False Advertising

I was kinda looking forward to this meal, because the menu said the main dish was going to be "potatoes and cheese."

Unfortunately, there were also some (disgusting) wieners in there, along with a stomach-busting sauce, so all I did was pick out the potatoes and pass the rest on to HVC.

I ate the entire salad, although that, too, threw me for a loop, since the menu said we'd be having "fruit salad," not "fruit mixed in with salad."

The bread was fine, and the mini pack of "almond" (butter? jam? spread?) gave it some extra flavor, although I could have used about three more packs of it.

I even gave away my "ice milk mousse," since I knew it wasn't that good, it wasn't the kind of mousse I was expecting, and the kids always love it when you give them an extra dessert.

Lunch Lady: Next time, stick to the menu!

Total points: 4

(Note: I will be out of town until August 4. Stay tuned and stay hungry!)

Tangy Fishy

I think this is a recording.

We had fried fish today.

Yet again.

For the umpteenth time.

At least I like fish, which is one reason why I had seconds. The other reason: I was hungry.

I also have to say that, although I'm not a fan of miso soup, the ginger miso sauce gave the fish a nice tangy flavor.

The salad had no such pizzazz, however, but I did manage to eat it, unlike the soup, which just wasn't very appetizing.

Don't get me wrong: The soup wasn't bad, but it was greatly lacking in "Bam!"

Total points: 5

Let's Re-Name This Meal "Salad"

They might as well have called this meal "salad," because that's all I ate.

Well, to tell the truth, I did nibble at the tofu before giving away that main dish to you-know-who.

HVC wasn't interested in the soup, however, so I just dumped it.

(If HVC won't eat it, you know it must be bad!)

Thanks a lot, Lunch Lady...

Total points: 2

I Like This Tradition

This meal was a pleasant surprise.

I didn't read the menu carefully and thought we were having just another (generally not very good) "traditional" meal like what we have about two or three times a month.

Lucky for me, this "traditional" meal turned out to be curry!

I've said it before and I'll say it again:

You just can't go wrong with curry.

The salad would have been practically perfect, too, were it not for the you-know-what, but I ate it all, anyway. I especially liked the cheese in the salad, which we only get about once a month.

(I swear I wish we had a salad bar where we could choose what to put on our salads instead of getting stuck with ham, ham, and more ham.)

And check out the bottom right-hand corner: Fruit for dessert! Hurray for that!

I didn't have seconds of the curry, but I did grab a second pack of sliced apricot. The fruit wasn't as sweet as I would have liked it, but I can't really complain!

Total points: 7

The Lunch Lady Drops The Ball

This is the meal that they served just two hours before the mini-triathlon.

That bowl of spicy whatever plus tofu had "danger" written all over it.

Think: Exploding stomach.

Good thing HVC came to the rescue.

I didn't want any part of that salad, either, since it just didn't do the trick for me.

(HVC had an absolute Field Day today!)

All I wanted was something light and easy on my stomach, so the only part of this meal that I ate was the noodles. They had absolutely no flavor, however, so I didn't even finish them.

Luckily, however, I didn't count on the food staff to meet my nutritional needs before the race. That's why I brought my own "calories" to school and was all set.

Today was the perfect opportunity for the Lunch Lady to bust out a special pre-race meal for the students (even though the only ones participating are the juniors), but she dropped the ball.

That comes as no surprise, however, since the Lunch Lady has never impressed me with her (lack of) creativity...

Lunch Lady, if you're reading this, here are some suggestions:

Hamburgers and hot dogs on the 4th of July

Pumpkin soup on Halloween

Turkey sandwiches on Thanksgiving

Heart-shaped cookies on Valentine's Day

Spaghetti for lunch before the mini-triathlon

Get with the program a little, please! The kids would absolutely love it!

P.S. Remember what I said about "exploding stomach" above? Well, check this out: After crossing the finish line, the third-place finisher took about two steps, bent over, and up-chucked his lunch, tofu and all. Yuck!

Total points: 2

Ham? No, Ma'am!

There it is again, the omnipresent ham in the salad.

Pass.

Oh, and look what's in our soup: Gobou, or rather, yesterday's leftover gobou.

Pass.

What's left?

Cabbage, luckily covered with (my favorite) sesame dressing, and a pice of deep-fried fish.

The fish really wasn't all that bad, but just look at it. It looks pretty "dead" to me. That's not exactly the most appetizing way to serve food, is it?

Total points: 4

Sloppy Chicken

This meal was a first for me.

That main dish looks like a right mess, and it certainly was.

I used my chopsticks to eat the potatoes, but I ditched them when I got to the boiled chicken and simply grabbed the mini drumsticks with my hands.

I wish the chicken had been easier to eat, but at least it wasn't bad. I even went and got seconds, but I asked for potatoes only.

The only part of the soup I ate was those two fish balls (or whatever the heck they were). The rest of it, the gobou (burdock root), just wasn't appealing.

I did finish the salad, but it wasn't a winner.

