Turkey twizzlers and mint custard – your memories of school dinners

Packaged, processed and full of nostalgia – school dinners in the 1970s and 1980s.

Things have changed when it comes to eating lunch – or is it dinner? – at school.

This week is national school meals week – a whole week dedicated to the canteen food on offer to children at lunchtimes across the UK.

Gone are the days of turkey twizzlers and lumpy mash followed by sponge pudding and custard every day.

Sometimes the custard was pink and tasted of strawberry or it was green and tasted of mint!

Youngsters can now enjoy tasty and nutritious meals that are prepared fresh each day with mouth-watering options like chicken korma, spaghetti bolognaise and roast dinner on the menu.

Beef pie, creamy mashed potato and fresh vegetables is one of the options on some school dinner menus across Warrington (Image: Edsential)

The menus run on a three-week cycle and there is always freshly baked bread, seasonal vegetables and salad followed by fresh fruit and organic yogurt available.

They’re a real hit with hungry children taking a break from the classroom with youngsters in Early Years and Key Stage One entitled to free school meals every day.

But what were school dinners like in days gone by? What do you remember about midday meals when you were growing up?
We asked and you told us – in your hundreds!

Here are some of the meals – good and bad - that you remember from your childhood:

• Joanne Hampson: Sausage roll, chips and gravy – very healthy!
• Rachel O’Hara: Turkey burgers
• Emma Hipperson: I dream about melting moments – they were something else!
• Jayne Morgan: Manchester tart.
• Helen Ijichi: Yogurt with a shortbread biscuit. I can’t eat strawberry yogurt without a shortbread finger over 35 years on.
• Jane Davies: Bacon mashed potato, beans and grated cheese. I still love it.
• Laura Elizabeth Fletcher: School tray bake and custard.
• Catherine Lake: Semolina and jam.
• Val Fox: Cheese and onion slice and melting moment biscuits.
• Richard Ryden: Treacle pudding and custard on Fridays in the 1950s. It was to die for and we kept going back for seconds.
• Toni Lilley: Semolina and a blob of jam.
• Fiona Deans: Rice pudding and asking for extra skin because that’s the best bit.
• Jan Rowe-Blackman : Sponge pudding with different colour custard.
• Tara Barnett: Chips, peas and gravy every day for five years.
• Ben Keogh: The best thing about school dinners was the jelly.
• Lynne Fewster: Junior school was Manchester tart and high school was fresh chocolate brownies and their fresh cheese quiche.
• Dave Hunt: Jam roly poly with pink custard.
• Ann Skovgaard: Cheese pie, mash n baked beans. Loved it as a kid – heaven even now.
• Nicola Priest: Being forced to eat semolina and hiding cheese pie in my blazer pocket.
• Nickkie J Robinson: Chocolate concrete and pink custard.
• Chris Poller: Turkey twizzlers and past king.
• Ian Moreland: Helping to do the dishes to get an extra pudding!
• Karl Loftus: Butterscotch angel delight.
• Janet Owens: Roast dinners and fish and chips on a Friday.
• Nikki Williams: Chips, cheese and gravy with loads of salt and vinegar. Pudding had to be chocolate cake and mint custard or school tray bake with pink custard.
• Alison Oldknow: Manchester tart. Steak pie – a corner piece – and a hot glass of coffee as a special treat.
• Nicola Davies: Chocolate cake with peppermint custard.
• Vicky Britch: Double chips and gravy.
• Christine Jones: Corned beef, mash and beetroot.
• Steve Maddox: Liver and onions.