School dinners always smelling of boiled cabbage

The obligation for all schools to have that smell of boiled cabbage pervade its corridors from about mid-morning until mid-afternoon no matter what’s cooking is today not enforced as rigourously as it once was, and according to a statement from the relevant regulatory body (OFFPONG) ‘schools are not trying hard enough’.  It was originally stipulated by the 1944 Education Act and where it still exists it might even be the same cabbage, but its gradual disappearance is taken by critics  as another indication of falling educational standards.  They complain that school dinners have improved considerably mainly due to alternatives being made available by concerned mothers passing them through the playground railings during break. The important thing about school dinners today is that they are there not necessarily to be eaten but to ‘send out the right message’ with regard to nutrition. They recommend the reintroduction of  the ‘grab-a-platter- and-watch-it-splatter’ school of institutional  catering. ( While they are about it they are thinking of introducing Alphabet Soup as a means of raising literacy standards which some say have been in decline ever since they turned he ‘R’ round at ‘Toys “Я” Us’ .)

Even  so they still congratulate school catering staffs on doing a wonderful job against the odds on what’s left of the budget after kitting out the dinner ladies in natty straw trilbys  . It has also been pointed out that in fact all food smells of cabbage at some stage of its decomposition on the same principle as ‘ All dustbins smelling the same whatever you put in them’ (q.v)  

(Fawn Purejoy , Northampton) - QQ***