At KAXE we love hearing your stories. This week, with school back in full swing, we are wondering about your school cafeteria. What was your favorite school lunch? Or the worst?
Here's what we heard:
We heard from Mary in Bemidji: "I went to two different high schools. The first one had great fresh Mexican food, thanks to all the great Mexican women that worked in the kitchen. The second high school was across the country and the food was scary, especially the hot dogs, which were wrinkled and reminded us of severed fingers."
Wendy from Tower texted, "Honestly, my absolute favorite school lunch was pizza day, one can never forget the big rectangular pieces of cheese pizza." Many others agreed!
KAXE Producer Andrew Dziengel said, "I loved the hash brown patties our school would get. My love for them was so well known that other students would give me theirs. I think I had 12 patties for one lunch."
Listener Mike commented, "At my school in St. Paul in the late 1960s, they sold cereal bowl-sized portions of mashed potatoes and gravy. It was like heaven to a teenager. And it only cost a dime!"
Dawn in Baxter texted us, "A school lunch memory of mine is always having to sniff the open milk carton before drinking it to make sure it wasn't spoiled."
Another listener said, "I attended the Shevlin Elementary School, where we had great cooks and good food. My favorite dessert was "prune whip," a mixture of sweetened cooked prunes and whipped cream. The dessert that gave me the shudders was 'fig sauce,' a large fig sitting in a pool of sugary syrup... Ugh, even the memory of it makes me shudder."
Therese from Bemidji texted, "When our kids were going to school the cafeteria ladies creatively called the breaded fish they served 'sea wonders' but the students weren't very excited about them because they said you 'see them and wonder' what they are!"
"My favorite dessert was "prune whip," a mixture of sweetened cooked prunes and whipped cream."Shevlin, Minnesota listener
Other listeners mentioned the homemade things their school cooks made, like doughnuts, cherry cobbler and cookies. Yum!
KAXE News Director Chelsey Perkins remembered a cook at Pequot Lakes named Mary Etta.
"She used to give birthday spankings in front of the whole cafeteria with a giant wooden spoon," Perkins said. "Thinking that probably wouldn't fly these days!"
And speaking of things that wouldn't fly, we heard from Misty, who said, "My favorite school cafeteria memory is the food fight in ninth grade. A kid stood up, yelled 'food fight!!!' The long lunch tables were tipped on their sides and used as barricades. They took away our school dance that year as a punishment. So worth it!"
What was the best and/or worst thing about your school cafeteria? Let us know!
