the reason of the presentation but for its popularity.”
“I enjoy using a blend of my seasonings to make the special to have much flavor, but I enjoy combining cultures with Fatima to see what the Chef thinks so we can serve,” Carrington said. “I love being able to come up with ideas that me and Fatima agree on, but using what I know from Culinary to design these meals while using proper techniques. While also enjoying seeing people and connecting with them in different languages but for them to see a familiar face that they know serving what they’ll be eating.”
He also experiences challenges just like any other position.
“The hardest part of my job is communicating with those that speak a different language,” Carrington said. “It’s not the hardest but it’s challenging at times. I have learned to pick up on languages while being in the kitchen but for safety reasons, it’s hard to let those know in the kitchen.”
“A typical day for me making the specials is arriving at 7:30 and then clocking in at 8 am,” Carrington said. “Yes I get paid. I eat breakfast or drink my coffee and then I’m figuring out what the special is. I work closely with the Executive Chef and Food Service Worker, Fatima, to come up with a great quality of food that looks but also tastes amazing.”
The rest of the lunch staff at EHS also work hard to make the lunches simultaneously healthy and delicious. They get to school early to begin prepping and cooking lunch the second they get in the kitchen. There is a lot more that goes into the preparation of the specials than meets the eye. There is a large team of kitchen staff that is led by Whitsons food company and a head chef that organizes the menus according to state and federal food guidelines. Tre Carrington and the lunch ladies have many duties and responsibilities when making the lunch specials. From the time school starts until 11:16, they spend all day perfecting and making sure they follow standard codes.
“So it’s very busy. It doesn’t stop. We start at 6 a.m., and it goes all the way until lunches,” cafeteria worker Lori Mangan said. “I’m no stranger to hard work. Sometimes I prep 30 to 40 pounds of chicken. So do that, plus the health service. And if somebody else needs help, I go and help out if I have the time.”
If you ever wondered why the school won’t just serve Devil Dogs and Snoballs for lunch, it isn’t because they don’t want us students to enjoy our lunch and have tasty meals to look forward to. It’s actually because school lunch is regulated by the USDA’s National School Lunch Program.
“So Everett Public Schools contracts their food service company to my company called Whitsons Culinary Group, and our standards are that we have a wide variety of options,” Mangan said. “So, the world market is what the specials are called, and that’s Whitson’s concept. So, World Market, La Puccina’s Pizza, and Miss Ruby’s are the burger items, Coyote’s Girls are the nachos, and Shaky Joe’s smoothie. Real meals are salads and sandwiches.” You said.
The importance behind the specials is making sure that they are both healthy and nutritious, but also appealing to the students who will be eating them. While it might be challenging, the Whitsons team is successful in making meals that students love.
“We wanna give healthy food, but there’s no point in offering just that,” food service director Hannah Yoo said. “The kids aren’t gonna eat it. We wanna focus on foods that are healthy, nutritious, and desired by the kids.” You said.
Coming up with ideas for lunch specials is something that every staff member gets to participate in. Although there are set regulations they have to follow, they still use their creativity to come up with tasty specials that meet all of the federal standards.
“Ramon does the menus for the high school, we collaborate on the menus because we have to follow the USDA guidelines for the National School Lunch Program. So we can’t just put whatever we want. We have to follow government standards.” You said.
“If we give the chef an example or something, he does listen to what we have to say. Recipes have to be approved by the state or by Winston’s company.” Carrington said.
The lunch specials can vary by the day of the week from different companies they get from their providers. When they get the providers’ companies supplies they come up with creative ideas with the other chefs to make it the best they can.
“These special recipes are already prepared by the past week, I just put my ‘two cents’ into what I think is good for the week, including pasta,” Carrington said. “Anyways, we get started on the special and it typically runs from prepping until 9ish and then cooking until 10:40. Around 10:50 everyone goes to break and I typically stay behind to start putting food in trays and putting them on the line. When the 11:15 bell rings that’s when the action gets started.”
The goal and motivation they have for making these lunch specials is to serve and feed the community of Everett High School. Helping feed kids is quite an honor and devotion is amazing.