Total points: 6

Word Of The Day: Ridiculous

Today was yet another "Hungry Meal."

There was one big difference between today's Hungry Meal and every other Hungry Meal that we've had until now, however: They ran out of rice today.

Yessiree, Bob... You heard me right: They ran out of rice.

Believe it or not, this is at least(!) the second time this has happened. Since I generally pass on the rice, however, I normally wouldn't care if there were no rice.

The main component of today's main dish, however, was just that: Rice.

To finish off the main dish, you then take the side dish, wish is a sort of soup, I guess you could say, and pour it over your rice.

Since there was no rice, though, my side dish today was my main dish. Gee, thanks.

Actually, in all fairness, the food servers eventually busted out instant (microwavable) rice. The problem is, by the time they served that, it was already 12:50! By then, I had already had two bowls of "soup" for lunch and was in no mood for rice.

I don't really like purple grapes that much, either, so today's dessert wasn't that appealing to me. (I gave away half of my grapes.)

I still can't believe it's possible for the food servers to run out of rice. I mean, they pretty much make rice three times a day, day after day after day after day after day. You'd think they'd have gotten the hang of it by now.

Oh, and you should have seen how they were serving the microwaved rice. They served it in a bowl, but gave the poor few students and teachers who had to wait (forever) an extra bowl to eat it in.

Say what? Thanks for creating even more waste. That's just what we need.

I was joking with the students that they were supposed to take the second bowl, turn it over, place it on top of the other bowl, and shake up the rice and "soup" like a cocktail. Too bad that wouldn't work...

Oh, and yeah, what's up with the "endless" grapes? I mean, again, this meal is supposed to teach the students to appreciate food, yet they can pretty much feast on grapes.

Talk about sending mixed messages...

Total points: 2

(Note: Monday is a holiday, so the next post won't appear until Tuesday.)

The Barbarian Strikes Again

As you probably know by now, I'm not much of a fan of fried food, but I did eat today's (barbarian) chicken (most recently seen on June 20. I didn't eat the excuse for tartar sauce, though (I found a willing taker), and I wasn't happy about the fact that there were only a few drops of dressing left for me to "enjoy." Thanks so much!

The salad was OK, and I even purposely grabbed a bowl that had a piece of squid in it.

The soup was OK, too, which means I ate just about everything on my plate.

If the chicken had just been grilled instead of fried, this meal would have been much better.

Total points: 5

Yuck, Yuck, And More Yuck

The soup? Yuck. (I nibbled at it)

The salad? Yuck. (I passed.)

The main dish? More Yuck. (I nibbled at it.)

The water? Delicious!

Basically, I had 6 cups of water for lunch.

Amazingly, here are today's numbers for Honda, aka The Human Vacuum Cleaner (par excellence):

Bowls of rice: 2

Bowls of soup: 2.5 (including mine)

Bowls of the main dish: 2.5 (including mine)

Bowls of salad: 5 (Yes, that's right, five!)

The kid is amazing.

Total points: 1

Quail Eggs? In Soup? Say What?

Today's meal wasn't fun. How's that for a description?

Problem #1 was the fact that, as usual(!), there wasn't any sesame dressing left by the time I got my food. I did make a feeble attempt to cover the cabbage with the sauce that came with the fish, but, well, yeah, it was a feeble attempt.


That's why I gave away almost all of my cabbage.

Problem #2 was the fact that there were quail eggs in my soup. Quail eggs are bad enough when they are mixed in with the main dish, but this is the first time I can recall seeing them in soup. What is going on here? There's also ham in there. Ugh.

Guess what I did with my soup? Yup. I gave it away.

The salad wasn't bad, but that's the most I can say about it.

The fish was OK.

As you can imagine, I was left rather dissatisfied with my meal.

Total points: 4

A "Naan" Entity

If you're really good, you've already figured out what was so "special" about today's meal.

Hint: Why is that milk carton in the upper right-hand corner of the frame?

Answer: Because the table I was sitting at was really crowded.

Why? Because today we had a "Family Meal."

I probably should have just moved it out of the frame, but I had no idea whose milk it was and I didn't feel like asking.

Anyway, today's curry wasn't quite as satisfying as curry usually is. I think that's because it's normally served over rice, which gives it some bite.

The reason we weren't served rice is, of course, that we were served a piece of naan instead.

I really like naan, but this naan wasn't oven baked, so it wasn't anything special, unfortunately.

For a few seconds, I thought about getting seconds, but the food just wasn't shouting out "Yummy! Yummy! Yummy!" so I passed.

As for the salad, well, I don't like mayonnaise very much, so I gave it away without touching it.

I wasn't wild about the soup, but I did finish that.

This one certainly could have been better.

Oh... and Lunch Lady... You forgot to give us our dessert! Criminy!

Total points: 5

If It Works Once, Why Not Do It Twice?

Lookie here.

If you think something is missing again, you're right.

The soup and the main dish were especially disgusting (yes, disgusting!), so I passed on both and just stuck to the rice.

