A former school worker has shared a week’s worth of their school dinners and it left everyone saying the same thing. School dinners are typically regulated but still feature an array of quintessentially British dishes and favourites like bangers and mash, roast dinners, fish and chips, shepherd’s pie and more. 

There’s also usually desserts like cake, custard, apple crumble, jam roly-poly and other sweet treats like flapjacks or brownies. Schools have to ensure they’re providing necessary amounts of vegetables, carbohydrates and protein with recent meals expanding to offer curries, chillis and pizza though retro favourites do tend to make an appearance.

One man, who previously worked in a school for over a year, enjoyed the daily school dinner and took to Reddit to share a carousel of images featuring his meals over eight school days.

Among the dishes were fish, chips and peas with gravy; chilli, rice, potatoes, and garlic bread; another portion of fish, chips and gravy but this time with mushy peas; chips, peas, pigs-in-blankets and a large breaded item; yet another portion of fish, chips, peas and gravy; sausages, mash, carrots and broccoli; curry, rice and chips; and finally, a roast dinner.  

In the caption accompanying the photos, he penned: “I worked at a school. Selection of school dinners over 8 school days.”

The man, 36, is 6ft 4” and was appreciative of the large portions and nostalgia on offer each mealtime. 

In the comment section, he said: “I worked there for over a year and apart from the once in a blue moon curry days, they had gravy every dinner time.

“And it was f***ing great. I'm 36 though so the school dinner gravy was nostalgic as f***.”

In the comments section, fellow Reddit users couldn’t get over the amount of times chips were on offer. 

One person shared: “I was a catering manager for a school and I wasn’t allowed to serve chips more than two times a week. Even though there were a lot of junk snacks, the meals were always nutritious.”

The man replied: “They had a system which would track the kids’ intake with a school pass. As an adult they would serve me anything I wanted.”

The former catering manager replied: “Ah, so this isn’t so much ‘the selection of school dinners’ (implying the whole options on display) as it is ‘your selection of school dinners’. So the school’s offering may not be as bad as your choices.”

Warning: some strong language, viewer discretion is advised

The man confirmed: “Correct! Although from the point of view of a kid, from what I saw, their plate was not much different to mine even with dietary restrictions in place.

“I say they had options, but it was mostly just different forms of the same s***.”

Someone else said: “I don’t get this rule about chips. My niece’s school can have them once a week, and they’re oven baked chips. 

“But there is calorie laden pizza covered in cheese available every day, which has a lot more fat/calories than a portion of oven chips”. 

Another Reddit user said: “The canteen at the school I work in only serves chips once a week I think, but other than that it's still almost entirely beige.”

And another commented: “It was no more than once every two weeks in my school.”

Someone else added: “It looks good but so unhealthy! Look what they serve kids in school in France, Italy, Spain, Korea and Japan!”

Others pointed out how much gravy was on offer. The man said he often felt very tired after eating his meal and shared: “I do remember joking that they must be putting something in the gravy because I’ve never really felt as lethargic after any meal other than the school dinners.”