Lucky for me, this was another day when we had a kind of special rice (in this case called sansaiokowa or 山菜おこわ), so I was at least able to eat something.

We had frozen fruit for dessert, too. I chose the peach slice over the pear slice, but after finishing my meal (I had seconds of rice!), I went and got a slice of pear, too.

For the second day in a row, my meal consisted of rice and dessert.

Go figure.

Total points: 6 (If it wasn't for the rice and dessert, this really would have been a zero!)

Rice and Dessert: What A Meal!

If you know a lot about Japanese culture, you can probably figure out the date of this meal just by looking at the dessert.

Yes, that's right, it's July 7, or tanabata.

Too bad the stars didn't really align too well for this meal, however...

I took one taste of the soup before giving it away.

I nibbled at the other bowl of food before giving that away, too.

Luckily, the rice saved the day, since it wasn't plain and therefore rather tasty.

The dessert, which was a mandarin orange slice covered with clear gelatin, was also pretty good.

Once again, once I rid my tray of the non-appetizing food, I was left with a half-decent meal.

Total points: 6

Salad? What salad?

This meal was actually pretty good, but there's something missing.

Let me re-phrase that: This meal was actually pretty good, because there's something missing.

Can you tell what that would be?

Let me tell you: The salad.

You see, as soon as I grabbed the salad, I knew that I had made a mistake.

That's why I almost immediately gave it to the school nurse, who happened to be in line right behind me.

I did ask her if she wanted it, but I plopped it down on her tray before she had time to reply. Since she didn't put up a fight, I figured she either agreed to take it or somehow didn't notice my sleight of hand.

What else is funny is that the nurse seemed highly concerned with the fact that I put my bread (that oversized hamburger bun) directly on my tray rather than using (i.e., wasting) a plate for the same purpose. I told her I didn't use a plate because that was a waste, but her reaction indicated to me that she did not agree. That's really a shame, but I'm used that nonchalant attitude toward waste around here.

Anyway, like I said, minus the salad, this turned out to be a good meal.

I did get something strange in my pumpkin soup that tasted a bit like mochi, but I think it was actually a clump of powder or something similar to that. At least that's what some kids seemed to say it was.

For the most part, though, the bread and soup combo was pretty tasty, and I even had seconds.

By the way, there's one more thing missing: the dessert. It's missing because I didn't even notice that it was being served. No worries, though, since it has to be one of the world's worst desserts, also known as "zeri" (which is kind of like Jell-O, but much, much worse).

Total points: 6

Cold Fish

This was yet another pretty bad meal.

I'm not a big fan of miso soup, which is served with far too many meals, so I didn't touch it. I just didn't see the point.

The salad was just okay, for the usual reason: It contained tuna rather than ham so it was edible.

Oh, and it didn't contain any other yucky stuff.

About all I can say about the fish, too, was that it was edible. I gave away the daikon (that white stuff) but ate the bland, cold fish.

There's really nothing more to say about this meal.

Total points: 3

Satisfaction? Not Necessarily

Today's meal was "niku jagga," which basically means meat (niku) and potatoes (jagga).

Whenever we have niku jagga, I always ask someone, "Who's the lead singer for the Rolling Stones?" Most of them don't know the answer, but occasionally someone does.

The answer of course, is Mick Jagger.

Get it?

As the server was dishing up my "Mick Jagger," I whispered to myself, "Give me a lot of potatoes, please." It worked. Kind of.

Anyway, the potatoes were fine, but as usual for this dish, the meat was "stringy." I did have seconds, though, since I was pretty hungry.

Before I had the main dish, I ate the okra. I was surprised that it was served cold. I wasn't surprised that it seemed to be lacking in flavor.

As for the soup, well, a couple of girls I was sitting with started talking about the mochi that was in it and what color it was and all that jazz. The one girl seemed to be especially interested in them rice cakes. Since I wasn't, I offered her mine. Before she could get them out of my bowl, however, I told her she could have the whole thing. That took her a while to understand, but she finally got it. That was one less bowl that I had to worry about.

What this meal desperately needed was some background music (by the Stones, of course) to spice it up!

Total points: 5

Even Fish With Odd Sauce

Today, for some reason, we had fried fish yet again (on a Friday). This particular fried fish was much better than the usual fried fish, however. It had some really nice flavor, even though I can't quite put my finger on what it was.

If they had to do this fish all over again, I'd suggest they get rid of the slices of baby bamboo and replace it with something else like pineapple, perhaps. The sauce they chose looks like it's totally out of place on the fish, but it didn't ruin it, luckily.

I liked the fish so much that I decided to get seconds (after I finished my serving) as soon as I took my first bite. I hate to admit it, but the fish was delicious!

I certainly can't say the same about the salad, but I did finish that.

The soup, too, was just okay, and was an obvious repeat of yesterday's soup, except that the pork (which was barely there) was replaced by chicken (which was barely there).

Anyway, that's two meals in a row that I finished without any help.

That must be a record!

Total points: 7